The Best Chocolate Chip Cookies

Last I checked, nobody can really say that they 'don't like chocolate chip cookies'. Maybe some people can say...well, they are not my favorite cookies, but really now, who can resist these buttery, all American, heaven-on-earth morsels?



But not every recipe results in the best chocolate chip cookies. I think you would agree. Some recipes result in cake-like cookies, and some are too crispy, or plain unpalatable. We have made some of those ourselves, and have eaten far too many to know why we even bothered.



Besides the fact that these are the best chocolate chip cookies that I have ever made, I really like it that the recipe asks for melted butter, and not room temperature butter. I lack patience, and sometimes planning... So to have the butter to ready for the room-temp baking process can be tough. To be able to melt the butter and add to the recipe, and have the best cookies in less than 30 minutes? Brilliant.


Chocolate Chip Cookies
Recipe from Gooey Chewy Crispy Crunchy

Ingredients:

2 1/4 cups unbleached all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 lb unsalted butter, melted and still warm
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar, lump free
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
2 cups chocolate chips


Equipment: 

2 cookie sheets, ungreased or lined with foil, dull side up

Combine the flour, baking soda and salt in a bowl and mix together thoroughly.

In a large bowl, combine the melted butter with the sugars, vanilla, and the eggs. Stir in the flour mixture just until all the dry ingredients are moistened. Stir in the chocolate chips. If possible, let the dough stand for 1-2 hours.

Preheat oven to 375ºF. Position racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven.

Scoop rounded tablespoons of dough and place them 3 inches apart on the ungreased or lined cookie sheets. Bake for 9-11 minutes or until the cookies are just lightly brown on the edges. Remove from the oven and let the cookies firm up on the pan for 1-2 minutes. Cool completely before storing or stacking. Can be kept in airtight containers for several days, but best eaten right away!

Making Sauerkraut

Between farmers markets and CSA shares, we recently ended up with three heads of cabbage in the kitchen. Cabbage is one of those cruciferous vegetables that is rather versatile, but you've got to plan a bit ahead of time (since most cabbages are rather large heads of tightly folded leaves). A commitment of sort, actually.



I find cabbages quite beautiful to look at and I am always amazed that one tiny seed can become a work of art with patterns and spirals and different shades of green and purple. The best thing about it is that after admiring it, and photographing it, one can eat and benefit from its multitude of nutrients! My kind of vegetable!



We had been dreaming about making our own sauerkraut for a while now, since our exposure to some amazing homemade sauerkraut back at our old farmers market in California. We asked what went into their classic plain kraut and were impressed that the answer was: cabbage and salt.



We went ahead, with a bit of guideline from here, and chopped up our three heads of cabbage. A little sea salt and resting time later, we packaged our first ever sauerkraut jars. They are now living (and growing probiotics) in our basement. Results are to be determined and tested in a couple of weeks. Now... if we can do this, kimchi can't be too far fetched!

Homemade Black Raspberry Sorbet

Remember these black jewels we picked in Michigan last week? Well, we had wanted to turn them into something cold and delicious, but did not have enough time while we were up there. So, we took them home, one state south, and yesterday was the day for sorbet-making.



One of the reasons that I married my husband is that if we were given a choice, we tend to go with the old-fashioned way for most things. Almost always. One day when I came home from running errands without the rest of the family, they all had giddiness about them. All three of them. Should we tell Mommy what we got? He said to the kids... We had just gotten the chooks, and the coop to go with them. We also acquired a wheel barrow for our little backyard farm. I was hoping that they had not set up a composting toilet without a little bit of consultation.



We got an ice cream maker!! Yelled the kids. The old-fashioned kind!! They added. Oh phew. I can live with that, I thought.

When it arrived, my husband might have as well been a kid on Christmas day. The three of them attempted at the most basic of all: vanilla ice cream. We had Snowville cream and milk on hand, and so, they cranked and cranked. And 30 minutes later, we tasted the labor of love. It was not half bad.

In fact, it was good. It was not quite Jeni's - good...yet. But it was better than store-bought for sure. They went on to making more flavors...and this last, hand-picked wild black raspberry sorbet. I think it's the best one yet!

This is the recipe they used, from our trusted magazine friend Saveur.

Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies

I read a few food blogs regularly. Most of the time, they are a welcome distraction to what I should be doing. I love the visually beautiful photos, the stories behind the dishes, or just the plain inspiration for tonight's dinner.



Occasionally, these different blogs will start to talk about the same thing. A hype perhaps, but you can just sense that whatever the subject matter they are talking about has caught the wild fire in the food blog world. For instance, the No-Knead Bread took off like a jet plane. And then there was this wholewheat chocolate chip cookie thing that I wanted to ignore. Why? Because the regular white nutrition-less flour chocolate chip cookies taste just fine. I didn't want to be deterred. I already bake bread with whole wheat flour. Our pizza dough also gets a good amount of the healthier stuff. No need to go that way for cookies, thank you.



Intrigued, I was. So I allowed the concept to stick around, an option to go that way if I wanted to someday. Sure enough, that day came when I had to bring a little something to a dessert potluck recently. I was going to make Molly's tried-and-true cake since I had some lemons around the house. To my surprise, I had no regular unbleached flour left! Not even one cup of it. What I found in the pantry was a bag full of whole wheat flour. That was not going to make Molly proud.

So instead of the cake, I remembered Molly's post about the said cookies. I had all the other ingredients for it, so that would have to be the dessert of choice.

It was easy enough.  Basically, instead of using the white flour, you substitute with whole wheat flour. The recipe asks for baking powder, which is also different, but perhaps it helps balance the (heavier) weight of the whole wheat flour.

Out of the oven, I asked the kids to be my tasters. As sincere as you would like to hear about anything you make from scratch, they sang unanimously: They are great, Mommy! They taste just like the real thing! 

Well, they are the real thing, my children. And perhaps they will now be our go-to recipe (when we don't have any white flour in the pantry).

Below is the recipe I used, from Molly's blog. She also got it from yet another source. See what I mean about the food blog wild fire?

Whole What Chocolate Chip Cookies

3 cups whole wheat flour
1 ½ tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 ½ tsp. kosher salt
2 sticks (8 oz.) unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch cubes
1 cup lightly packed dark brown sugar
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
8 oz. bittersweet chocolate, roughly chopped into ¼- and ½-inch pieces, or bittersweet chips

Position racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven, and preheat to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment. (If you have no parchment, you can butter the sheets.)

Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl, and whisk to blend.

Put the butter and sugars in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. With the mixer on low speed, mix just until the butter and sugars are blended, about 2 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a spatula. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the vanilla. Add the flour mixture to the bowl, and blend on low speed until the flour is just incorporated. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl. Add the chocolate, and mix on low speed until evenly combined. (If you have no stand mixer, you can do all of this with handheld electric beaters and/or a large, sturdy spoon.) Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl, and then use your hands to turn and gently massage the dough, making sure all the flour is absorbed.

Scoop mounds of dough about 3 tablespoons in size onto the baking sheets, leaving about 3 inches between each cookie. (I was able to fit about 8 cookies on each sheet, staggering them in three rows.)

Bake the cookies for 16 to 20 minutes, rotating the sheets halfway through, until the cookies are evenly browned. Transfer the cookies, still on parchment, to a rack to cool. Repeat with remaining dough.

These cookies are very good while still warm from the oven, but I find that you can taste the wheat more – in a good way – once they’ve cooled.

Yield: about 20 cookies

A winning dough recipe

I was weeding in the new garden when the phone rang. Balancing the phone between my ear and shoulder, I kept on working the soil. The lady on the other end was calling from Cooks Illustrated, a magazine for which I actually have high regards. So instead of politely declining without hearing the rest of the first sentence, I listened on.

The lady, for an unknown reason, wanted to send me two things: The Best of America's Test Kitchen magazine, and More Best Recipes Cookbook from the Test Kitchen. The former is complementary, and the latter is an optional purchase. I can have it (for a fee), or send it back (if I don't want it). Because they are coming from a source I trust, I accepted without much thought, hung up and kept weeding.

Weeks went by, and I completely forgot about this phone conversation until I found a large package outside the door one afternoon. The cookbook is a decent size tome, full of recipes, related helpful illustrations, and stories about each dish (just like in the Cooks Illustrated magazine).

I have been hesitating to go one way or the other about this cookbook. By nature, I am a horrible recipe follower, so another cookbook around here may just collect dust like the rest. But it takes an effort to send it back as well.

At any rate, tonight I wanted to make pizza since I was strangely inspired by the growing rustic arugula in the garden. I opened the new tome, and landed at Pissaladiere. I zoned into the dough making part as each time I make a pizza, I seem to go about it differently.

This one was nice and easy, so I went with it, and actually followed all the steps of the dough making part! The result? Brilliance. I might even stick to this one dough recipe from now on. And just because of this 1/10 of a page of success, I might just keep the book and pay for it.



Pizza Dough
2 cups all purpose flour, with extra for dusting the work surface
1 teaspoon instant or rapid-rise yeast
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 cup warm water (110 degrees)

Mix all the ingredients together (by hand, or food processor). Shape into a ball and let it rise. After about 1.5 hours, gather the dough, knead with a little extra flour, and divide into two balls. Flatten dough until desired thickness, and it is ready to become the base for your next best pizza! Bake at 500º for ~ 10 minutes or until brown and crispy.

Market Mushrooms

I love mushrooms. Too bad the rest of the family does not share this sentiment. But in some ways, more mushrooms for me!

The Clintonville Farmers Market (one of the best around here!) has a vendor who has an urban farm right there in Clintonville. And he grows these beautiful Shitake mushrooms... Oh, I think he already has a new loyal patron!

If you like mushrooms, too, I am sure you know that fresh mushrooms don't need a lot of fuss. The simpler, the better.



Today in the garden, we pulled up (to 'check') on our garlic patch growing underground since last fall. Knowing that we aren't supposed to harvest these until this fall, we felt a little guilty, but up came one small head of garlic anyway (mother and son has the same amount of patience...the former perhaps having less of it).



But we put it to good use. I diced up the fresh garlic, sauteed the mushrooms in it with some good olive oil. A sprinkle of sea salt and herbes de Provence and some chopped up parsley ended the dish. Voila, the most earthy, delicious mushrooms you will have in central Ohio!

The winning Chocolate Cake Recipe

Before the cake bake-off, I tried a few recipes for chocolate cake. I am not a natural baker, partly because I have a hard time following a recipe! I have a tendency to tweak it, substituting ingredients if I don't have exactly what the recipe asks for.

For this particular event, I wanted to make a flourless chocolate cake at first, which I tried to make, but it did not quite turn out as planned (I don't have an electric mixer, which may be part of the problem). So I started playing around with the three recipes, ending up with this one!

In all honestly, my husband's cake was really quite good. I can see if he can share his secrets (I think he made up his as well). For now, here goes:

Preheat oven 350F, and set out a 9" spring form baking pan.


Cake Ingredients:

1 cup sugar

4 eggs, separated

3/4 cup sifted self-rising flour (with salt already added)

8 oz semi-sweet dark chocolate, broken into small pieces

1 stick butter (1/2 cup)

½ cup coffee

Melt chocolate  and butter in a double boiler until all melted together.

Beat egg whites until firm, set aside.

Combine egg yolks, sugar and coffee. Mix well. Add the chocolate mixture, and then the flour.

Slowly and gently mix in the egg whites. Fold this into the batter until all mixed.

Line a 9" springform pan with parchment paper, and butter the pan well. Pour the cake batter into the pan. 

Bake at 350 F about 30 minutes or until cake tester comes out clean. Lather with chocolate frosting and decorate with fresh raspberries. Serve with homemade whipped cream or a little vanilla ice cream.

Ginny's Chocolate Frosting

2 Tablespoons cocoa powder

2 Tablespoons unsalted butter

2 Tablespoons sugar

2 Tablespoons coca cola or pepsi

1 cup confectioners sugar

Melt the butter with the cocoa powder, add sugar and coca cola. Bring to boil, and take it off the heat. Add confectioners sugar and whisk until smooth. Poor and spread over your chocolate cake,

Maple-Syrup Cranberry Relish

Three ingredients together can bring your Thanksgiving Turkey dinner to a whole different level.

I love cranberries. I love maple syrup. A little sprinkle of orange zest, and you are done!




Maple-syrup Cranberry Relish

3 cups fresh whole cranberries
1 cup grade B maple syrup
Grated zest from one whole navel orange

Rinse the cranberries well. Put in a sauce pan, and add the two other ingredients. Bring to boil, and simmer for 10-15 minutes until all the cranberries have popped. The relish will start to look jam-like. Have a taste, add more syrup if you would like it to be sweeter. Otherwise, enjoy with your turkey, and stuffing!

Easy Popovers

How can one not like popovers? Just the name alone sounds fun, and the real things are even more fun because we can actually eat them!

I used to have a popover tin (it feels like in my last life, maybe in Maine?). With all the moving around, who knows where it is now. I do hope that whoever has it is using it to make these easy and delicious and kid-friendly pastries.

I was re-inspired to make them recently after reading this post, on a cold November day (which quickly went away for about a week when we had our glorious Indian summer days). I had forgotten how easy and quick and fun making popovers was until I made it again with the kids.

"We love them Mommy! Thank you for making them Mommy!" They both said while biting into their warm, steamy popovers, with the hollow middle filled with Nutella (although... everything is good with Nutella).

We liked them so much we made them again the following day, with a little more butter in the batter this time.

Popovers
Adapted from this post, and a recipe in this book (because you know, I can't follow a single recipe to save my life)

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup milk
2 eggs
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
4 tablespoon melted butter

Preheat oven 425 degrees Fahrenheit.

Whisk eggs, milk, sugar together. Add flour and salt and melted butter and mix well. For best results, mix the batter with a hand-held electric mixer (if you have one, if not, a blender probably works well) until batter is smooth and lump-free.

Grease a muffin tin pan, or a popover tin pan, and fill each one half way with the batter. Should make about 6-10 popovers depending on the size of your pan.

Bake for 30 minutes or until popovers are all puffed and golden brown.

Serve immediately with plenty of options for filling: butter, jam, honey, or Nutella!

Post Halloween Blondies

I may not be excited about Halloween, but I won't ever say no to a piece of blondie!

What's a blondie? Well, think of it as a brownie that tastes a little like chocolate chip cookie! Now do you still question my love for blondies?

So, despite our efforts to get rid of as much Halloween candy as possible (by giving it away to others), we are still left with handfuls of stuff around here. This recipe is a good way of getting rid of some of that stuff! You can add any kind of chocolate covered candy you would like. Here, we used Kit Kat Bars and Twix (we don't like nuts in our cookies/ brownies, but don't tell Jim that!).

Post Halloween Blondies

Wet ingredients
1/2 cup melted butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg

Dry Ingredients
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup chopped up Halloween candy (we used Twix and Kit Kat bars here)
several small marshmallows on top for decoration

Preheat oven 375 degrees F.

In a bowl, mix wet ingredients together. In a separate bowl, mix the dry ingredients together before adding it to the wet ingredients. Add the chopped candy and mix well. Grease an 8x8 baking pan and fill with the batter, making sure to spread it evenly. Sprinkle marshmallows on top.

Bake for 30 minutes until golden brown. Remove from oven and let cool 10-15 minutes before cutting into squares. Served warm with a glass of milk or a cup of tea! Happy non-Halloween!

Cherry Tomato Jam

We are expecting some frost tonight...our first one, I believe. And yet, we still have so many cherry tomatoes that are trying to make it just one more day!

Our dear Claire was inspired in the garden yesterday. She wanted to can tomatoes... which we have done a lot of this season already, and there is not enough to can anymore. But those cherry tomatoes! Something must be done with them before they go to waste.

Tomato Jam. It just popped into my head just like that. Not that I had made it before... but why not? Can't be too hard right?

The little chef got it all together: the harvesting, the cleaning, the chopping, the stirring. I was just the sous-chef. The result: brilliant. It went very well with the Alaskan Cod I made (and did not plan to have tomato Jam on the side). It was just meant to be.

Claire's Cherry Tomato Jam

Two cups of ripe cherry tomatoes

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

a pinch of salt

Wash and slice cherry tomatoes into halves. Combine all ingredients and let simmer for about 15 minutes. Let cool, and serve!

Last Fresh Pesto!

For the first time in a while, we have our own basil plants that are prolific, delicious, and oh so fragrant!

It is going to be heart-breaking to see the first frost-bites on these little plants...so, I am not going to wait for that. Instead, I am going to harvest them before that dreadful day, turn them into pesto and freeze for a mid-winter's feast (or two or three or more!).

I generally don't measure my ingredients for pesto. It it by taste, and may vary from person to person (you may like more nuts and less cheese, more garlic or a miniscule amount). Here is a basic way we make ours at home:

Ingredients:

• Bunch of fresh basil leaves, washed and drained
• Handful of nuts (we like tamari almonds, or walnuts)
• One clove of garlic
• A good amount of grated Parmesan Cheese
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Salt and pepper
• A squeeze of lemon juice

I generally start with the nuts, cheese and garlic in the food processor, and mix that well. Then add a lot of olive oil so you get a consistency of a thick soup. Add the basil leaves next, then salt and pepper to taste, and squeeze in lemon juice at the end. You may need to add a bit more oil, or water works, too, if it is still too lumpy. Remember, taste as you go. You can tweak it with less or more of each ingredient, depending on your liking.

Freshly made pesto over a well-cooked (al dente) pasta is one of the most delicious dishes ever! Try it now before the season is over. Or like I said, make it, freeze it, and celebrate summer in the middle of January...because it will be summer somewhere in the world!