Handwritten Recipes and Delicious Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ever since I was a little girl, I loved it when mom would let us "help" her bake. I grew up believing that every recipe should have a name in front of it, like "Trudy's Gingersnap Cookies" or "Grandmère Evelyn's Bread".

(mom's chocolate chip cookie recipe she handwrote for me a few years back. I can't bring myself to copy it over anywhere.... so it's faded and food smudged. I love it)

Mom never baked or cooked from a cookbook. Nope, she had her own little black book of recipes, bought in the early years of her marriage. I love this book, it's filled with recipes handwritten by my mom. To this day, I feel like recipes are only "legit" if they have a name and are handwritten somewhere.

My mom is a fabulous baker and cook. That said... I happen to also kick butt at baking. Oh, I don't do it as often as she did while we were growing up, but that's just because Andrew and I usually devour an entire batch, cake, pie in two or three days flat.

One of the recipes I have tweaked (and have to say *might* result in better cookies than my mom's-GASP I know!) is her chocolate chip cookie recipe.

Mom uses shortening (I use real butter), light brown sugar (I use dark sugar), 1 tsp of of baking soda (I use .5), 3 cups of flour (I use 2.5~2.75) and she bakes her cookies at 350 (I bake at 325).

In solidarity of sharing recipes, I thought I would share my mom's (adjusted) chocolate chip cookie recipe :) It's not healthy, and I've noted the planet friendly changes you could make, but they sure are delicious!

Lisa's Mom's Chocolate Chip Cookies
(Makes about 3.5 dozen cookies)
Preheat oven at 325F

• 1 1/3 cup of butter (salted)
• 2 eggs (free range/local)
• 1 tsp of vanilla
• 1 cup white sugar (fair trade)
• 1 cup dark brown sugar packed (fair trade)

Cut butter in cubes, place in glass bowl and soften in microwave (approx 30 secs). In large bowl add butter and sugar: cream together. Add eggs and vanilla.

(Using the butter wrapper, or a stick of cold butter, grease the pans. Spray grease is gross and has added chemicals!)

Once this is mixed well, add the following:

• 2.5 to 2.75 cups of all purpose flour
• 0.5 tsp of baking soda

Using a wooden spoon, mix together. Go with less flour first (I typically start with 2 cups, mix and then add until the dough separates from the sides of the bowl. Your local humidity of where you live will affect this, so trust your gut over the actual amount of flour).

• Add the ENTIRE BAG of semi-sweet chocolate chips (fair trade, organic).

Mix together with a wooden spoon.
Using a teaspoon, scoop out enough to make a cookie the size of a golf ball and roll it in the palm of your hand. Place them 3 in a row, 4 rows per pan leaving 2 inches between (trust me, they will spread).

Bake them between 10-14 minutes. Now, the trick is to set your timer for the minimum time (always with cookies) and to check them, adding 1-2 minutes afterwards. Each oven is different, so always use your instincts! I bake *these* cookies until I see that there are good brown edges all around so they are crispy AND gooey.

If you take them out and think, "Darn too early!", just leave them on the pan (over a burner) for a few minutes, the heat from the pan will continue baking them.

If they are perfection- wait a few minutes and remove to a baking rack to cool.

Enjoy!

(please don't copy this post, and the images, and share them on facebook like the current trend with recipes. It's stealing and not cool. Instead, I would it if you shared the link to my blog post directly- THAT is très cool- merci!)