I have a sin to confess!
I have NEVER EVER baked chocolate chip cookies before!
Yep, that’s right!
Not that I don’t like them, I LOVE THEM! But in my country they are not popular and I thought of them as something extremely hard to make.
Since I got this AMAZING book ( “The Dessert Bible” by Christopher Kimbal) for my birthday though, I decided I will give it a try, and guess what!
THEY ARE PURELY G-E-N-I-U-S!!!

The recipe that’s in the book claims to be the fruit of a long and thorough research and testing ( more than 50 variations) and I have to tell you, I believe it! This is not just any cookie, that’s the BEST CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIE I’ve ever tried and believe me, I’ve tried a lot! 🙂 Don’t be fooled that just because I didn’t bake them, I didn’t eat them! My weight scale can confirm that! 🙂

So, I just couldn’t but give you the recipe, because it’s a life-saving miracle for moms in this sugar-induced-coma season!
The recipe is for 20 large cookies ( I doubled that the first time, because I was sure that there wouldn’t be any left for me to test bake on different temperature).
We liked them so much that I had to make 6 rolls with cookie dough in a plastic wrap and put them in the freezer to store!
Basically, from one dose you can have 20 large ( 30 small) cookies or 3 plastic wrap rolls for storage.

Please, be sure to follow the EXACT instructions for best results!
Ingredients:
1/4 Cup Crisco
8 tablespoons ( 1 stick) unsalted butter, softened but still firm, I will tell you more about this later)
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
1 large egg white
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
10 ounces chocolate chips ( chunks are preferred over chips though)

Now the author explains wonderfully how you should find out if your butter is the right temperature – use a thermometer! 🙂 But if you don’t have one, you can take the butter out of the refrigerator and let it stay for 2 hours outside The author says it is enough time to reach the right temperature- 65F degrees.
There is a whole scientific explanation of the process about butter creaming( as pretty much about everything in this book, it’s just unbelievable!) but basically the butter stick has to be able to bend, but not to be soft.
Be sure to use wooden spoon to mix the batter, since the mixer is gonna turn it into soup.

1. Take out your butter at lest 2 hours before mixing the dough.
2. One hour before mixing, take the eggs out of the refrigerator too.
3. Preheat the oven to 375 F degrees.
4. Beat the Crisco and butter in a medium bowl until pretty smooth but with a few harder pieces( about 1 minute)
5. Add the sugars and stir until well blended.
6. Add the egg, egg white and vanilla and beat until smooth.
7. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt ( I have to tell you I didn’t do this, since I’ve always mixed the baking powder and salt with the batter before I add the flour and it worked for me)
8. Add the dry ingredients to the batter and mix together.
9. Add the chocolate chips and fold in ( it’s better with chocolate chunks, but if you don’t have, chips is OK.)

Line a large cookie sheet with parchment paper. In the original recipe the author says that if you want large cookies you have to place heaping tablespoons dough on the paper with 1 1/2 inches between the outer edges of the balls of dough. What I did was, I placed the dough on plastic wrap and rolled it in it. then I left it in the freezer to harden up a little bit and then cut in circular pieces.
In the original recipe the cooking time is 12 minutes or until tops are lightly browned ( and you have to rotate the pan front to back halfway trough baking). I found that 12 min baking and 1 min broiling works just fine for me, but all ovens are different so I recommend you do some testing on your and find out the best timing. I baked different batches, so I can see the difference in the timing and the way the cookies tasted afterwards.
DO NOT overcook!
They are going to be crispy and that’s not the point!
The good cookie is crunchy on the outside, chewy on the inside!
Remove the cookies from the baking sheet immediately. Let them to cool down.
If you cooked the cookies properly, they would stay chewy for at least 2 days!
Enjoy and don’t forget to check out the book!