Cookie Monster

Chocolate Chip Cookies are sacred to me. I absolutely love them, and have sampled all different kinds, over and over. But truth be told, I have never found the right recipe to make them just the way I like them. Which is to say, flat and crisp, with a slightly chewy center. Sounds easy, right? Not so much, not for me anyway. I can't tell you how many batches of cookies I have made that are thick, cake-y and just not right. In fact, it's always been so disappointing to me that I pretty much stopped making them all together. Also, I do not like too many things in my chocolate chip cookies - nuts are fine sometimes, but I feel that with many of the bakery ones, there is way too much "stuff" crowded in there, and you can never taste the cookie.

Well, I was having a real craving for them the other night, so I pulled out my trusty Martha Stewart's Cookies book, and decided to try her recipe for "Thin and Crisp Chocolate Chip Cookies". They looked and sounded right, and I had this nice bag of Guittard chocolate chips just begging to be used, so once the butter softened, it was cookie time.

I am pleased to report that they were perfect! And now I know why - there is more butter and sugar and less flour than in a traditional chocolate chip cookie recipe, so it changes the consistency. Such a simple thing, but I am so glad to finally have a good recipe in my repertoire, that I just had to share.

One thing, if you make cookies, even just occasionally, it is well worth it to invest in a cookie scoop. Makes the cookies uniform size and with that nice professional looking roundness, and it's a lot less messy than using a spoon. This is my 1 T. size - I also have a 2 T. size that works for big cookies and cupcake batter. Those tools, a KitchenAid stand mixer, and parchment paper (or Silpat sheets), are a baker's best friends.

Thin & Crisp Chocolate Chip Cookies

• 2 1/4 C. all purpose flour
• 1/2 t. baking soda
• 1 1/4 C. (2 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 1/4 C. granulated sugar
• 3/4 C. packed light brown sugar
• 1 t. coarse salt
• 2 t. pure vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs
• 1/4 C. water
• 2 C. semisweet chocolate chips (about 12 oz.)

Preheat the oven to 350

Whisk flour and baking soda in a bowl

Put butter and both sugars in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment; mix on medium until pale and fluffy, about 3 min

Reduce speed to low. Add salt, vanilla, eggs, and water; mix until combined, about 1 min

Add flour mixture; mix until just combined

Stir in chocolate chips

Drop heaping tablespoon size balls of dough about 2 in apart on baking sheets lined with parchment paper

Bake cookies, rotating sheets halfway through, until golden brown, about 20-25 min

Let cool on baking sheets on wire racks 1-2 min

Transfer cookies to racks to cool completely

We Scream

I am beginning to feel like the Brenda Dickson of cooking. "Hello, and welcome to my home. Let's teleport into my closet!" Just as she was obsessed with herself, I feel obsessed with anything that I can learn to make that is beautiful and tastes good. Hence my new all-consuming hobby: ice cream.

Apparently, homemade ice cream is something that a lot of people grew up with. Even my husband has memories of turning the hand crank in his grandmother's back yard to churn some fresh peach ice cream for the evening meal. This would have been as foreign to my family as milking a cow - ice cream was something that you bought from the grocery store in a cardboard-covered rectangle (Neopolitan was a favorite), or if you were very lucky, from the local ice cream parlor. Baskin-Robbins was the cool kid on the block in those days, with its trendy flavors and coveted ice cream cakes.

Today, it's all about foodie flavors. Local, handmade, organic, and creative iced treats have become the sought-after cones of choice, blurring the lines between sweet and savory with flavors like Peppercorn, Olive Oil, and Strawberry Balsamic. In San Francisco, one of my favorite places is Humphry Slowcombe which features flavors as exotic as Foie Gras as as local as Blue Bottle Vietnamese Coffee. It's not only the coasts that are embracing this trend - places like Jeni's Ice Cream in Columbus, OH are churning out flavors like Cayenne and Goat Cheese and Roasted Red Cherries. With these kinds of flavors, you could skip the meal and go right to dessert!

I was lucky enough to find an unused gift card a couple of weeks ago, and used it to purchase the ice cream attachment for my KitchenAid stand mixer. To go with it, I bought "The Perfect Scoop" from frozen-treat master David Lebovitz, and it has been my Bible so far in learning to make my own ice cream.

I always like to start things from the ground up, so my first experiment was with vanilla ice cream. To start, it calls for some simple ingredients: whole milk, sugar, heavy cream, salt, a vanilla bean, eggs yolks, and vanilla extract. With that, I was off and running...