I’ve said so many times that I need to get into cooking more often. Especially now, I don’t have an excuse not to. I’m home all the time. I don’t have much to do. Yes, it’s not super easy to get all the ingredients I might need, but that’s not that big of an issue. I should be cooking more often for both my physical and financial health.
I’m slowly getting better at doing that. I’m not great, but I’m trying. I’m not cooking every day or every meal, but I’m cooking more often than before. I still don’t love that I don’t have people to cook for. I’m trying to remember to either cut recipes in half or to freeze portions since I don’t want days of leftovers. But I still get more joy out of cooking when I know someone else will be enjoying it.
Fortunately, this week I had an opportunity to make something for others to enjoy. I got to see my family yesterday (after another full 2-week quarantine) and I’ll write more about that next week. We were going to have dinner together, and I asked my mom if there was anything I could make or help with. She didn’t need my help, but I offered to make something for dessert. Since she didn’t have a dessert planned, she said I could make something. So I decided to make Bon Appetit’s Best Chocolate Chip Cookies.
I know there is a lot of controversy with Bon Appetit right now, but this recipe was something I saved a while ago and really wanted to try. I don’t plan on seeking out any recipes from their site until their diversity is improved and pay discrimination is fixed. So this was a one-off until things are better for their employees.
I don’t bake that often, and I bake from scratch even less often. I have a few go-to desserts I know how to make, and I think only 2 of them are from scratch. The others are either box mixes that I like or box mixes that I modify into something different. Baking from scratch isn’t hard, it’s just not something I do. And I rarely bake just for me because I don’t want to have a ton of desserts in my house. But seeing my family gave me the perfect excuse to try this recipe.
I only had 1 small fail while making it. I sometimes do brown butter in the microwave, but this microwave is still new to me. So the butter exploded/popped and got all over the inside. I cleaned that up and then had enough butter to do it over, but this time I used my stove instead. Brown butter seems to make everything delicious, so I was happy it was in this recipe. It also made the combination of butter and sugar easier to mix. I didn’t need to use a hand mixer or wish I had a stand mixer. I was able to use a whisk and get it perfectly smooth.
The only other fail I might have had was in either rest time or oven temperature. I do have a thermometer I put in my oven to make sure it’s accurate. I thought it said the right temperature, but I’m not sure now. And the recipe mentions letting the dough rest if you feel like it needs it. I didn’t think I did, but after baking them I’m questioning it.
These cookies spread out so much when I baked them. I only put 6 on a full-sized baking sheet, and they still were touching! I know this isn’t the biggest problem when making cookies and I actually think it worked, but still. I tried one after they cooled down and they were really good! The edges were crisp and the center was gooey. I do wish I added more chocolate chips, but I was trying to follow the recipe perfectly and didn’t want to adjust anything. But when I make these again (because I know I will be making them again), I’ll just remember to add more.
I was proud that I made something new from scratch and that it wasn’t a failure like it could have been. And knowing that they were going to be enjoyed by my family made it so much better. I might have to find other things I can bake and drop off to my friends so I can test out more recipes and then not have to have a ton of leftovers in my house.
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