I’m not sure if there’s a cookie more “cookie” than the chocolate chip cookie. Sure, there are sugar cookies and snickerdoodles, peanut butter cookies and oatmeal scotchies … but there’s just something just so … just so quintessential about the chocolate chip cookie, it’s hard to put into mere words.
If you think you know everything there is to know about this simple delicacy, think again. I’ve done some extensive research and let’s just say my eyes were opened. I would now like to share some of my new found knowledge with you. Check out these impressive bullet points:
- I always assumed the chocolate chip cookie was so named, due to the fact that it is a cookie what contains the chocolate chips. Not so. Turns out it’s named after its creator, The Earl of Chocolate Chip Cookie. Apparently, the Earl was gambling one night and wanted a tasty dessert. He had a mighty hankerin’ for some M&Ms, in order that he might keep playing cards and not make a mess. Unfortunately, the popular candy-coated safety-bonbons would not be invented for another two hundred years. Undeterred, he asked his servants to bring him cocoa chunks baked into a biscuit, thus keeping his hand free of all mess, save a few crumbs. It was such a popular invention that people immediately named this creation after its inventor. This is why even today we call chocolate chip cookies, “Earls.”
- The modern chocolate chip cookie requires flour.
Don’t believe me about the flour thing? Check out this actual true story. A few weeks ago, my youngest daughter Rachel came home with a school project. The project was for her Skills for Living class and was simple: make a chocolate chip cookie and bring it to class for grading. This was an excellent project because I can’t think of a single skill more important than making chocolate chip cookies. And I don’t mean that in my usual sarcastic tone, either. Chocolate chip cookies are how you win friends and influence people.
Rachel loves mixing things together and applying heat to them, so this is one school project she wasn’t going to waste time on. She set to work right away on it and I left her to it, plopping myself down in front of the television to watch another riveting episode of iCarly.
Perhaps thirty minutes after the cookie project began, I began to enjoy the wonderful aroma of hot, fresh cookies. About two minutes after that, I began to sense something had gone terribly wrong. The smell of burnt sugar had now displaced the wonderful home-baked smell I enjoyed such a brief, brief time ago. I calmly walked to the kitchen, opened the oven door, and decided it was time to remove the first batch of cookies, although they still had at least eight minutes to go:
Those were the first five underdone cookies. The sixth “done” cookie was the one I scraped off the bottom of the oven:
“I think I did something wrong,” she declared. I agreed. So I started to walk down the recipe, checking off items like a NASA flight director looking for all systems go. When I got to “3 c. flour” she responded with, “Oops.” She accidentally used the 1/2 cup measure instead.
(Incidentally, we don’t have a one-cup dry measure any more. It disappeared mysteriously a few years ago. It was there one day and gone the next. For a while we figured it was “around here somewhere,” but I’m beginning to lose hope. I’m sure it went to the parallel universe containing all the mismatched socks.)
And the cookie project? Not to worry, though. We still had some percentage of the batter left and we could definitely add flour to it and still get an “A”. It was time to change the Skills for Living class into Math for Cooking.
First we had to see how much batter we used. So we scraped everything off the cookie sheet, put it on a plate, then weighed it.
As you can see, it was one big, sugary, chocolately mess. It was horrible. I think it took me at least twenty minutes to eat it. Our next step was to weigh the remaining batter. Once we had these two figures, we could easily calculate the ratio of used vs. unused batter, like so:
That was close enough to “half” for me. Knowing we were 1.5 cups short on the full batter, we were now 3/4ths cups short for the remaining recipe. A quick dump of flour, a few twirls of the batter, and presto! Good as new.
About a week later she came home and proudly announced, “I got one hundred on my cookie!” Unfortunately, I had to correct her. “You mean you got one hundred on your Earl.”
on March 10, 2009 at 1:14 am
I am SO glad you were able to help her and save the day. Cookies are just one of those things everyone needs to learn how to make 🙂
on March 10, 2009 at 4:12 am
Way to save the day Charlie! You are officially the King of Chocolate Chip cookies!
on March 10, 2009 at 4:42 am
Now I want cookies….THANKS!!!
Hallie
on March 10, 2009 at 5:44 am
Being an engineer, I fully appreciate the use of the Casio Scientific Calculator in the baking of chocolate chip cookies.
on March 10, 2009 at 6:12 am
I learn so much here.
on March 10, 2009 at 6:41 am
Ah yes, the Earl of Sandwich’s far lesser known cousin. A story so few know…
on March 10, 2009 at 7:16 am
“It was horrible. I think it took me at least twenty minutes to eat it.”
I almost spit my hot tea out of my mouth while reading that. 🙂
on March 10, 2009 at 7:42 am
Anne beat me to that comment, but I had the same reaction! Love your droll wit, Charlie!
on March 10, 2009 at 8:16 am
Okay, never in a million years would my math skills be able to help me figure out how much flour to add!
Glad it worked out! For what its worth, tell Rachel I have made muffins forgetting to add sugar and bread forgetting to add yeast!
on March 10, 2009 at 10:00 am
I feel cheated of a picture of the finished product! 🙁
Bravo for saving the day Charlie, even though we have no proof of that!
Tusc 😉
on March 10, 2009 at 12:16 pm
“It was horrible. I think it took me at least twenty minutes to eat it.”
SOOOO glad I wasn’t drinking anything when I read this. ROFL Glad you took photos, it was priceless.
Gotta say, you haven’t had the ultimate CC cookie until you’ve had the Dove Double Chocolate Chip cookie. Oh, heaven. I make ’em tiny so I can indulge in just one or two and not blow my calorie count. 😉 (They are available through Independent Chocolatiers.)
Path to Health
on March 10, 2009 at 2:35 pm
Hah! This made me chuckle.
Good save, Charlie! (Both in “rescuing” the first batch and figuring out how the flour to add.)
on March 10, 2009 at 2:36 pm
I would have happily joined you in eating the mistake. LOVE cookie dough (although mine usually does contain flour).
on March 10, 2009 at 8:48 pm
Hm. Are you sure that I wasn’t in the kitchen when you tried to make these cookies? I tend to have that kind of effect. The one of turning any cooking into, well, not quite what it’s supposed to be!
Looks like a fun adventure though! HEART cookies. Nom nom nom.
on March 11, 2009 at 9:49 am
A split second before I got to this sentence– ‘It was horrible. I think it took me at least twenty minutes to eat it,’– I was thinking, well, I hope he ate that stuff. Chocolate chip cookie dough before the flour is added is the best part!
Good job, Charlie!
on March 12, 2009 at 1:50 pm
I loved this post! And how you saved the chocolate chip cookies. Never again will I say that flour is overrated.
on March 15, 2009 at 11:38 pm
Wow. I totally thought I was the only freak who actually used ratios of food to figure things out.
on August 4, 2009 at 7:07 am
your cookie`s are very nice to me i love ti that is my food to go to school every day in the morning.thank you for that given to me.
onehting to say it to use can i hve onehunthered hahahaha that fun to me okay then i have to go now that it all i want to say to use all just take care of your self and your friend with you and your fmilys.