Chewy Chocolate Cookies

We've all be there. We want to do our own thing, but our children are acting amazing and they asked to spend time with you. Yes, someday you will miss their constant need for attention, but this month is NaNoWriMo and I want to spend every free minute that I have writing. But when this girl asked if we could bake cookies and she had vacuumed the house, helped with laundry, and mostly picked up her room, I really couldn't say no.

Then she wanted to use the EasyBake Oven to bake cookies. Although these are childhood relics for many of us, the effort it takes me to get the pan exactly right far outweighs the effort of me sticking cookies on a cookie sheet and baking them for a few minutes. I said no to the EasyBake Oven. (If you enjoy cooking with your kid's EasyBake Oven, leave me a comment and let me know what you like about it). Next she wanted a bowl and a spoon so that we could make cookies the "old fashioned way." Her argument was, "I'm still learning about the past at school. I want to see how people made cookies a long time ago." Kid, go to your Nana's house and watch her use her hand mixer. As for me and my baking, the stand mixer works just fine and contains a little more of your mess. I did let her make the cookies from scratch and we experimented with a recipe I made up on the fly. I knew the basics, so I stood back and gave instructions, sometimes remembering the order of things and sometimes not. But all in all, the cookies turned out chewy, fudgy, and hard enough that they were able to be decorated (a step that I was surprised we were doing).

I started by lining the ingredients up on the stove and digging through a cupboard (one of many I can barely reach) for the measuring cups.

Tori jumped on adding the ingredients. Nothing was an exact science on Saturday, but she did most of the work. I had to guide her some - and for the most part, she listened. We started with 1 1/2 cups of flour. (She dumped it into the measuring cup before I could tell her to dump it right into the mixing bowl, but no harm done).

After the flour was poured into the stand mixer, we measured out 1/2 cup of sugar and 1/2 cup of brown sugar. (Being somewhat of a sugar addict, I might add another 1/2 cup of sugar next time). We also added 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 1 teaspoon baking soda, 1 egg, a stick of butter, and 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla. One egg wasn't enough to make a good dough, so we added two more.

We used a tablespoon scoop to place the cookies on the cookie sheet.

We baked the cookies for 6-9 minutes. Then we let them cool.

Then Tori wanted to decorate them. (She had found the cookie decorating supplies in the cabinet - oops!)

All in all, the time that we took to bake cookies was worth it. My daughter was excited to bake and equally as excited to make this video.

If you want to try our recipe for Chewy Chocolate Cookies, here it is.

Chewy Chocolate Cookies

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit

Ingredients:

1 1/2 c flour

1/2 c white sugar

1/2 c brown sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/3 c baking cocoa

1 stick butter

3 eggs

Mix the dry ingredients together. Add the butter and the eggs. Dough will be a little sticky, but shape into balls. Place on cookie sheet. Bake for 6-9 minutes at 350. (Do not over bake). Cool on wire rack. Decorate if you wish.

Next week, Tori wants to make a video of Thanksgiving. Stay tuned.