Cookies

It's "C week" at J's preschool, and today was first lab meeting of the school year for me.  I wanted treats for the new faces to think we're lots of fun (which we are).  Not only are cookies are a great way to make friends, they are a great way to do (and eat) science.  There's measuring, mixing, chemical reactions, heat transfer, fractions, etc.  If you want to double the recipe, now you've added multiplication!!

J helped me make chocolate chip cookies for my lab yesterday.  This is our fave recipe which we got from a Ghirardelli bag of chocolate chip cookies many moons ago.  The key is 2 tsp of vanilla = delicious!

Ingredients:

1 cup of butter (2 sticks)                   2 ¼ cups flour

¾ cup sugar                                        1 tsp baking soda

¾ cup brown sugar (packed)             ½ tsp salt

2 eggs                                                1 package of chocolate chips (12 oz - or about 2 cups)

2 tsp vanilla

Directions:

• Combine butter, sugar, and brown sugar until light and creamy
• Add vanilla and eggs one at a time
• In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and salt
• Stir the flour mixture slowly into the sugar mixture
• Slowly add the chocolate chips
• Drop cookie dough on cookie sheet (in desired amounts)
• Bake at 375°F for ~ 8 minutes (watch carefully - we like them slightly under baked so they are softer longer)
• Let cool and devour

Recipe makes ~4 dozen decent sized cookies

Variation: scoop dough into personal pan, bake 11 minutes, top with ice cream and enjoy your pizza cookie.  The pan is extremely hot and not recommended for little ones.  Please remove cookie from pan or cool before serving to little kids.

After I decided that our cookies last night were going to my lab, I asked J what he wanted to bring for "sharing time" this week.  They are supposed to bring something that starts with the letter c.  Bet you can't guess what his answer was.  The Cookie Monster would be so proud.

We went with another recipe, just for variety.  This is my next favorite recipe we found on a Funfetti box moons ago.

Funfetti Cookies
1 box Funfetti Cake mix - yes, it has to be Pillsbury - the other rainbow cake mixes smell like playdough when you make them into cookie dough and just don't taste right.
1/3 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs

Preheat oven to 350 deg F.  Mix ingredients in a bowl.  Scoop cookies out onto cookie sheet.  Bake for 7 minutes (again a little on the under baked side).  Makes 2 dozen Funfetti cookies.

*Cake cookies work really well for quickie desserts.  The general rule is follow the ingredients on the cake box (any brand cake), without the water and minus an egg.  Our next favorite is chocolate cake with chocolate chips added.  We're real dessert people if you can't tell.

Happy cooking!