Funny Story About My Cookies
I made some chocolate chip cookies for Sally this Valentine’s Day. In particular I made one of them in the shape of a heart and served it with some ice cream and hot fudge. The recipe I used is one I have been perfecting over the past few years, so I was hopefull that they would meet her standards. Unfortunately, she didn’t like them as much as the chocolate chip cookies recipe off the back of a bag of chocolate chips. I couldn’t figure out what it was that made her not like my cookies, until now…
My Aunt always used to make exceptional cookies, and I never really knew why her’s always turned out so much better than mine. I suppose I should have just asked for her recipe, but I ended up experimenting a lot. The following progression of events and trials led to the secret I had been looking for: butter flavored shortening.
One day I came across a recipe that called for shortening instead of butter (or, more accurately, half butter and half shortening). Well, that made all the difference. It lead to the soft, fluffy cookies I always remember my aunt making when I was a kid. They were thick and didn’t just collapse into the pan when baked (like my original cookies). The only problem with using shortening was that the taste of the cookies was a little off. Well, two days before Valentines Day, I stumbled upon butter flavored shortening. Perfect. That’s what I used to make the cookies for Sally, and I thought the result was fantastic. I used butter-flavored shortening (not just half and half with real butter) and completed the ensemble with big chocolate chunks (what’s better than big chunks of chocolate, right?).
The only problem is that Sally didn’t like them. She said they weren’t sweet enough, and I should have just made the recipe from the bag of chocolate chips. I pulled out a bag of chocolate chips and compared to my recipe, and the only real difference was my use of shortening. This was my dillema. I loved the effect of the shortening, but Sally didn’t like the result. From then on, I would have to choose between cookies I liked and cookies she liked: the two couldn’t mutually coexist.
The good news is, that I’m a moron, and the shortening/butter wasn’t the only difference between my recipe and the bag’s. I had completely forgotten about it until just today, but it all makes sense. See, I’m a bit of a “health-tard” sometimes. I was making the chips late at night the day before Valentines Day, and for some reason it occured to me that I should use a little whole wheat flour in my cookies. Why not? Whole wheat flour makes everything else tastier and just a little healthier. I substiuted exactly one cup of the stuff for an equal amount of white flour. Except, then I went to bed and completely forgot about my decision. It is that decision that must have caused the flavor difference that Sally noticed. I haven’t tested it yet, but if that’s the difference, then I can make chocolate chip cookies with butter-flavored shortening (and all of their associated fluffy-ness) and still please Sally’s somewhat discerning tastes (yay). I just need to skip the whole wheat flour, but that’s not a big deal: they are, after all, cookies.