Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

The Crisco recipe is the best. They are cakey on the inside, crisp on the outside....not flat but they don't rise huge either. Delicious!
http://www.crisco.com/Recipes/Details.aspx?recipeID=2102

I swear these are the best chocolate chip cookies ever! Follow instructions exact, I bake about 10 minutes. I do not add the walnuts, as we don't care for them. The recipe is off allrecipes.com They are the best...enjoy! This recipe yields about 6 dozen cookies.

(Also, make sure your bakng soda is fresh)

INGREDIENTS

* 4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
* 2 teaspoons baking soda
* 2 cups butter, softened
* 1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
* 1/2 cup white sugar
* 2 (3.4 ounce) packages instant vanilla pudding mix
* 4 eggs
* 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
* 4 cups semisweet chocolate chips
* 2 cups chopped walnuts (optional)

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Sift together the flour and baking soda, set aside.
2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter, brown sugar, and white sugar. Beat in the instant pudding mix until blended. Stir in the eggs and vanilla. Blend in the flour mixture. Finally, stir in the chocolate chips and nuts. Drop cookies by rounded spoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.
3. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes in the preheated oven. Edges should be golden brown.

Every chocolate chip recipe is a variation to the toll house recipe. You just need to change certain ingredients around to get the type of cookie you like. Alton Brown has written three different variations, the puffy, the crispy and the chewy. Try them out you will probably find one you enjoy. Also, if your baking soda is older than six months time to buy new for baking. Someone had posted the recipe with the pudding, which is very puffy and cake like.

Butter makes your cookies browner, crispier, and 'flatter'.

Try a recipe that uses shortening (crisco). It will give you the cakey, 'soft batch' texture you're looking for.

Shirley O. Corriher has a great book, "Cookwise", the explains the chemistry of cooking and ingredients. She addresses the chocolate chip cookie entirely. If you're interested, it is a really cool read.

We've discovered that if you use the Toll House recipe and just use heaping measures of the flour, they come out delicious and cakey. I've never measured exactly how much over I go with the flour, but when I say heaping, I really mean it.

My personal favorite is the kitchenaid cookbook recipe.

1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup butter or margarine, softened
2 eggs
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3 cups all-purpose flour
12 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips

Mix wet ingredients on med, add dry, mix on low, add chips. Bake 11 min at 375.

I have spent 5 years perfecting this recipe (fluffy and thick, tiny crunch to the outside, soft inside) and have consistently found the following:

--Butter makes them spread out and thin. Soft Parkay Margarine works the best.
--Be very certain you added enough flour. The dough should be very thick. A kitchenaid mixer will almost strain against it.
--The small oxo cookie scoop is perfect for a traditional oven. (Double scoop for convection)
--If your oven temperature runs low, it will make cookies run thin and flat (even store bought dough does it). You can buy an oven thermometer at bed bath and beyond to test this - my mom's oven did this for a year before we figured it out.
--Airbake cookie sheets make them run thin - I hate them. Cheap regular cookie sheets used upside down tend to prevent spreading due to the airflow. Calphalon cookie sheets are also fantastic.

I actually prefer flat cookies myself, but if you want them puffier there are two things to try, no matter what recipe you use.

1. Use margarine or crisco instead of butter. Butter has a lower melting point, so the batter spreads on the pans before the cookies set up in the oven.

2. Chill the batter before you put the cookies on the pan. And don't put dough on a hot pan (so you have to have at least 2 pans alternating.)

Thanks for sharing that secret, ladies! I never knew that!

T.
www.ReadandGrow.com

I think if you are using an oil-based spread instead of butter that can cause the flatness.

I have had this problem lately too and my neighbor suggested I try using an ice cream scooper (the kind that has the clip and the ice cream pops out) or a mini scooper like that. So I tried it last weekend and I got the BEST cookies. The full scooper makes the cookies really big and the smaller version makes them a more realistic size. Also make sure your ingredients are relatively fresh. I think I might have been handling the cookies too much when I scooped them out before. And I use the toll house recipe.
Good luck. By the way, I always cook with Butter!

Hi M.!!

Butter does tend to make the cookies a little flatter, however you can counteract this two ways. FIRST and foremost is make sure you are using enough flour! The dough should be firm...chilled if you can beforehand and not putting a new batch on a pan that just came out of the oven will help too...alternate your pans.

You can also guarantee great rounder "puffy" cookies by using a cookie scoop to drop them on the pan vs. a spoon. I am a consultant with the Pampered Chef and over the years have tried many things. We too like the cookies more "domed" vs. flat. I don't want to sacrifice the butter by using shortening either and this does do the trick! I also bake on stoneware so they are more evenly done. No dark edges and perfect every time!

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The medium scoop makes the "perfect" 2" size cookie...but if you like the larger ones, I'd recommend the large scoop.

If your cookies turn out too flat it's because you're not adding enough flour. Your dough should be quite stiff. The amt of flour you get when you measure depends on how "fluffy" the flour is. The best solution is to mix up a batch (toll house works fine) and bake 1 test cookie. If it is too flat, add 1/4 cup flour, mix, and bake another tester. You will figure out how much flour you need to get the consistency right.