American Chocolate Chip Cookies

By Laurie

These are amazing- I make them all the time!

This is a recipe for real American style soft cookies - great for 4th July celebrations.

This recipe comes with an urban myth: A woman in New York met a friend at a small coffee shop, where they ordered drinks and cookies. They liked the cookies so much that she asked for the recipe. The owner of the coffee shop said that she could have the recipe, but she would have to pay something for it. The woman agreed, and paid for the coffee, cookies and the recipe on her credit card. When she got her next credit card statement, she realised that she had been charged a massive $200 for the recipe. She was furious! She called the restaurant, which refused to refund the money, saying that it was a fair price for the recipe. The woman said that, for that price, she must have bought the copyright for the recipe and she would send it our worldwide. She passed the recipe on to everyone she knew, and asked them to do the same.

So here it is; pass it on!

Ingredients

• • 100g (3 ½ oz) porridge oats
• • 125g (4 ½ oz) plain flour
• • ½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• • ½ teaspoon baking powder
• • ½ teaspoon salt
• • 50g (2oz) bar milk chocolate, grated
• • 100g (3 ½ oz) butter at room temperature
• • 100g (3 ½ oz) soft dark brown sugar
• • 100g (3 ½) oz caster sugar
• • 1 large egg
• • ½ teaspoon vanilla extract/essence
• • 115g (4oz) chocolate chips

Preparation

Step 1

1. Preheat oven to 190°C/375°F/gas mark 5 /
2. Put the oats into a food processor or liquidiser and whizz to a fine powder
3. Add flour, bicarbonate of soda, baking powder and salt and whizz again to mix together
4. Add grated chocolate (or break into chunks and whizz again)
5. Put both sugars into a large bowl with the butter
6. Cream them until light and fluffy
7. Beat the egg and vanilla together in a cup
8. Beat this into the creamed butter mixture (use an electric whisk if you have one)
9. Add chocolate chips and dry ingredients, mix well with a spoon until everything is mixed in and you have a dough
10. Use you hands to roll into balls the size of ping-pong balls and put them, 5cm apart, on to non stick baking paper on a baking tray.
11. Bake in the oven for about ten minutes. They should have a golden colour, but still look a little underdone (this is what makes the lovely chewy soft texture). If you like them crisp, keep them in a bit longer
12. Leave them on the tray for a couple of minutes to firm up, then use a fish slice to lift them onto a wire rack to cool