How old were you when you baked your first batch of cookies?

My mom always baked and I remember helping from a young age. But I don’t think I tried it on my own until I was maybe in high school. I’m sure my mom will correct me on this. I do remember sometime in highschool becoming obsessed with baking and regularly making right messes of my mom’s kitchen.

Call this pay backs.

Zoe has been begging for some new independence lately. She heard that her cousins are allowed to cook certain things. And she wants to learn too. And I’m really excited for her.

But I’m a bit of a control freak. As much as I like to pretend I’m all calm and cool and patient. I have a hard time going with the flow. There are certain things that just have to be done the-way-I-want-them-done-because-I-know-better. No shocker I’m a bit OCD in the kitchen. I freak out when the lemon zester is in the wrong drawer, or I find a coffee mug where the glasses go. Or when someone puts. the. tongs. away. upside. down.

So enter Zoe and her first batch of all on her own chocolate chip cookies. I sat back and watched. Mostly. At times I had to sit on my hands to stop myself from helping. You know, like when she measured the vanilla extract.

I tried not to help here

or when this happened

Then this happened

black dog + flour + kids = dusty dog

But it’ okay, because we ended up with these.

Yes – real butter and eggs. Because these are Zoe’s cookies. These are not my cookies. And well, cookies should be what you want them to be and in this case, Zoe wanted cookies that Daddy would like.  I confess – I really, really liked these too. 🙂

Quantities below are exactly what ended up in this batch. We used hazelnuts because that is what Zoe wanted. They happened to be sliced which added the most sublime texture. A level of sophistication – if chocolate chip cookies are allowed to be sophisticated….

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Chocolate Chip Hazelnut Cookies

perhaps the best chocolate chip cookie ever - like a cookie kicked up a notch to fancy by adding sliced hazelnuts

Servings: 4

Ingredients

• 1 cup softened butter salted
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla
• 2 cups whole wheat flour all-purpose
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup white chocolate chips or semi-sweet for all dark chocolate cookies
• 100 g package of sliced hazelnuts or other nut of your choice

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 350
• In a large bowl, or bowl of your stand mixer, cream together softened butter and sugars. Add eggs and vanilla and mix until smooth.
• In a medium sized bowl mix together flour, baking soda and salt.
• Add flour mixture to sugar mixture in 2 or 3 additions, blending with the mixture running at low speed until incorporated. Whip sides of mixing bowl down with a rubber spatula in between additions.
• Add chocolate chips and hazelnuts. Mix at low speed to combine.
• Drop cookie dough, tablespoon sized amounts, onto parchment lined cookie sheet.
• Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until cookies are turning golden brown around the edges. Remove from the oven and allow to site on baking sheet for 2 minutes then transfer to a cooling rack.
• Makes approximately 4 doz cookies.

Trish Cowper

Trish

Thank’s for visiting. I’m Trish. I share healthy family recipes to inspire your family to eat their veggies and save room for cake!