The Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

Adapted from the Cookies for Kids' Cancer recipe.

Beat together until smooth and creamy:

1 C butter (227 grams)
1½ C light brown granulated sugar (301 grams)

(OR 1 C soft light brown sugar + ½ C granulated white sugar)

Add, one at a time:

1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 T vanilla

Whisk together, then gradually mix into the butter mixture:

2 C regular flour (240 grams)
1 C old-fashioned oats (quick-cooking oats are fine, too) (90 grams)
¾ t salt
1 t baking soda
1 t baking powder

Use a spatula to mix in:

3 cups of a mixture of chopped nuts, chocolate chips, and/or roughly chopped dark chocolate

Refrigerate the dough for several hours before baking. 

Don't skip the refrigeration step. If you bake cookies directly after making the batter, they will spread and be flat.

Preheat oven to 170-175ºC (340-350º). 

Make golf-ball-sized balls from the cold dough. Place on parchment paper on a cookie sheet or oven pan, about 5 cm (2 inches) apart. Bake for 15 minutes at 170º, slightly less at the higher temperature. They are done when the edges are slightly browned, and the top is still dough-colored.

Cool on a cookie sheet until they are cool and firm enough to move to a cooling rack.

If you are not going to bake all the dough

After refrigeration, form the dough into golf-ball-sized balls, put them in a ziplock freezer bag, and freeze for later use. When you want some cookies, take out a few cookie-balls and put them on your baking sheet and pop them in the preheated oven. Baking straight from freezer to oven works well at 180º for 15 minutes. That's how I made the cookies pictured below.

Tomato and Eggplant Salad

Garlic-seasoned tomato and eggplant salad

1 Japanese eggplant
1 tomato
2 T sweet (summer) onions, minced or sliced as thin as paper, and/or ¼ t finely minced garlic

Wash the eggplant and tomato. Prick the eggplant with a fork and put it in a microwave-safe container, cover, and cook it in the microwave for 90 seconds on high (or until soft). Alternately, slice it lengthwise, then in half, and steam it until soft in a steamer on the stove. Set aside to cool. 

Make the dressing:

1 T olive oil
1/3 T apple cider vinegar or balsamic vinegar (or a mixture of both)
¼ t tobanjan (Chinese hot chili pepper sauce) 
soy sauce to taste

Cut the eggplant lengthwise in half, and then slice each half into half-circles. Mix with dressing and refrigerate for 30 minutes or more.

Shortly before you want to serve it, cut tomatoes into thin wedges, and mix them in with the eggplant. 

Add:

Salt to taste