 |
| It's a what???? |
Maybe it's the winter doldrums, maybe stress, maybe it's some subliminal signal I've received: whatever the source, I've been craving Toll House chocolate chip cookies. Sweet, salty, chocolatey goodness. I've fought the urge, reached for a carrot, had a glass of water, a bowl of cereal, yet day after day the urge has persisted over the course of the past week. And tonight I succumbed.
At eight o'clock I fired up the big beast and ventured out in the 10 degree darkness to fetch a bag of chocolate chips. I should have left with the Toll House Morsels but instead, thinking better of using a full cup of real dairy butter, I decided to be clever and get an 8 ounce tub of Land 'O Lakes Butter with Canola Oil spread. "50% less fat and calories!" Wow! Genius!! And I won't have to wait for butter to soften on a cold winter night.
Setting to task I should have stopped when I added the eggs and saw the butter-like substance virtually dissolve. But I didn't. I thought the cure lay just ahead and pinned my hopes to 2 and a half cups of flour. Alas, even dumping an extra scoop of flour and then the entire 12 ounce bag of chips did nothing to remedy to goop I had created. (Side bar: Using the whole bag of chocolate chips was strictly verboten in my childhood home. It was a case of pure economics masquerading as concern for health and good taste. "That's too many chocolate chips. It's too sweet. It doesn't taste good," she would say. "All that sugar isn't good for you." And she was probably right. More to the point, however, she could mine a double batch with just that one 12 ounce bag of chips-- a triple batch if need required. Clever lady, my mom.)
Those of you who know your way around counter-top kitchen appliances have just gone, "Ohhhhh" in the most knowing and disappointed fashion. You're ready to hit delete. But wait! I read the package! Nowhere-- not top, bottom, or sides-- did it say, "This product is not suitable for baking." Nowhere. In fact, what that package should say is, "If buying this product for baking chocolate chip cookies, please return product to the dairy shelf, select butter, or rethink what it is you're trying to accomplish." But it doesn't say that anywhere either. And it really, really should. Because the fact of the matter is this: If you want a chocolate chip cookie, the thing you are craving is intensely sweet, rich, sweating dairy fat, dense, chewy, and loaded with calories.
And so I'm left with 2 dozen spongy chocolate chip cookies that look like some type of deep ocean mollusk, minus its shell. The good news? They won't get eaten because they just aren't right. ("100% fewer calories!!!") The better news? Tomorrow's garbage day. These little creatures are going back in the wild.
Next time? Two sticks of Grade AA Butter. Plain and simple.
