.chocolate chip oatmeal cookies.

I have decided to start blogging about all my favourite recipes that I have gathered so far. This is mostly for my own reference and to have one place to store things rather than a zillion cookbooks and recipe cards laying around. Also, I am frequently asked for recipes of my most common dishes, so if you were ever wondering how I made the amazing spinach dip, or how my brownies are more amazing than grocery store two-bite brownies, you can find all that out here!

My first recipe is these chocolate chip oatmeal cookies.

I wish I was a photographer so I could show off how truly amazing and melt-in-your-mouth like these fantastic cookies are. I got the recipe from my good friend Lauren, who got it from one of her friends and then that is where my trail of knowledge comes from. You will notice these cookies in the photo contain a few extra bits than the recipe calls for. These ones have chocolate chips, reese chips and skor bits.

I think there are some major mistakes people make when doing cookies, such as not following a recipe correctly. If it calls for butter, USE BUTTER. There is no substitute. When making cookies, NEVER ever ever melt butter. Always whip room temperature butter with the sugar. You may think "but I just took this butter out of the fridge and its crazy hard and I want cookies NOW", but this is the wrong attitude and it will yield the wrong kind of cookies. Be patient. Leave the butter at room temp for an hour. You can slice the butter to speed the thaw, but I promise, if you put it near a microwave there was no point in starting these cookies in the first place.

And now for the recipe:

Ingredients:
1 cup butter
1 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 1/2 cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cup quick oats
1 cup chocolate chips

Cream butter, sugars and egg in a bowl. In seperate bowl mix flour, soda, powder and salt. Add to the creamed mixture and mix. Once mixed add vanilla and mix through. Add quick oats and chocolate chips.

Bake at 375 for 10-15 minutes. (I never bake them longer than 12 minutes. Usually 9-10 minutes is all I like to give them. They come out still soft so I set them on a baking rack to cook for a few minutes in the pan before transferring them directly to the wire rack. They freeze amazingly and thaw to taste just as chewy and amazing as the day you made them.