As I said earlier, this is the first recipe I ever memorized. Much better than storebought dough, because you can control what ingredients you use. I mostly use organic ingredients, because they taste better.

Preheat: 375°F
Bake Time: 9-15 minutes

Ingredients

2 1/4 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda

2 sticks of butter
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 eggs

2 cups chocolate chips

Make sure your butter is soft enough not to overwhelm your mixer. I usually cut mine into tabs. In a large mixing bowl, combine butter and sugars. When creamy, add the vanilla and the eggs.

In a smaller bowl, combine dry ingredients. Alton Brown will tell you, for any recipe, always add your flour in thirds. Mixing it all in at once is physically impossible (or maybe just a really bad idea), and adding it in too many sections is just a tedious waste of time.

Make sure you wipe the sides of the bowl with a spatula so that all the flour is mixed in. When it comes time to add the chocolate chips, you’ll probably want to use the spatula instead of the mixer, depending on how powerful your mixer is, or how soft the dough still is.

Hardly anyone will tell you this about chocolate chip cookies, but they’re really much better when you chill the dough before you bake them! That way the dough won’t run all over the place, which would result in flat, thin, watery-looking cookies with shapeless chocolate chips. Colder dough produces firmer cookies. If you don’t have a lot of time, stick the dough in the freezer for a few minutes.

Bake time is contingent upon a few things. 1) how hot does your oven get and 2) how crispy do you like your cookies. I usually start with a timer set for 10-12 minutes then check to see if they are the color I like. A rich golden brown is best. They’re delicious served warm, but they also keep fairly well. After letting them cool, store them in a ziplock bag (if you didn’t already eat them all).

You can easily make these in a toaster oven if you just want a few warm cookies after dinner, as opposed to a whole batch! That’s what we used to do when we were little. Refrigerate your remaining dough. I’m taking these to the office because, if I’m honest, I don’t really want to eat them all by myself, I just felt like baking!