Cookies Gone Awry

I've been searching for the "perfect" chocolate chip cookie recipe for a while now. The perfect cookie entails the right amount of crunch and chewiness in the same bite. It must be sweet, but not cavity inducing. The perfect cookie must be made with whole wheat flour and vegan butter so I can call it "healthy"  (well really justify it for myself) while tasting like the creme de la creme.   Turning to the Toll House recipe is just not good enough for me— it's just as homemade as buying the Toll House "break & bakes." I'm starting to think that the agony of finding the right recipe is just not worth it. But my palette, told me otherwise a few nights ago. 

My friend, Nicole, and I spent last Thursday evening baking chocolate chip cookies. We were off to a late start, probable around 9:51. I wanted to try a new recipe, one that I found on a favorite blog of mine. I have never been so precise when baking, we double checked the instructions and used exact measurements. I like to use Earth Balance, vegan butter, instead of regular butter filled with large amounts of artery clogging, heart attack causing cholesterol and fat. The sticks are packaged in half size. Therefore, 2 cups of butter would mean 4 sticks of Earth Balance. 

We mixed the batter, placed little balls of dough on two shiny pans, and put them in the oven. As we anxiously waited, Nicole and I cleaned the bowl. Mmmm cookie dough. 

With 6 minutes to go, I turned the oven light and saw that our cookies had merged together to form  large pans of what looked like mush with specks of glistening chocolate. It was so bad that on one of the pans, the slop of cookies began to dripping off the edge. When the timer turned off, the result was an ugly and tasteless mess. I thought this recipe would be the end to my interminable search! I was ever so wrong. 

 

A few days later, I replayed the steps we took when baking over and over again in my head. I continued analyzing the chocolate chip recipe, seeing where we could have gone wrong (or where the maker of this recipe went wrong). It hit me like a gallon of milk being thrown at my head— we only put 2 halves of Earth Balance in the batter! 

Lesson learned: you can't expect to master the "perfect" cookie recipe past bedtime.

I plan to make a new batch this week. Any recipe suggestions?