Perfect Recipe #1--Chocolate Chip Cookies

I have a problem. The consequence of my vast collection of cookbooks and cooking magazines is that I rarely use the same recipe more than once. However, there are some recipes that I always return to. Each day I will write about one. Please post your own favorites by using the comment function on this blog.

I actually have two favorite chocolate chip cookie recipes, but lately I've been using the one listed first. David likes to tell a story about when he brought some of my chocolate chip cookies (recipe #2) to work. It was soon after we had moved to the first small town we had ever lived in. I was at the grocery store later that week, and the cashier, who I had never seen before, told me that she heard that I made great chocolate chip cookies. I was puzzled and a little confused. I had no idea who this woman was and how she knew me and my cookies. It turned out she was related to someone who worked at the hospital. We like to call it our very first experience with living in a fish bowl.

One more note about chocolate chip cookies. I recently saw that Jessica Seinfeld wrote a new book called Deceptively Delicious. The recipes in her cookbook use vegetable purees in order to pump up the nutritional value of foods without kids knowing it. Apparently she has a recipe for chocolate chip cookies that uses garbanzo beans. I would like to try it, though I'm not sure it would match up to the two recipes I have below.

The Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipes
Recipe #1...I found this recipe on oprah.com. It was created by Jamie Laurita.
INGREDIENTS
1 pound butter, softened
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1 1/2 cups light brown sugar
4 eggs
2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
5 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
4–5 cups chocolate chips
2 cups chopped pecans
1 cup shredded coconut

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Cream the butter until light and fluffy. Gradually add the sugar, continuing to cream until all the sugar is used.
3. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
4. Stir in the vanilla.
5. Sift together the flour, salt and baking soda. Add all at once to the butter mixture, stirring well with a wooden spoon.
6. Add chocolate chips, pecans and coconut and stir until mixed.
7. Form dough into large balls and press down lightly on an ungreased non-stick baking sheet.
8. Bake until golden, about 15 minutes, being careful not to brown the edges. Remove from oven and place baking sheet on a wire rack; cool 5 minutes.
9. Transfer cookies to rack; cool completely.

Recipe #2
2 cups butter
4 cups flour
2 tsp. baking soda
2 cups granulated sugar
2 cups brown sugar
5 cups blended oatmeal (measure oatmeal and blend in blender to a fine powder)
24 oz. chocolate chips
1 tsp. salt
8 oz. Hershey bar (grated)
4 eggs
2 tsp. baking powder
3 cups chopped nuts (your choice)
2 tsp. vanilla

1. Cream the butter and both sugars.
2. Add eggs and vanilla; mix together with flour, oatmeal, salt, baking powder, and soda.
3. Add chocolate chips, Hershey bar and nuts.
4. Roll into balls and place two inches apart on a cookie sheet.
5. Bake for 10 minutes at 375 degrees. Makes 112 cookies.