Secret Ingredient Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ok, so I guess if I tell you the secret ingredient, it's hardly a secret anymore.  BUT, when people taste your amazing cookies, they'll say, "Wow!  These are really good!  What did you put in them?" you can respond, "My secret ingredient."

Well, I needed something special for my tired guy after a long day of work, so this is the result.

SECRET INGREDIENT CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES
[Adapted from the Choc. Chip Cookie recipe in the 1973 ed. of the Good Housekeeping Cookbook]

Ingredients:
1 1/4 c. unbleached, all-purpose flour  [scoop and level w/ a knife, don't spoon it into the measuring cup]
1/3-1/2 c. packed light brown sugar [I like mine a little less sweet]
1/4 c. sugar
1/2 c. butter softened [1 stick; you should be able to press your finger in it easily, but it shouldn't be practically melted]
1/2 t. baking soda [w/o aluminum]
1/2 t. sea salt
1 dash nutmeg [seriously, just a small dash; secret ingredient #1]
1 large egg [organic, for in case when you decide to eat the dough]
1 t. almond extract [your secret ingredient #2! Imitation extract doesn't cut it]
1/4 t. vanilla extract
6 oz. [or 1 c.] semi-sweet chocolate pieces [my favorite are the Ghirardelli dark choc. chunks, but in the picture I used mini-chips b/c they were in the pantry today]

What 2 Do:
Preheat the over to 375 F. and grease your cookie sheets.

In a large bowl, measure all your dry ingredients and mix with a fork.

Lightly beat your egg with the extracts.

Beat the dry ingredients, butter, and wet ingredients (egg mixture) together in a mixer on medium, just until blended and clumped.

Add your chocolate chips and mix on low for a few seconds until they are generally distributed through the dough.

Loosely form 1' balls with a spoon and your hands.  Smash them a bit.  And space them a couple inches apart on your cookie sheet.  [If you have more than one sheet worth, keep dough cold in the fridge before putting it in the oven--warm oils = flat cookies.]

Bake 10-12 min. until lightly browned on edges.  It's ok if they're still a tad light in the center.

Remove from oven, let sit for a couple minutes, remove with a spatula onto wire racks, and try to wait until they're not molten chocolate before you devour them with a creamy glass of milk.

This should make about 2 doz. 2' diameter cookies (bit thick and chewy but not soggy!)  It will make fewer if you ate a spoonful (or two) of dough like I did . . .

Cinnamon Sugar Popcorn

Sometimes cloudy, thundery days that are 90+ degrees out (and thus unfit for little people playing on metal playgrounds) require special snacks to keep us all going.  This one provides both entertainment as well as deliciousness.

Caught red-handed!

Cinnamon Sugar Popcorn
1/2 cup unpopped popcorn (I like to use organic heirloom types--so yummy!)
2 T. butter

Make the above as listed on your stove-top popcorn maker.  Be careful not to overcook (burn) it--you'll have to sacrifice those last couple kernels not popping for it to be right.

3 t. sugar (you might be able to replace this w/ honey; I haven't yet tried)
2 t. cinnamon
1/2 t. sea salt

Mix these together in a little bowl.  When the popcorn is done, toss these into the popcorn maker with another 2-3T. butter and give it a mix and a swirl.

Now, pour it all into a bowl and watch your good intentions to give some to the neighbors melt away as you rapturously stuff your face.  Maybe, I'm sometimes tempted to snatch the bowl away from JT so I get a little more . . . maybe.  :)

I can't blame JT for stuffing his face--it was pretty much
a race to see who could consume more!

Seriously, though, it makes awesome gifts (in a little bag or tin) to give to teachers, neighbors, people you owe a thank you to, that person who has everything whom you need to buy a Christmas gift for, etc.

The American Dream

I remember as a kid singing along boisterously to the catchy lyrics:
Only in America
Can a guy from anywhere
Go to sleep a pauper and wake up a millionaire

Only in America
Can a kid without a cent
Get a break and maybe grow up to be President

The American Dream is a funny thing.  See, we used to actually mean these images in the lyrics above in a literal way.  When some of my great-great-grandparents came over on the boat, they really were penniless and looking for opportunity found through hard work and a little luck.  But I think that our concept of American success has moved away from American exceptionalism [in the sense de Tocqueville meant as a people focused on hard work and practicality, nearly to the point of abandoning cultural arts] and toward American sensationalism [where one creates a sensation, not a product and achieves fame, not experience].  In other words, we focus less on hard work and more on deserving a break or an opportunity for fame.

We still like the "underdog" to win.  This is why we rejoice to see a guy writing music in his basement, surrounded by an awesome vintage toy collection as a grand success.  But I think Walt Kowalski and his ilk would have a conniption if we told them that was our new image of the American Dream.  70 Million hits and counting on You Tube and you're there, baby!


Now, while I appreciate a new music sensation as much as the next Generation Y young adult, I worry that many of my peers expect that to be the "normal" path to success.  I see this attitude in my students all too often when they slack off all year and then beg for extra credit at the end--the magic moment when it all just clicked without much work never happened!  Fortunately, I also have many students who know that you only pass a Mrs. Henson test with some effort; even if their grades are not sky-high now, they are on the road to true success.


I hear a lot of talk about our problematic "entitlement culture."  What people don't talk about as often is the source--good ol' fashioned laziness.  Some say the generations before us worked so hard that they tried to pave the road smoothly for us, so we could have it easy.  Well, we do have it easy in many ways, but we also are experiencing ridiculous rates of clinical depression--my generation doesn't know how to deal with difficulty when it comes, and we don't know how to use elbow grease to get out of the rut we're in.  Case in point, I heard a mom bemoaning the other day that she probably couldn't have more kids because she wouldn't be able to pay for college for more than three.  Since when were you a bad parent if you couldn't shell out $30,000/yr for college for each kid?  I know quite a few people who paid their own way through college and have become financially savvy, resourceful, and thrifty at a young age because of it.

True success is not instant fame or even being a millionaire or billionaire who can afford a personal helicopter ride to ski down an iceberg or something.  I'd say that true financial/work success is the ability to provide the necessities for your family in an ethical way that uses your talents to serve others.  Sadly, in an economic and social climate that makes it difficult to survive on one income and that struggles to understand that raising a family well is hard work, we are in danger of losing the traditional American Dream to a society polarized into workaholics and state-supported non-workers.  Sadly, I know people forced by circumstances into both of these categories.  How do we recapture American exceptionalism?  Perhaps by just doing it ourselves.  Gandhi says, "Be the change you want to see in the world."  I think that's easier said than done, but necessary all the while.

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