Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe, the favourite sweet of Eva Larue

Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe by Ruth Wakefield,

Ruth Wakefield, who was the owner of the Toll House Inn in Massachusetts, is credited with inventing the chocolate chip cookie. The story goes that one day in 1930 she cut a Nestle's Semisweet Yellow Label Chocolate bar into small chunks and added it to her butter cookie dough. The cookies were an instant hit with her customers and word of their popularity reached the Nestle company. Nestle must have realized that adding small chunks of their chocolate bar to cookie dough would appeal to the mass market because by 1939 Nestle was selling chocolate morsels (or chips). What a brilliant marketing plan it turned out to be when Nestle packaged the chips in a Yellow bag and then bought the rights to the Toll House name and Ruth Wakefield's chocolate chip cookie recipe. They called her recipe "The Famous Toll House Cookie" and printed it on the back of the Yellow bag of chocolate morsels.
This recipe is very similar to the recipe on the back of the Nestle's chocolate chip bag. Made with butter and a combination of white and brown sugars it produces a rich and chewy cookie with caramelized edges. Now, making chocolate chip cookies can present a challenge. As John Thorne states in his book 'Serious Pig', "our national cookie demands more skill than many of us can muster.....It is too rich for its own good." So if you have trouble making these cookies you are not alone and as John Thorne tells us "there is no really foolproof method."
Note: Although flour, sugar (white and/or brown), butter or margarine, baking powder and/or baking soda, eggs, vanilla, and chocolate chips make up a chocolate chip cookie recipe, taste and texture do vary by recipe. So if you want to try another type of chocolate chip cookie I have included a recipe for Chocolate Chunk Cookies. This recipe has more brown sugar than white sugar which gives the cookies a more caramel flavor. And true to Ruth Wakefield's original cookie recipe, I have chopped up a semi sweet chocolate bar instead of using chocolate chips. There is also less flour in these cookies so their texture will be more crisp and you may need to chill the batter before baking as the batter has a tendency to be soft because of all the butter.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) with rack in center of oven. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Set aside.
In the bowl of your electric mixer (or with a hand mixer), cream the butter. Add the white and brown sugars and beat until fluffy (about 2 minutes). Beat in eggs, one at a time, making sure to beat well after each addition. Add the vanilla and beat until incorporated.
In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the egg mixture and beat until incorporated, adding the chocolate chips about half way through mixing. If you find the dough very soft, cover and refrigerate until firm (about 30 minutes).
For large cookies, use about a 2 tablespoon ice cream scoop or with two spoons, drop about 2 tablespoons of dough (35 grams) onto the prepared baking sheets. Bake about 12 - 14 minutes, or until golden brown around the edges. Cool completely on wire rack.
Makes about 4 dozen - 3 inch round cookies
Note: You can freeze this dough. Form the dough into balls and place on a parchment lined baking sheet. Freeze and then place the balls of dough in a plastic bag, seal, and freeze. When baking, simply place the frozen balls of dough on a baking sheet and bake as directed - may have to increase baking time a few minutes.