The Mother of All Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipes

Growing up, my mom was super woman. What am I saying? She still is. She's Martha Stewart meets the Energizer Bunny meets the most naturally likable person on the planet. She made 3 hot meals a day for us (my dad would often come home for lunch) and was always going above and beyond by doing things like making her own homemade bread, doing holiday traditions like heart shaped cookie cakes for Valentine's Day and Caramel Apples for Halloween. Don't get me started on Thanksgiving and Christmas! Now that I'm a mom and am in charge of "keeping house," I truly have no idea how she did it. I'm convinced she has super powers. She might be an alien. She's undeniably the best.

Though she is also quite the spectacular baker, this recipe is one I curated over the years on my own. I may be "the second best cook in the world" (according to Cooper, with his "Moo," what the kids call my mom, being #1)...but when it comes to chocolate chip cookies, I will toot my own horn and call myself Queen.

A lot of the "secrets" to great chocolate chip cookies, I've found through trial and error over the years. I do little things each time to try something different to see the result. A lot of times, I scrap the idea...but every now and then, I find a way to up my cookie game even more. This actually just happened last week while I cooked 6 batches for a fundraiser. I tried something different & it made a huge difference! And, don't worry, it's included in this post.

So, here you have it, the best way to get compliments, impress people, and become "queen" of any potluck or fundraiser; my very own Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe. YES, I'm divulging all my secrets here. All I ask is that you send your friends to this post to share the recipe. You might be the new queen of your gathering, but don't forget who gave you the crown, all polished and perfect ;)

Queen Em's Chocolate Chip Cookies

Servings: 5 dozen cookies. You can 1.5x the recipe, but doubling it usually makes too much for any mixer to handle.

Ingredients:

3 heaping cups of Flour (with extra for the side)

1 teaspoon Baking Soda

1 teaspoon Salt

1 cup (2 sticks) Butter, softened

1 cup Granulated Sugar

3/4 cup Brown Sugar

2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract

2 large Eggs

2 cups Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips

1 cup Dark Chocolate Chips (I like Ghirardelli)

1/2 cup Milk Chocolate Chips (ditto)

3 Tablespoons Sea Salt Flakes or Coarse Sea Salt

The Queen's Directives:

In a side bowl, add flour (heaping cups), salt, and baking soda. Stir with a spoon.

In a mixer, add sugar, brown sugar, softened butter, and vanilla extract. Mix well. Slowly add 2 eggs to the mixture, one at a time.

Then, slowly add the flour mixture to the sugar mixture and continue mixing. The slower you add the flour, the fluffier the cookies will be!

Preheat Oven to 375 degrees.

Once well mixed, use a spoon to take out a small bit of dough. Think ping-pong ball, but then pinch off to make even smaller. These puppies grow in the oven! Hand roll it into a small ball. Then, hand place chocolate chips - using only 1-2 milk and dark chocolate chips per cookie, with semi-sweet being the main chip used. Here's how I do it: place 1 dark chocolate chip, surround by semi-sweet chips, then place 1 milk chocolate chip, surround with semi-sweet chips. Roll again to make the ball nice and even. Then roll the chip-stuffed dough into flour (I put it on a paper towel and just roll the dough around in it.) This step adds an extra layer of thick, fluffiness to the cookies.

Disclaimer: you do not have to do the above hand-placing technique. You could just throw the chips into the mixer & let it do its thing. This is how I do it, which is partially attributed to the very mild OCD I experience in my daily life (less mild while making cookies, as you can see...) and it's partially due to the fact that it makes the cookies look seriously perfect and beautiful. Half of the experience is seeing people's reactions to how the cookies look. They're flipping gorgeous.

Next, place the dough balls onto an uncreased cookie sheet. (Never spray a cookie sheet with Pam, etc when making cookies. It'll cause them to flatten.)

After you place on cookie sheet, spaced apart, bake for 3 minutes ONLY.

When 3 minute alarm goes off, open oven & partially pull out cookie sheet. Sprinkle sea salt (large crystals or flakes) onto top of cookies. Don't be scared that it'll be too salty - sea salt is different than regular and gives an awesome flavor. Then, turn the cookie sheet in the oven (for even cooking.) Bake for another 6ish minutes (depends on your oven.) Once cookies have a very light brown around the edges, take out of oven.

Let cool on cookie sheet for about a minute or two before transferring to wire cooling racks. Don't miss this step! Aerating cookies is crucial to the texture.

These cookies are amazing fresh out of the oven (what cookies aren't?!) but they're also incredible the next day (especially if allowed to cool on wire racks for hours.)

And voila, you are the new queen of cookies and they'll bring all the boys to the yard (ask my husband!) He says I wrangled him into proposing by making these cookies and then discontinued making them on a regular basis once married (cue my villain laugh...)

I won't lie, this isn't the fastest or easiest recipe I'm going to share with you, but it probably is the one that will get you the most credibility, and I can promise your kids will love them and beg for you to make them regularly. I hope that they bring your home as much joy as they've brought mine. I know the smell will be long-lasting, but I hope that the memories you make will be even more so.

Enjoy. Share. There's enough room for all of us cookie queens.

Xo, Em