I’ve talked about this before. THIS is what I made before kids. We’d take it to both our jobs and share. Chex mix, muddy buddies (aka puppy chow), 2 kinds of fudge, peanut butter kiss cookies, chocolate molds, chocolate covered pretzels, chocolate dipped oreos, and on and on! I would make most of the this in the few days right before Christmas and then also share with family, and some of it even got frozen and I’d sneak a few things out for new years and my husband’s birthday in February. Nothing quite like ‘surprise fudge’ in February. Let’s just hope no one googles ‘surprise fudge’ and ends up here. I’m sure they’ll be extremely disappointed.
A few years ago I managed to make ‘8 weeks of cookies’. The idea was that we started 2 months before Christmas so we’d have something done each week and not leave it to the last minute. We had a ton of cookies, and even had some to donate for events and put towards freezer rationing. Even though we made a few different kinds, with Keeley being small chocolate chip was made about 3 of those 8 weeks. They freeze well, they keep for several days on the counter without going stale, and they’re pretty kid friendly. With 2 kids wandering around MOBILE! now it’s a bit harder to just stand and get things ‘done’ in the kitchen. They need to be supervised, so I need to do something VERY simple. Luckily…..
I have found my holy grail of recipes. Why is it the holy grail? Not because it’s ‘the best ever’ or ‘super puffy’ or anything like that. It’s the holy grail because you only need a bowl, a spoon, a mixer, and 3 measuring utensils: a teaspoon, a 1/2 cup and a 1 cup. If you’re REALLY lazy about washing up you could probably skip the 1 cup and just use the 1/2 cup measure over again! Clean up is super easy, and there’s no fiddling with a half a dozen little spoons and gadgets just to get some cookies, darnit!
Recipe from the chocolate chip bag (from Aldi)
1 cup (2 sticks) butter (I use one stick of butter and one of margarine)
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1 t baking soda
1 t salt
1 t vanilla
2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips (we use a 12 oz bag minus a few for kid/adult bribes)
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Cream together everything but the flour and chocolate chips, then beat in the flour and stir in the chocolate chips with a spoon. Drop them on a cookie sheet in your desired manner (teaspoon full 2 inches apart is recommended) and then bake. The pkg. says 12-15 I think ours always go exactly at 10 with our oven.
Bam. You have cookies.