Saturday, November 10, 2012

Homemaking Class- Cooking 3

Lesson #3 was more cookie baking and an experiment with our chocolate cookie recipe.  I figured we could just use a tried and true recipe of someone else's or we could experiment and really learn what different things do to the consistency of our cookies.  So, for lesson 3 we kept our Betty Crocker recipe the same, only we chilled the dough for an hour or so.  Here is our results, and what else we discussed during this lesson.
Our new and improved "chilled dough" cookie.

Our first attempt at chocolate chip cookies, following the recipe to a T.

Well, we did figure out that the recipe says to bake the cookies for 8-10 minutes.  We found that our oven works best by doing these for 9 minutes and taking them out to sit on the tray for a bit.  Our experiment round #1 made softer cookies but still lacked the thickness that the girls were hoping for.  But they were glad for the less crispy edges.  But we figured that was because of the baking time.  So, really, this recipe turned out the same even with chilling the dough. 

We also discussed butter:
~1 stick DOES NOT equal 1 cup
~The better qualities of butter in flavor and health
~In order to cream with sugar, it should be at room temperature, that means taking it out of the refrigerator and letting it sit on the counter for awhile.

So, we are still out to perfect this Betty Crocker recipe just the way my girls want them.  Next experiment will be adding 1/2 cup more flour and seeing what that does to our dough.  They are certainly learning more by experimenting than just trying new recipes.  And they are having so much fun doing it!  That's the important part, aside from growing in knowledge in the kitchen. 

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