Monday, November 30, 2009

A Monster [Cookie] Destroyed My Kitchen!

- or, part of it, anyway.

Now don't look at me with those "oh my God you still have Halloween candy sitting around your house" eyes. No, no, this would be a prime example of be making a valiant attempt to catch up on writing about the baking I did in between work sessions, when sitting at the computer was so not what was on the priority list! These gigantic (think full-hand size, including fingers), thick and chewy discs of deliciousness were baked shortly after it became painfully clear that there really were no more kids coming around for Halloween this year! Of course, that means that it was about the second week of November - God only knows why my stepfather thought he could pawn off half-full boxes of chocolate and chips at the office - before I could act on my recipe-planning whim. It wasn't really a bad thing, though, since it did force me to plug in some more hours on schoolwork, but finally I needed the break!

I tore into the abandoned box and came up with a bucket of the good, fun-sized swag: four bags of plain Ruffles, 8 Aero bars and ten tiny boxes of Smarties! Of course unwrapping them left a pile of garbage big enough to alert GreenPeace representatives all over the province, but they were already made, packaged, shipped and sold... I don't think there was any chance of really reducing a carbon footprint. Plus, there were cookies to think of. The whole assortment in the white bowl, with slightly crushed, salty chips on the bottom and super colourful chocolates on top, looked so pretty I had to take a photo! Then I hauled out the flours, flax and sugar and got down to business.

I guess you could say I did turn into the monster that destroyed my kitchen. To me, the only way I can reliably blow off steam is to whip up a batch of whatever suits my fancy! Some days it's bread, others it's muffins or cookies, and I don't usually seem to make the same thing twice. I guess I should label it something like "creative-overload ADD", but then I'd probably get to add yet another psychological modifying prescription to my roster! Nah, I think I'll just stick with calling it "baker's brain", or maybe "blogger's boredom"!

It's funny to think that the "healthy" modifications I made to this cookie dough recipe (and I am so sorry but I can't remember the initial source!) were all done without thought, but really turned the end product into something better than your standard cookie! The ground flaxseed and twelve grain flour created a nutty and semi-crisp base that wasn't sweet enough to overpower the chocolate but not salty enough to make you forget the potato chips either. I'm sure that if you made smaller dough balls and baked them for the same amount of time you would come up with equally tasty, crunchier results - but as big and soft as they were my dad had no complaints!

Really, what better way to kick off this year's edition of Eat Christmas Cookies - hosted as always by the wonderful FoodBlogga! We're in year 3, can you believe it? I'm proud to say that I've been able to be a part of every round up so far, so lets keep it going! If you want to see the offerings from previous editions, you can find year one here and year two here.



Monster Mash Cookies
Makes 12 giant or 24 "normal" cookies
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup  granulated sugar
2/3 cup canola oil
1 egg
1 tbsp vanilla
2 tbsp ground flaxseed
3 tbsp hot water
1 1/4 cups flour
1 cup 12-grain (or whole wheat) flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
64 grams (about 4 "fun-size" bags) plain potato chips, lightly crushed
48 grams (8 "fun-size" bars) plain milk chocolate, broken into chunks
140 grams (10 "fun-size" boxes) Smarties or M&M's chocolate
  1. Preheat oven to 375F, line two large baking sheets with parchment or silicone.
  2. In a large bowl, combine sugars, oil, egg and vanilla.
  3. In a small dish or cup whisk together flaxseed and hot water, stir into sugar mixture.
  4. In another bowl whisk together flours, baking soda and salt.
  5. Add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients and stir gently to just combine.
  6. Fold in the potato chips and chocolates.
  7. Portion out large dollops or balls of dough onto the sheets.
  8. Bake for 13 minutes (chewy jumbo cookies) or 15 minutes (more "toll-house crisp" style jumbos).
  9. Cool completely on the sheets.
Amount Per Serving
Calories: 356.4
Total Fat: 17.6 g
Cholesterol: 19.8 mg
Sodium: 51.2 mg
Total Carbs: 47.1 g
Dietary Fiber: 2.7 g
Protein: 4.4 g

3 comments :

  1. What a creative recipe!!

    Blessings-
    Amanda

    ReplyDelete
  2. Chips in cookies?! What a crazy good idea

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  3. Potato chips in cookies? Whoa! Kids would go crazy for these! Thanks, Sarah!

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Thanks for the feedback!