Soft and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

A little end of the summer anecdote about two little girls and a lemonade stand…

My daughter Pia is one of those children who wakes up every morning and wants to know exactly what is planned for her that day. She can never have enough activities crammed in. On this particular day- I actually had nothing. Nothing at all. How boring! Remember being a kid in the summer, and there were days that were just sooooooo booooooring!

Thank goodness Pia hasn’t learned the word boring yet! Anyways, to keep her busy she asked if she could have a lemonade stand, and I thought- that’s brilliant!

I swung by and picked up my niece Madison (she is the greatest Mother’s helper EVER).

We set up a very fancy lemonade stand featuring:

– lemonade
– popcorn
– three varieties of cookies: snickerdoodle cookies , soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies (recipe below) and apricot oatmeal cookies (recipe coming!)

The only disagreement arose when they were making the sign.

Pia thought that it wasn’t nice to charge for anything, and that it should be free, (I did indeed have a moment of motherly pride!) Madison thought that was crazy and that this was a business (my husband could not have agreed more!) Anyways there was a compromise. The Lemonade was free, and the snacks were 50 cents each.

Let me just tell you- we live on a quiet street. I wasn’t expecting much. But I was wrong. In two hours they made $40!! But better than that, my older child felt the pride of doing a job, and seeing that she earned something herself. I have never seen such a happy child as she shoved her half of the money into her piggy bank.

Anyways I have enclosed the recipe for the soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies, which I made differently on accident, (isn’t that how it always goes!? The accidental recipe!)

*By the way- I don’t have any pictures of the process, because I didn’t expect them to turn out soooo yummy! But I am sure you all can figure out to make cookies 😉

Soft and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies, makes 2 dozen cookies
-1 cup salted butter, softened
-1 ½ cups white sugar
-2 tsp vanilla
-2 eggs
-2 ¼ cups flour
-1 tsp baking soda
-1 tsp salt
-1 bag chocolate chips

1)Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and prepare two sheet pans with parchment or silpats.

2)In a mixing bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until creamy.

3)Add the vanilla and the eggs and beat until creamy

4)Meanwhile mix the dry ingredients together in a separate bowl.

5)Add the dry ingredients to the mixing bowl and stir until you have a thick cookie dough.

6)Add the chocolate chips.

7)Scoop the cookies onto the sheetpans and bake at 350 for about 10 minutes. (when you take the cookies out they should still be a bit doughy looking in the middle- they will stiffen up).

Enjoy!