Tea on my table

I’ve added on a new category in happygrub called “on my table”. Food looks best up close and personal, but I’ve really fallen in love with composing a shot of the food with other elements on the table. I hope you like the second shot that I took which was tea after a hard day at work on a busy Saturday. In the picture is the latest donna hay magazine which has a gorgeous gorgeous spread of a picnic in the woods. (Wenyin, I know you’re not into food as much as I am but buy the magazine just for this spread. You’ll love it!) What we had for tea were these chewy toothsome chocolate chip cookies. I’ve been waiting eagerly for my supply of couverture chocolate from Liz and finally got it after meeting up with the girls for dinner. H doesn’t really have a sweet tooth so I was the only one gleefully carrying my bag of chocolate and having chocolate filled dreams. I suddenly recalled that H loves chewy cookies and started hunting for a good recipe to incorporate the chocolate in. If you have a blog about cookies called cookiemadness, you must be mad enough about cookies and make really good ones.

 So this was the recipe I used, adapted from epicurious. I always halve the sugar in most recipes, because I like the cookie to taste like a cookie and not a candy bar. I’ve also converted my measurements to metric because I don’t have a measuring cup! I first baked this on a baking sheet and it spread like crazy, it was good, crisp around the edges and soft in the middle. But, I had difficulty scraping it off the sheet, it kind of stuck. Maybe it was because I didn’t butter the sheet. Its just one of the things I don’t do. Or sift flour. So far nothing serious has happened.. This was the moment I desperately wished I had a silicon baking sheet. Yes we are living in a silicon world and I am a silicon girl. So I took out the next best thing, my silicon daisy mould! The cookies turned out high and soft instead of flat.  

Chewy chocolate chip cookies

Adapted from Epicurious

Makes about 12 cookies 

200g plain flour

175g castor sugar

¾ tsp baking soda

¾ tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla essence

2 small eggs

100g softened butter

150g chocolate chips or more if you like 

Method

Cream butter and sugar till fluffy. Add eggs and beat well. Beat flour and baking soda. Fold in choc chips. The mixture will be really liquid. Drop a tablespoon onto a baking sheet lined with parchment, well buttered or just onto a silicon mat. Or onto a silicon mould like I did. Bake at 190 for 15-18 mins or till golden brown.  

We were inspired ourselves to take a walk down MacRitchie Reservoir. Somehow we walked in the wrong direction and didn’t end up in the rainforest. It was great fun though.