David's Incredible Chocolate Chip Cookies

Based on the Toll House recipe but with lots more of the good stuff.
Makes about 10 dozen 3" cookies.

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. (Important! 350 degrees is too hot.)

1 pound butter (= 4 cubes) (margarine is not as rich tasting)
1 pound dark brown sugar (= 1 box = 2 1/3 cups)
1 cup white sugar (use 1 ½ cups for crunchier edges)
4 eggs any size
2 Tablespoons real vanilla (= 1 ounce = 1/8 cup) (Cook's Choice for cookies is a good brand)

3 cups unsifted white pastry flour (all purpose flour is OK too)
     (4 cups OK for thicker cookies that transport better; sift only if lumpy)
1 Tablespoon baking soda

2 pounds walnut pieces (=8 cups)
Two 12 ounce bags chocolate chips (=4 cups) (or substitute M&M's or anything similar)

Unwrap butter into a soup bowl then soften for about 1-2 minutes in a microwave.
Cream butter and sugars in a VERY large bowl (a 5 gal. bucket works)
Stir in eggs and vanilla
Pour flour on top of butter mixture
Sprinkle soda on top of flour, mix soda into flour, then stir flour into butter mixture
     (This way you don't need a separate bowl for the flour)
Stir in the walnuts and chips

Drop cookies on ungreased cookie sheets. Make them any size you like.
Bake for 15 minutes or until the tops are still a little moist and the bottoms are just turning brown. If under-baked, they will still be gooey when cool. If over baked, the chips will turn dark and burnt on the bottom and the cookies will be hard. Adjust oven temperature if necessary so cookies come out just right at 15 minutes.

Eat within a few hours. The sugar crystallizes after a day and the cookies aren't quite the same. Extra dough can be formed in rolls 1-1/2" by 10", wrapped in wax paper and frozen for months. Just slice, bake and enjoy whenever you get the cravings!

Substitute and adjust the ingredients to your liking, for instance use all white sugar (3 cups) and 1 pound (3 ½ cups) of slivered almonds instead of walnuts, butterscotch chips instead of chocolate chips.

     David Reichard, May 30, 1999
     radiodave@igc.org      www.radiodave.net