With spring comes blooming flowers, new seedling sprouts and baby animals. This time of year also brings the onslaught of school fundraisers and activities.
My daughter’s class is raising money for prom, and her school recently held its spring festival and fair. Here in the South, almost every school fundraiser includes a bake sale. Just this month, we’ve prepared cake balls and Oreo balls — and will be baking several dozen cookies in support of the fundraising efforts.
When I need to bake cookies for a crowd, my go-to recipes are the Neiman Marcus Chocolate Chip Cookies and Ginger Crinkles. Not only are the recipes delicious, the first recipe comes with a great story that — depending on what you read — may be a hoax.
As the story goes, a woman was shopping at the prestigious department store chain. On a break from shopping, she enjoyed lunch at the store's restaurant during which she dined on a salad and a chocolate chip cookie for dessert. The woman loved the cookie so much that she asked her server if she could purchase the recipe.
Neiman Marcus $250 Chocolate Chip Cookies
The server informed the woman the recipe will cost "two-fifty." Assuming the server meant $2.50, the woman purchased the recipe only to learn her credit card was charged $250. Outraged, and in an effort to presumably get her money’s worth, she shared the recipe with anyone and everyone who would take it.
What the Ginger Crinkles lack in the urban legend department, the cookies make up for with taste. Both cookie recipes result in unique sweet treats that are crisp at the edges, tender on the inside, and full of flavor.
I can only hope my daughter’s bake sale has a customer like Neiman Marcus did on that fateful day.
Neiman Marcus $250 Chocolate Chip Cookies
5 cups oatmeal
2 cups butter
2 cups sugar
2 cups packed brown sugar
4 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
4 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
24 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
1 8-ounce plain chocolate bar (I used Hershey), grated
3 cups chopped pecans
1. Place three cups oatmeal in a food processor and chop until a coarse powder.
2. Cream the butter and both sugars using a stand mixer or hand mixer.
3. Add eggs one at a time, mixing until incorporated, then add the vanilla and mix.
4. Add the flour, oatmeal (both powder and remaining whole oats), salt, baking powder and baking soda and mix until incorporated.
5. Stir in chocolate chips, grated Hershey Bar, and pecans.
6. Using a cookie scoop (I use a 1 1/2 tbsp/ 2-inch scoop) or your hands to roll the dough, form 2-inch balls and place 2 inches apart on a parchment-lined cookie sheet.
7. Bake for 10 minutes at 375 or until golden.
Ginger Crinkles
2/3 cup pecan oil (or vegetable oil)
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup Steen's Molasses
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
Smoked pecan sugar (substitutes: turbinado or granulated sugar)
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Mix oil and sugar with whisk.
3. Beat egg in a separate bowl and stir into oil-sugar mixture.
4. Stir in molasses.
5. Sift flour, salt, soda, cinnamon and ground ginger into the wet ingredients, and mix the ingredients until blended.
6. Scoop dough with a cookie scoop (I use a 1 1/2 tbsp/ 2-inch scoop) or use a small spoon. With your hands, roll dough gently into balls.
7. Coat rolled dough in smoked pecan sugar (or turbinado sugar), and place on a parchment-lined cookie sheet.
8. Bake 15 minutes for chewy cookies and up to 17 minutes if you prefer your cookies crunchy.
Note: Both doughs freeze well. Freeze the dough one of two ways: (1) as a large mass in a freezer-safe bag or container. When ready to bake, thaw the dough, scoop, and bake as directed, or (2) scoop dough into balls, and flash freeze the dough on a parchment-lined cookie sheet for 15 minutes. Once dough balls are slightly frozen and will not stick to each other, transfer dough to freezer-safe storage bag. You will need to increase baking time slightly if following the second method and baking frozen dough.