This week I experienced my first taste of failure. I was not thrilled with the way that either of these two cookies turned out because quite a few of the bottoms got burnt. The cookies made from scratch were so much better than the cookies made from store-bought dough, but I don’t think that came as a huge surprise.
Let’s start with the store-bought dough cookies, so we can talk about them now and never speak of them again. The few cookies from this group that didn’t burn were crispy and virtually taste-free. The chocolate chunks were evenly distributed and a decent size, but they didn’t taste much like chocolate. I really like my chocolate chip cookies to have a nice soft center to them, but these had almost the texture of crackers. Terrible, chocolate-studded crackers.
My homemade cookies tasted great for the most part. I was disappointed by how many I discovered to have burned, but overall, they really weren’t that bad. Cookies are definitely something I am going to work on again in a few weeks, I really want to improve on them. I got a suggestion from my friend Anna to use Silpat baking sheets when doing cookies, and when I brought this idea up to others, I found that many baking friends and acquaintances swear by them. I will definitely pick some up before I do cookies again. The homemade cookies did have that delicious soft center to them that I crave in a good chocolate chip cookie, the chocolate morsels were evenly distributed and melted to perfection in the few cookies that I sampled for myself. The cookies were flavorful, but I feel like they can be better. I also would like my homemade cookies to look a little bit more like the other ones did on top – they were just so professional looking. Maybe it’s something that comes with practice. I’ll have to see.
I shared the cookies with my coworkers, who seemed very happy for the treat on the last day of our fiscal year. The homemade cookies went really fast, while there is still a full Tupperware container of the other cookies sitting on my desk waiting to be thrown out come Monday. I was nervous about the snow that was supposed to hit over the weekend possibly closing the building and the cleaning crew not being able to empty out my trash over the weekend. One of the last things I want to find at my desk on a Monday morning is the lingering odor of burnt cookies – gross! The reactions to the cookies were pretty positive. Most people responded that the cookies were great, and I truly appreciate it. I’ve said it before, but I’m my own worst critic sometimes, so I’m definitely harder on myself than the other taste-testers I have. I was also surprised to find out that lots of people really like burnt baked goods, because some of my coworkers responded to my burnt-offering apology with the kind, “Doesn’t matter to me,” and even “No, I like the burnt ones!” This leads me to believe that people will take any free baked goods they get, or maybe that the folks in my office are so starved for homemade baked goods that the quality of the product doesn’t even matter. For the next couple taste-test columns, I’ll be employing other testers, so we’ll have to see.
With this project I came up against my first brush with a bad finished product, but I’m eager to push through. I will definitely be investing in some Silpat sheets and will be trying cookies again in the near future. Stay tuned!
Thanks for reading.
- Jon
No comments:
Post a Comment