Let's Make Our Cookies Bigger

People of the world, aren't you tired of tiny cookies? You know the kind I'm talking about. They're the kind that you end up making when a recipe says, "Drop cookie batter by rounded tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheets." That's what the recipe says for Nestle's Oatmeal Butterscotch Cookies, which I made again tonight (here's the recipe from the first time I made them). They're great cookies--sweet chemical morsels embraced by wholesome natural oatmeal--and I definitely enjoyed them when they were small. But tonight I wanted them bigger.

To make them bigger here's what I did: I used an ice cream scoop. I scooped out big blobs of batter, pushed the little handle on the scoop and dropped them on to parchment paper placed on my cookie sheet. The recipe was to make two dozen, I made nine. Then, instead of using the time allotted on the bag, I baked them until they were flat and brown around the edges.

And you know what? I got exactly what I wanted: big, smile-inducing cookies. Everybody loves a big cookie. So don't cowtow to the tiny cookie gods just because they yell at you from the side of a bag. Get yourself an ice cream scoop and make your cookies bigger: you'll be glad you did.