Baking as "therapy"...

I come from a long line of cookie-bakers, although I'm not the most dedicated baker in the family by far. I tend to bake as the mood takes me, & as I find the time (which makes holiday cookie baking problematic, since that's the busiest time of year round our house!). I have become more intentional about baking over the past few years though, thanks to the birth of my child, B. I bought my first bread machine when B was very little (I'm on my 4th machine :) because I didn't want to buy bread with preservatives in it, & I wanted to be in charge of the ingredients. I love my bread machine :) I have been very happy with the King Arthur Baking Company for their great ingredients & gadgets, too. Over this summer B has been helping me more & more with the baking & I taught him a very reliable way to measure flour: scoop the measuring cup overflowing with flour, chop across the top of the cup with the edge of a knife to settle the flour evenly, then slide the knife across the top of the cup (with the edge, not the flat side) to remove the excess flour. B is now my expert flour-measurer, which is very cool. It takes me about half the time to bake bread & cookies with him as it does without his help!

When B was diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome, one of the associated concerns that came to light was his low muscle tone. This causes B's fingers to hyper-extend (he's what we used to call "double-jointed" because of the hypotonia) & of particular concern were his hyper-mobile thumbs. When B was 7 years old we had him evaluated by a hand surgeon, at our pediatrician's recommendation, because she was concerned that these joints were so weak that he might injure himself doing regular kid-things, like climbing or catching himself when falling. Thankfully, the surgeon ruled-out any possibility of potential injury but did mention that the thumb joints are a particularly difficult area to strengthen, & recommended squeeze balls & the like. B is not the kind of kid to use squeeze balls, but something I saw in the King Arthur catalogue made me think I'd found a substitute :) I purchased this cookie scoop 3 years ago & we're still going strong with it. When B first started using it he needed both hands to squeeze the cooky dough out, but these days he uses it casually, one-handed.

So, to encourage baking therapy, here's my favourite chocolate-chip cookie recipe (formerly a toll house recipe, but adapted over the years to be my own :).

Set oven to 375 degrees

Cream together with mixer:
1/2 cup softened butter (unsalted)
1/2 cup crisco (butter-flavour is nice)
3/4 cup granulated sugar (I use organic sugar)
3/4 cup brown sugar, packed

Add while still mixing:
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 1/4 cups flour

When flour is well mixed in, stir in 1 12-oz pkg of chocolate chips (or chocolate chunks, or a mixture of chocolate & mint chips, or chocolate & cappuccino chips- yum!). B dislikes nuts, so we don't add them.

Drop by the tablespoonful (or scoopful :) onto an ungreased cooky sheet & bake 9-11 minutes for regular sheets, or 13 minutes for air-bake sheets, till lightly browned. Cool on racks.

Makes 5-7 dozen cookys (if you fill the scoop flat, rather than rounded, you get a couple more dozen).

What we do is: I get the mooshy stuff into the bowl, then B measures the granulated sugar, then I do the stickier brown sugar (we do 3x 1/4 cups). He gets the mixer going & creams the butter/sugar mixture while I measure the rest of the ingredients & add them. By the time we get the last cup of flour into the bowl his arm is getting tired, so I finish the mixing & then mix in the choc. chips with a rubber spatula. The I fill the scoop & hand it to him to squeeze onto the cooky sheet. Voila! Cookys we both feel good about! Enjoy :)