The Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Ever

By Audrey Yeung

Servings: 16

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 13 minutes

Ingredients:

• 280g all-purpose flour

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• ½ teaspoon salt

• 170g unsalted butter

• 150g brown sugar (light or dark is okay)

• 100g granulated sugar

• 1 egg and 1 egg yolk

• 150g brown sugar (dark only)

• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• 225g chocolate chips

Instructions:

1. Whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together in a large bowl. Set aside.

2. Melt the butter in a bowl that is microwave-safe. You made that mistake last time, so you’re not going to make it again because it broke. You stared at the cracked pieces for a while before cleaning them up, forcing yourself to face the reality that baking is probably not your thing. But then again, what is? And yet, here you are.

3. After the butter is cooled down, mix it with the brown sugar and granulated sugar with a spatula. Then, add the eggs and mix them all together until the consistency is smooth. You measured too much sugar, and now it’s all mixed up. Oh well, what’s a little more, anyway? You can hear the specks of sugar in the batter because no matter how much you mix, the ratio is going to be off. Your friends were wrong; baking isn’t fun. They said it was supposed to help, but it’s not. What a sick joke they must have played because look at all the ingredients you bought! Look at the batter that is half-ruined!

4. Pick up the phone, because your best friend has been calling you for the past half an hour. Hello, how are you doing, you say, because that’s the script you learned when you were given your first phone at the ripe age of eleven. He says he’s doing well, and he asks it back. Or maybe he’s asked something else. You’re fine, you want to say. You’re doing well, you’re trying to say. You’re baking, you say instead. He doesn’t reply for a while. The phone lines are rusting. And he says something else about not sleeping enough, but his words come out muffled like he’s underwater, so you tell him to sleep well and to have a nice dream. He lets out a sigh, and he says goodbye, so you say goodbye, and then he hangs up.

5. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix it all together until a dough forms. Add the eggs as well, and top it off with the salt. The dough isn’t forming, and it’s more liquid than anything. Maybe add more flour. Ignore your doctor’s call; it probably isn’t important if he’s called seven times already. Dust the flour from your hands and put on some music. The speaker is dead, so just play it on the phone. Did they put out new music? The album is good, but not as good as their first. The dough is still liquid. Is there any point, then? Add more flour, but it’s too dry now. The eggs! Add the eggs. Mix it together. Turn off the music. Turn off the air conditioner. Close the windows. Everything is too loud.

6. Pour the chocolate chips into the dough. You thought they expired a couple of months ago, but they seem fine. Mix everything together. Apparently, you’re supposed to taste it, and it tastes alright. Mix it more. Again. A little more. Once more.

7. Scoop the dough into balls and place them on the baking sheet. 

8. Bake them at 325°F for thirteen minutes. 

9. Take them out of the oven after thirteen minutes. The clock must be moving faster because that doesn’t look right. The cookies are cool already, and the oven mitts were unnecessary. They’re already getting stale, but didn’t you just take them out of the oven? Oh well. 

10. The fridge has a pink sticky note that says, “Don’t Cry!”. You stuck that on this morning as per suggestions from your family and friends. In a wonderful turn of events, you didn’t cry today, so pat yourself on the back and enjoy your cookie.

Rationale: I wanted to write something, in honour of the theme of mental health awareness, that would bring attention to this topic more subtly - conveying depression in a way that might not be everyones 'first thought' through lesser known symptoms, and I hope that it might bring more awareness and increase general knowledge of what many people might be going through.