Donna Andert's Chocolate Chip Mint Cookies
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(as adapted by Bill Evans)

all-purpose flour       610   g
unsweetened cocoa        65   g
instant nonfat dry milk  60   g
salt                    a ceremonial amount

butter                  2 1/4 cup (4 1/2 sticks)
brown sugar             220   g
granulated sugar        300   g

large eggs              3
vanilla extract         3     tsp
peppermint extract      6     tsp

milk chocolate chips    3     cup (two 11.5 oz packages)

Allow the butter to soften so it's easy to mix in the sugars. You want it to be soft throughout, but you don't want it to melt. My favorite method is to take your largest mixing bowl, the one you'll be using for the cookie dough. Remove the sticks (and the half stick) from their wrappers and place them in the bowl. Place this bowl in the oven and fire up the oven for two minutes. Then turn off the oven and remove the bowl. Wait for about 45 minutes. Then two minutes of heat, and 45 minutes outside the oven. Repeat this a few times. Obviously this means starting the softening way, way before the rest of the steps in making the cookies.
Mix dry ingredients together. Set aside.

Whip the vanilla into the butter. Mix in the sugars.

Into that, mix the eggs, and then the peppermint. Then mix in the dry ingredients.

Add the chips, preferably by abandoning the mixer and using your fingers.

350 degrees, about 14 minutes, less for fresher flavor, more for structural intecgrity. Your kilometerage, and oven, may vary. The recipe yields enough that I have to bake in three shifts. I found that the second shift required somewhat less baking time than the third shift, which in turn required less baking time than the first shift. Be alert to this possibility.
NOTES

Salt or no salt? Your choice. Salted butter or unsalted butter? Your choice. I prefer no salt at all in these cookies.

I like to open the eggs into a separate, very small bowl rather than straight into the dough. That makes it easier to fish out tiny bits of eggshell.

If a bit of eggshell is in the small bowl, you can chase it out by scraping it up the side of the bowl with the side of an ordinary table-style teaspoon.

Since the recipe calls for 6 tsp of peppermint extract, if you buy a 1 fluid ounce bottle, it'll be tempting to just dump the whole thing in there. If the brand is McCormick, that could be a mistake. I've often found their 1 fluid ounce bottle to be generous enough that the mint flavor becomes far, far too strong.

I grease the cookie sheets with a "pencil" (a stick, with the wrapper still around it) of frozen margarine. If it's not frozen, you'll get too much margarine on the cookie sheet. (Butter will probably work as well.)

For placing the cookies on the cookie sheet, I recommend using a 1 1/2 tablespoon ice cream scoop, the kind with a curved blade inside the scoop to release the content easily.

Sat Sep 27 01:54:16 PDT 2025