Egg whites, beaten and folded in?
??? I don’t know. Do egg whites stay lofty in the presence of butter though?
I googled and they look like this but I’m still not sure. Extra baking soda and vanilla pudding. ??? http://www.seededatthetable.com/2010/09/29/perfectly-puffy-chocolate-chip-cookies/
Hmm, see the comment about fresh baking soda. Tho I don’t think most home cooks fuss about that.
Egg whites do their job in soufflé, even with a heavy cream sauce, with butter. The rest, I don’t know.
I’ve had some disappointing results with Toll House cookies over the years, but lately I seem to have gotten much better at this recipe.
I’ve become a a stickler for the fresh baking soda. It seems to make a difference, at least in my experience.
I also take my time creaming the butter and sugar (by hand, though), add extra vanilla extract, extra chips, add the baking soda and sea salt after mixing in the eggs and before adding the flour, and leave the freshly mixed dough in the refrigerator for a day or two before baking.
Hm, I don’t think those puffy choc chip cookies look right. Speaking of choc chip cookie variations - here’s everything you need to know: http://www.handletheheat.com/ultimate-cookie-troubleshooting-guide/
@redpoodles My first thought was the vanilla pudding as I’ve seen recipes that refer to that.
Personally, I like my chocolate chip cookies gooey and dense and slightly underbaked. That’s what a good cc cookie is. 
Okay, here’s a recipe using shortcut ingredients that is actually good enough that years ago I requested the recipe from an older friend who brought it to some church event. It is from Peg Bracken’s I Hate to Cook Book II. I’ve never actually made it, but now that I’ve dredged the card out of my recipe box I think I will.
In a bowl, put
1 pkg yellow cake mix (she use Duncan Hines, which was 1 lb 3 oz)
1 pkg instant Vanilla Pudding mix (I’m assuming the standard size)
4 eggs
3/4 cup salad oil
3/4 cup sherry (she doesn’t say what kind, probably cream)
1 tsp nutmeg
Beat it all together for 5 minutes at medium speed. Pour into a greased tube pan or bundt. Bake at 350F for 35 min in a shiny pan, or at 325F for about 40 min in a dark coated pan, or until it tests done. Cool in pan for 15 min.
I’m betting that it’s the sherry and nutmeg that appealed to me.
The White Almond Sour Cream Cake (WASC on the baking forums) is my fancy go-to. (I skip the almond extract and dbl the vanilla.) The recipes are for large batches, as it’s usually a celebration cake. A sure winner.
I believe the old recipes used box mixes when they were 18 oz. No end of chat about how to convert to the new 15 oz boxes. (I say, WTH, just buy another box and make it 18.)
My D just sent me this link for oreo stuffed chocolate chip cookies, look seriously decadent!
http://gimb.co/2dulamL
I use ghirardelli chocolate chips for chocolate chip cookies, use extra chips and also refrigerate at least a few hours before baking them. It keeps the cookie from spreading out as much so it is softer in the middle, less crispy. I think the ghirardelli chips are better quality chocolate than nestles.
I’ve made those oreo stuffed choice chip cookies many times. Always a hit with teens. They are fairly massive cookies by the time you cover the oreo in cookie dough, about 3x the size of a normal chocolate chip cookie. They are pretty awesome.
I’m also a ghiradelli chocolate chip user. So much better than Nestle.
There is a recipe for salted caramel chocolate chip cookies that is similar to the oreo one except the cookies are stuffed with caramels or rolos. They are pretty amazing too.
The typical chocolate chip cookie is already way too sweet for me; I can’t imagine how sweet they’d be with an oreo or caramels in the middle. Maybe I should be posting this on the “what do you hate that everyone else loves” thread, but those cookies don’t sound appealing to me at all.
I like my cookies with double the nuts and half the chocolate chips, and extra salt. I won’t eat a chocolate chip cookie without nuts. Just too sweet. Don’t like a gooey cookie either.
My only “secret” recipe is one I got over 40 years ago from a friend for a sweet and sour salad dressing. It particularly calls for tarragon vinegar. I recently mislaid the card with the proportions and, after an hour long google search, finally found it from an old restaurant. They warned not to substitute for the tarragon vinegar–it’s the secret ingredient. I’m no longer finding tarragon vinegar in any grocery or specialty store in my area or elsewhere–it’s been replaced with so many other fancy vinegars, I can still find it online, but I guess if that source dries up, I’ll have to try making it myself.
When I had my chocolate business, I used to make several kinds of “Over-stuffed Oreos.” I would take the oreos apart, add an additional filling, reassemble, then dip the whole thing in dark chocolate or milk chocolate couverture, and garnish with a contrasting color of couverture.
The flavors were sea salt caramel, natural crunchy peanut butter (always Teddie SuperChunk), and three different dark chocolate ganaches (mint, raspberry, and orange liqueur).
A client asked me to make them, and I initially thought they were too hokey for me, since my specialty was high end truffles, caramels, and the like, but people adored them. They were popular as wedding favors with initials on them, too.
Believe me, they were a completely different thing from the coated versions Oreo sells. Top quality ingredients make a big difference.
Wow, I know some chocolate fanatics who would love those.
I’m a weird one; I only like chocolate when it is combined with nuts (salty nuts) (or covering a toffee, also crammed with nuts) so those Oreos, no matter how expertly done, would not be for me.
Did you ever make toffee? There’s a company here in LA called Valerie Confections that makes the best artisanal toffee.
@doschicos, if you guys wouldn’t mind coming to Iowa, we can host a shindig any time. hehe
Road Trip!
Shotgun! And I call dibs on the music…ok, we can take turns but no Country.
No Abba.
I’ve made salted caramel sauce, but it was before I bought the candy thermometer. Nuff said. I think my digital thermometer is a secret weapon of sorts. Not expensive, but nice to cook meat to the right temp. Can use on breads, too.