Sugar Coma

Lately I've been on a personal quest for the perfect chocolate chip cookie, with the help of my dear friend, Allrecipes.com. I cannot even explain the excitement that this website stirs in me (no pun intended!) each time I log on - millions of recipes waiting to be tried and enjoyed, ruined and perfected...a world of possibilities!

There are so many things that can go wrong with a chocolate chip cookie.

When Krister and I were first married I decided to make a batch and somehow I got confused by the butter measurements and used a POUND of butter rather than a cup. When they came out of the oven they were laid flat like roadkill and, when pressed with a fingertip, would actually leave little pools of butter behind, filling the holes like rain fills fossilized dinosaur footprints in the ground. It was tragic. I cried and cried, partly because I felt like an idiot and partly because butter is so darn expensive and I had just wasted a whole box of it for nothing. Sweet Krister didn't want the night to end in defeat, so he whisked me away to the store to get more ingredients and try, try again.

Ever since that butter-laden disaster I have had a personal vendetta against the chocolate chip cookie. I picture the ingredients laughing at me, taunting me, laying in wait to sabotage my efforts. And so I search. I try out recipe after recipe, dedicated to finding that one that will have just the right texture, the right flavor, the one that will be truly worthy of accompanying a big glass of cold milk. Thanks to allrecipes.com, I feel closer than ever to attaining my goal, to claiming the victory over the ever elusive chocolate chip cookie of my dreams. I'm not there yet, but I am making a valiant effort.

My quest continued this afternoon as I tried my hand at a new recipe. Unfortunately I was left unsupervised in the kitchen with a whole bowl of cookie dough. You would think there was heroin in the stuff the way I was downing it. [Disclaimer: I have never even been in the same room with heroin, nor would I recognize it if I were, but I hear it's quite addictive and thus it works well to give you a picture of my inability to exercise self-control in this situation. Don't do drugs, kids.] What is it about cookie dough that is so irresistible? Part of the problem may be the fact that I have no way of measuring how much I've eaten. It's not like cake where I can see a receding line that marks the damage I've done, or like Junior Mints where I can see the delightful morsels disappearing one by one. Cookie dough just sits there innocently, begging you to sneak just one more spoonful, a pinch here, another pinch there.

But like all good things it is not so innocent once you've gone completely overboard. It's not good to feel sick before the first batch of cookies pops out of the oven. It's not good to see your finger swooping toward the bowl to grab another pinch of dough while your thighs are yelling, "Enough already! You're not even giving us a chance!" It's not good to wonder if you'll be able to eat dinner later after all that cookie bingeing. And, it's not good to eat dinner anyway, then follow it up with a couple more cookies and a few scoops of homemade ice cream. That, my friends, is what you call a sugar coma.