Thanks to everyone who commented on my recent posts about feeling so overwhelmed by my own feelings. I’ve appreciated so much your generosity with me, and there are a couple of you to whom I still need to respond by email – there is great kindness here. As the days have passed, and certain parts of my life have been shown in sharp relief, I choose to go with the flow as an act of stability rather than as an expression of wavering. I’ll say more about this process, perhaps, in an upcoming post or two, but for now I want to just say, again, thank you.
I also appreciate so much the opportunity to step out of the internal angst every so often and step into the kitchen – The Karmic Kitchen. Blogger Big Shamu (Only Orca In The Midwest!!) hosts a bloggie cooking festival of sorts every couple of Sundays. She announces a theme or ingredient in advance, and then on the appointed Sunday everyone who wishes to participate posts their contribution to the theme. In true dim sum fashion, it’s a little bit of this and a little bit of that. Participating in Dim Sum Sunday has been great for me because it’s gotten me into my own kitchen, a place I more or less just swept with a glance until fairly recently. Additionally, I’ve been able to feel centered while cooking, especially with my children but even by myself. It’s been fun to more or less “discover” myself singing as I cook. For a person who spends so much time roiling around in my internal world, I think a bi-weekly cooking “assignment” is probably excellent therapy.
Today’s theme was really exceptional. Kids’ Choice works differently than any other Dim Sum in which I’ve participated, though I just jumped into the fray recently so it may have been done before. Here’s the explanatory post, complete with frightening photos of disaster looming. LOL Now, here’s how it worked around here: I decided what my children and I would make together (they’re young enough that I am not up for leaving them in the kitchen alone – see above under “disaster looming”). I then let Shamy know what our Kids’ Choice was (oatmeal chocolate chip cookies!!); she then made her own version. We each photographed the results and you’ll see both sets of photos on both blogs. Shamy was a busy landlocked marine mammal, inasmuch as she was also doing this with several other families.
I picked cookies because I recently bought cookie sheets and parchment paper; and the children and I have made cookies from mixes before, but not from scratch. Chocolate chip cookies seemed like a no-brainer, and the oatmeal seemed to hint at something that might possibly be marginally healthy (don’t laugh too hard). I asked around for tried-and-true recipes, since I was looking for a classic that I could appropriate into my own cookie-baking repertoire. A friend who bakes all the time suggested Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies from Allrecipes.com She said when she takes these to potlucks they fly away. This seemed like a good recommendation. Here’s the recipe, just copied and pasted from the site.
Ingredients- 1 cup butter
- 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/4 cup white sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 cup boiling water
- 2 cups quick cooking oats
- 1/2 cup raisins (optional)
- 1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
- Beat butter or margarine,
sugars and vanilla 
until light and fluffy. Add flour and salt, mix well.
- Dissolve baking soda in boiling water and add to mixture. Stir in rolled oats,
raisins (note from Making Space: no raisins were harmed in the making of this batch of cookies!!) and chocolate chips.
- Drop by teaspoonful onto ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 10-12 minutes. Don’t over cook. (There are no eggs in this recipe, I didn’t forget to type it down).
We made it exactly as the recipe recommended, and well, may I just say that when you put two sticks of butter together with a bag of chocolate chips and throw in some sugar, flour and oatmeal, you just really really can’t possibly go wrong. Haha
This turned out to be a great recipe to do with young children. No eggs, so feel free to eat the batter. The batter is really easy to stir, even for small hands and arms. The many different sizes and shapes of cookies all cooked evenly at the same time. A most excellent recipe for a distracted mom who hasn’t made a chocolate chip cookie in thirty years, supervising young children who – well, who REALLY REALLY REALLY want to cook. And talk. And sing. And dance. All at the same time. And of course each one MUST have my full attention. So yeah. This is a household that needs a cookie recipe that’s not especially high maintenance. We’ve found it. Holy moly we have FOUND it. (Special note to those who know my family a bit more than I’ve revealed here: on my blog I ask that commenters not refer to the number, ages, names, or genders of my children. You can call them The Sweeties if you want a handy nickname. Thanks!)
Now, having said all of that, I must confess to some mild (extreme?) interest in trying out Shamu’s recipe, which I have not yet seen. She did send me photos, and as always, her fantastic cooking and her gorgeous photography blew me away. 
She indicated that her cookies got pretty much the same response in her neck of the woods as our cookies got here. 
Well, I mean, you can’t really go wrong with a chocolate chip cookie, can you? But it sure is nice to have a recipe that’s more than just OK. And I gotta tell y’all, this next photo durn near made my heart stop. Lordy that woman can photograph a cookie!
Yep, definitely gonna head over to The Karmic Kitchen to find out how to make THAT.
So there you have it. In the passing of internal turmoil, the gentle alchemy of a little of this and a little of that brings sweetness and bonding. And at the end of the day, a shared food adventure reminds me that we all want that experience of contributing to something wonderful while feeling cared for. It’s really as simple as – an oatmeal chocolate chip cookie.
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