Chocolate Crinkles - Revisiting Childhood Memories

I've always loved food. And I've always had a sweet tooth. My mom was never a big baker, so when I was about ten, I decided to try my hand at baking. Probably because I wanted something sweet and there wasn't a cookie or treat anywhere in the house. 

I remember the first cookies I made were from a Girl Scout cookbook. I have no idea where that recipe is today. All I remember is that it was for chocolate chip cookies and included a box of cake mix. I thought they were the best cookies in the world.

So I guess my love of collecting recipes began at a relatively young age, though many of those early recipes have disappeared. Over the years, I've recalled a recipe called Chocolate Crinkles and wondered why I hadn't saved it. Or figured it had been lost in one of our many military moves years ago. So imagine my delight when I was going to through a stack of my mom's recipes and found that recipe card I'd hand-written at twelve years of age.

Last Tuesday was my friend, Drenda's, annual cookie exchange. Yes, I know I've been talking about it for weeks. Well, as soon as I found this recipe, I knew what I was taking.

Let's gather our ingredients.

2 cups sugar

4 eggs

1/2 cup vegetable/canola oil

2 cups all purpose flour

2 tsp. vanilla extract

2 tsp. baking powder

4 oz. unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled

1/2 tsp. salt

1 cup confectioners/powdered sugar

Okay, let's start with that chocolate.

This is what you'll be looking for at the store. And it's a 4 oz bar, so that works out perfectly.

Chop it up to aid the melting process, then you can either melt it in the microwave in 30 second intervals or on the stove over low heat.

Once the chocolate is melted, set it aside to cool.

Once it's cooled, mix together the chocolate, sugar, oil and vanilla.

Blend in the eggs, one at a time.

Next, sift together your flour, baking powder and salt and slowly add to the chocolate mixture.

Don't be alarmed when your cookie dough looks more like a really thick cake batter.

We're going to cover this with plastic wrap and pop it into the refrigerator for 3 hours.

I press the plastic wrap against the batter so it won't dry out.

After three hours, your batter-like cookie dough looks like this.

Stiff and smooth. All of the sugar granules have dissolved.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Form dough into 1 1/2 inch balls. 

Roll balls in confectioners sugar.

Place 2 inches apart on baking sheet.

I ended up with somewhere between 5 and 6 dozen ball/cookies, so be prepared.

Bake for 10-12 minutes or until set.

And voila!

Aren't they pretty? 

I will confess that they didn't taste quite as good as I remembered. Actually, they taste a lot like brownies. And my guys had no complaints. One even asked if he could take some to his friends. 

But I guess my taste buds have become more refined over the years, so next time I'm going to make one slight tweak.

Cinnamon.

Yep, next time I'm going to add a teaspoon or so of cinnamon to ramp up that chocolate flavor.

Now it's your turn. How old were you when you starting cooking/baking? 

Did you have a favorite recipe? Do you still have/make it today?