Big Fat Chocolate Chip Cookies

Have any of you with children ever greeted your kids, freshly home from school with a plate of warm, gooey chocolate chip cookies and a glass of cold milk? Their faces brighten and whatever woes they may have on their weary little shoulders are suddenly lifted. They are welcomed into the warmth of your kitchen and your love. As the melted chocolate spreads from their fingers to their faces, and then to the table, furniture, and walls you smile and know that they will be enjoying this sugar high for hours to come. They are suddenly eager to tell you through cookie-stuffed mouths about their day, their ups and downs, disappointments and successes. You listen, rapt, because you have nothing else to do. Your kitchen is clean, despite the fact that, yes, as you recall, the cookies have just moments before been pulled from the oven. No dishes to wash, no laundry to tend to. In this perfect moment it is just you and your child. You become gradually aware that there is music playing somewhere. You realize that you are either dreaming or you have been abducted by aliens and they are subjecting you to euphoria-inducing holograms in classic Star-Trek style. You turn back to your child just before he sprouts chocolatey tentacles reaching out to...

Eh... just kidding.

But, if ever there were such a perfect moment outside of the Andy Griffith Show, and barring alien intervention these cookies would have to be part of it. They've never failed me.

Big Fat Never Fail Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 Tablespoon vanilla
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Sift the flour, salt and baking soda. Set aside.
Combine butter, brown sugar and sugar. Add egg and egg yolk and vanilla and blend until creamy. Stir in dry ingredients just until combined. Stir in chocolate chips.
Cover and chill for at least an hour.
Preheat oven to 325 degrees, line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
Scoop out cookie dough with 1/4 cup measuring cup. (Hey, did you catch the title? These suckers are huge! Leave plenty of space around each cookie) Bake for 17-20 minutes or until edges begin to turn golden. Allow to rest on cookie sheet for 1-2 minutes and then transfer to cooling rack.

Chow down, my friend.