As of this week, I am the mother of a TEENAGER. Ack!I asked my son what kind of cake he wanted for his birthday, and he told me a chocolate chip cookie cake (a simple request compared to last summer's birthday baking project). He didn't tell me how he wanted it decorated, so I did my own thing -- projecting how I felt about having a teenager. I thought it was kind of amusing.
My 13-year-old, whose birthday has been accompanied by his first real pimple, interpreted the decorations a different way. The blue guy had some errant sprinkles on his face, which my son thought was meant to be pimples. He thought the guy was saying "oh no" about having pimples. Oops. Nothing like a mom's insensitivity to ruin a kid's self-esteem.Oh well ... I have my own self esteem to worry about. I've been a little dejected about the idea of being the mother of a teenager. Luckily, tonight CRB has a fun gig at the Jukebox in Spencerport. There's nothing like some rock & roll to make you feel young! Any Rochesterians out there, come out and see us! We'll take the stage sometime between 10 and 11 p.m. There's no cover.
Here are the recipes I used for the cake:
Thick and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake
Rah Cha Chow note: This is my favorite dough for making chocolate chip cookies. If you are making a cookie cake, it will be a bit too much dough for a 12-inch pizza pan. Either eat the extra dough with a spoon (don't blame me if the raw eggs make you sick) or make a few cookies with it.
2 1/8 cups (2 cups plus 2 tablespoons) all-purpose flour (bleached is best but unbleached is ok)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
12 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 1/2 sticks), melted and cooled until warm
1 cup light or dark brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups chocolate chips or chunks (this time I used a combination of milk and dark)
Parchment for pans
Heat oven to 325 degrees. Mix flour, salt and baking soda in a medium bowl; set aside.
Mix butter and sugars until thoroughly blended. Mix in egg, yolk and vanilla. Add dry ingredients; mix until just combined. Stir in chips. (I like to refrigerate for awhile at this point, but it's not absolutely necessary. The dough supposedly can be refrigerated for up to two days or frozen for up to a month -- but cookie dough, even frozen, doesn't very long in my household.)
For the cookie cake, press most of the dough onto a 12-inch parchment-lined round pizza pan, leaving a one-inch rim on the outside rim of the pan. Bake until light golden brown, about 21 minutes.
With the extra dough, drop by scant 1/4 cups onto baking sheet. Place on parchment-lined cookie sheets. Bake until cookies are light golden brown and outer edges start to harden yet centers are still soft and puffy, 15 to 18 minutes. Cool cookies on cookie sheets.
Decorator icingadapted from Magnolia Bakery
1/2 cup shortening
3 to 4 cups confectioner's sugar
1/4 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Decorator pastes for coloring icing (the ones I like best, from Williams Sonoma, are pictured)
Place shortening in a large mixing bowl. Add two cups confectioners sugar and then the milk and the vanilla.
On the medium speed of an electric mixer, beat until smooth and creamy, about 3 to 5 minutes. Add one more cup of sugar and beat for two minutes. If you want the icing thicker, add the remaining cup, a little at a time, beating well after each addition. You may not use the whole cup.
If desired, add a few drops of food coloring paste and mix thoroughly.
Use and store the icing at room temperature for up to three days.
This makes plenty for making various colors to decorate the cookie cake. You will have some left over.