Thank you scone lady a.k.a. mrslarkin! I will definitely take a look at that book. I do experiment a lot, much to my children's chagrin, but I am not very good at documenting my results. food52 is helping me a lot with that!

Thanks mrslarkin! My kids will love this. I was never much on baking (I always hired pastry friendly cooks) but it seems my kids appreciate it more than my savory food dishes. As far as my cookie recipe, It's not the be all end all of cookies just a recipe that works so I kept it. I don't think there is anything wrong with toll house if your using white sugar, but I like the flavor of brown sugar and so this recipe worked.

Here's the link to Alton Brown's cookie experiments. I've tried The Chewy and it's really really good. http://www.foodnetwork.com/good-eats/three-chips-for-sister-marsha/index.html

Will give DonnyG's cookie a try too!!

If you're into experimenting with recipes and ingredients (like I always do) you should check out Shirley Corriher's cookbook Bakewise: http://www.amazon.com/BakeWise-Successful-Baking-Magnificent-Recipes/dp/1416560785/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1288023047&sr=1-1

Thanks DonnyG - I should have tried your recipe first. I thought I would start with a recipe I know as a reference point and I ended up with what you predicted.Your recipe is next!

But, what happened in your cookie's could work for a pan cookie.

What makes me go hmmm...Is the amount of butter used in the nestle toll house recipe. It calls for 2 stick or 1 cup. makes me go hmm... The recipe I posted only calls for 3/4 of a cup. I'm all for more butter usually but I'm thinking it maybe too much for structure. Just a thought.

Brown sugar does not equal white sugar plus molasses, at least when it comes to the texture of chocolate chip cookies! It is probably a great substitute for recipes where short oven times and leavening are not crucial factors. I performed my cookie experiment and have some interesting results. [note: I followed the tollhouse recipe for this experiment, substituting molasses + white sugar for brown sugar by doing the following: I mixed one cup white sugar and 2 Tbsp. unsulphured molasses in a bowl with a fork until blended. It did not look like brown sugar because the color had a reddish tinge to it.] I measured 3/4 cup of my homemade "brown" sugar by lightly packing it into the measuring cup as I normally would. My cookies really spread and turned into one giant thin cookie, much to my consternation. However this made the rest of my family happy because the cookies are thin and "juicy" as my son described? They really have a wonderful butterscotch-ey toffee-ish flavor but they were way too bendy for me. So perhaps chilling the dough, or adding a little more flour, or decreasing the butter, or clarifying then chilling the butter (to get rid of some of the moisture), or using baking powder in lieu of baking soda would help to reduce the amount of spread and correct the consistency issue. I think I need to perform additional experiments. I will post a recipe if I get a good one out of this process. But even if I don't, thanks to DonnyG I know how to jumpstart a car!

Donny's right on both the Brown sugar sub ratios and the car jumping instructions. Just don't mix the two up!

My understanding is that most brown sugar is refined white sugar to which molasses has been added back, so you're really not doing anything different than what the processors do...

:) very useful info! Thank u donnyg. Recipe is a must try. Post it if u can. I've been playing around w alton browns The Chewy. He melts the butter, then chills dough. Uses brown & gran sugar. Its a honkin cookie.

Jumpstarting a car-requires two cars and a set of jumper cables. Park each car front to front lift hoods and Identify battery. Using your jumper cables connect positive to positive (red to red) and negative to negative (black to black). Car being used to jump needs to be running and turn ignition key to start car being jumped. If you have a manual transmission get the car rolling (Doen a hill are a push from a friend) with the ignition in the on position. Once you get up to speed as fast as you can push in clutch shift to second gear and let the clutch out. This is called bump starting. LOL! I hope this helps.

Thanks DonnyG for the recipe - you seem to enjoy a lower chip to dough ratio as do I! And thanks to Mr_Vittles and mrslarkin, I might do a little comparison testing with the molasses substitutions, just out of curiosity, and if that means I will have twice as many cookies, well then I will just have to suffer through ;) And, I will post my findings, in the name of science.

That is a great question! And thanks for the answers. Gonna try it out. Now if I only knew how to jumpstart a car. Which may never happen, what with my exploding appliance phobia.

Yeah. Donny G's ratio will work out fine. Cook's Illustrated said it is a suitable substitute when you don't have any brown sugar.

Sorry, I think i'm having some comprehension problems today. You can make your own brown sugar with white sugar and molasses with the ration of 1 cup sugar to 2 tblsp of molasses you can mix it by pulsing in your food processor. Most recipes that call for brown sugar have the goal to have a softer chewy-er cookie as the end result. So, yes it could change the levening action in your cookie and can result in a flatter cookie with less snap but I think this could depend on cooking temp and length of cooking time.Molasses retains moisture. You can see the difference in brown sugar VS. White granulated sugar. If you don't like the result don't use the brown sugar. Or use a 50/50 mix of brown sugar and white sugar. Or try this recipe that works for me.

Chocolate Chip Cookies W/ brown sugar
2 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup butter soft (room temp)
1 1/4 cups brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 1/4 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Mix together flour, baking soda and salt.
With your mixer cream butter and brown sugar until light (2 minutes). Beat in vanilla extract and egg until smooth. With the mixer on low speed, gradually add in all the flour mixture, stopping when the dough has just come together
Fold in chocolate chips.
Place tablespoons or scoop of dough on baking sheet.
Bake for about 10 minutes (+ or - 1 ) until just golden around the edges.
Transfer to a wire rack to cool

Good luck!

Makes 3 dozen.

1 cup to 2tblsp will get you there!