I’ve tried quite a few cookie recipes over the years. This is my favourite at the moment for ease, speed and simplicity of ingredients and produces cookies that are crunchy-chewy round the edges but soft and fluffy in the middle.

Makes 12 generously sized cookies (maybe more if you add chocolate chunks etc)…

Set the oven to 190°C

In a small-ish bowl:
Mix 175g plain flour, 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda and 1/2 tsp salt

In a large mixing bowl:
Cream 125g sugar with 90g caster sugar and 90g light brown sugar
Add 1/2 tsp vanilla essence and a large egg and mix until fairly smooth
Combine in the flour mixture from the small bowl a third at a time

Lay a piece of baking paper on a rectangular baking sheet or tray (I use my grill pan).

Put 6 balls of the dough (about half the mixture in total) on the tray in a 3 by 2 arrangement. No need to flatten down as it’ll melt down in the oven.

Put in the oven for 9-11 minutes. Take out when just going brown around the edges at which point they should still pretty squidgy in the middle.

Slide paper off the tray, add another piece of baking paper and then repeat with the other half of the mixture.

P.S. If you’re really fancy, you might have two baking trays and be able to bake all 12 cookies at once but this is how I do it. It’s handy to do it in two batches if you have a habit of forgetting about your baking as you only burn half the batch!

I defy anyone to watch this without smiling…

I’ve finally managed to find a pen that will fit in my wallet. I had one from a cracker for a while but that disappeared somewhere. Anyway, it’s the OHTO Petit-B and it arrived today from Cult Pens. Here it is with an extra small Moleskine Volant for a complete tiny note taking solution! (Although the Moleskine is 1cm too long for my wallet)

It’s got a nice fine tip and writes pretty smoothly – not quite as nice to use as my favourite pens the Pilot G-Tec-C4 and the Pilot V5 Hi-Tecpoint (0.5mm) but I can’t get them in my wallet.

I think that’s a suitable inane post to restart up this blog!