As with most things, cooking a lot means you learn a lot about cooking. I’ve been doing a lot of cookies this semester (as the locals know), and it’s been a pretty neat learning experience. I’ve figured out just how important your solid oils are (butter, margarine, shortening), and the sort of neat things you can do by varying quantities. I’ve experimented with adding extra eggs, and I’ve gotten a good handle on how the alcohol in vanilla extract impacts batter and cooking characteristics. I’ve played with solid to liquid proportions and figured out how to attain various thicknesses of cookies. I’ve chilled dough and rolled it. I’ve messed with temperatures and cooking times to see how things change when you cook at higher temps for shorter times. I figured out how to dissolve marshmallows into batter so that they don’t leave bubbles in things when you cook them.
It’s been a lot of fun, and pretty dang educational. As I often do, I am wondering whether I could put together a business and sell baked goods over the internet. And as I often do I figure I’m probably not interested enough in actually doing it. Ah well.
Thomas