I love to bake… I’ve always loved to bake.  But I don’t do it often since I also love to eat… a LOT!  I had made this recipe with regular flour for my family and for the high school youth group that I host on Wednesday’s and they were a HUGE hit… it makes a nice, soft, study cookie.  I made another huge batch of these this weekend for their mission trip meeting today – again another huge hit…. So I wanted to try to tweak the recipe for me (since I couldn’t even taste the batter which is really my favorite part).  I know the mouth feel of gluten free flour isn’t always the same – I started off trying the recipe with an almond flour blend… the texture was right on, but the taste… well, it tasted “floury” – and while good, not quite right.  So then I tried it with the Trader Joe’s gluten free flour blend.  Now I know some of you gluten free bakers are all about making your own flour blend based on what you are baking.  More power to you, but I just haven’t gotten into that yet… I try not to eat too much of this substitute stuff as I do feel better when I avoid it – but c’mon – a girls gotta have a good home made (and by that I mean – eat the raw cookie dough as we bake3) cookie.   So anyway – back to the cookie at hand… I used this recipe and quartered the batch (the original recipe makes a TON of cookies… great for a party – a church group – a meeting – but not great for a girl trying not to eat herself into a sugar induced coma) – I tweaked the recipe a bit since like I said before, what I find “off” about most gluten free recipes is the mouth feel… enter instant pudding… it really helps the mouth feel AND makes these a great sturdy, light, fluffy, cookie (and yes, the dough is the BOMB… and for purposes of CYA… do not eat raw or undercooked cookie dough – you do this at your own risk… as do I!)  so by quartering this recipe and holding back a smidge on the flour and adding a little more instant pudding… I ended up with one amazing chocolate chip cookie – even my hubby had to ask me if I’d handed him a gluten free cookie to try or the regular wheat flour cookie.. its that good!!!

So my fellow gluten avoiders… try it – you will NOT be sorry (and unless you want over 100 cookies on your hands…. or in your tummies) make a smaller batch – because they will be eaten… oh yes, they will be eaten..

Original Recipe from All Recipes… just use my tweak (oh… and I use Mexican vanilla… I haven’t been able to confirm its  gluten free, but I can tell you I have NEVER had a reaction to it… and I put it in most things I bake – but not fudge… it doesn’t work with fudge!)

If you need help cutting the recipe down just leave a comment and I’ll be glad to help you out.  Oh… I also baked at 325 for about 15 minutes instead… of 350, I think gfree flour is happier at a wee lower temperature and by quartering the recipe I got about 2 dozen cookies after I was done tasting the batter and licking the beaters.

Happy Gfree baking! – excuse me while I go clean the chocolate off my face!

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/award-winning-soft-chocolate-chip-cookies/