Cookie Mix Recipe: Fat Deviating

I've been on a roll lately with deviating from sweets recipes—even easy and convenient ones. This time, I deviated from a Krusteaz Triple Chocolate Chunk cookie mix. (Krusteaz has nothing to do with the Simpsons show clown, Krusty.)

The box calls for only 1/2 cup (1 stick) of butter and one egg besides the packaged mix. Simple. But I didn't want to use only all butter for the fat.

Sooo, I used half the butter called for. The other half, I replaced with one tablespoon of sesame oil and enough cooking oil to fill 1/2 cup.

Yes, I realized AFTER I baked the cookies that I put in too much cooking oil. I should have added three tablespoons of cooking oil instead of seven, resulting in 400 extra calories (200 calories x 2 oz. oil).

The results weren't disastrous. The cookies came out crispy, and just a mite oilier than if I'd replaced the correct amounts of fat. The cookie webpage claimed the cookies to be "chewy". They had 400 additional calories spread over 46 cookies, which amounted to less than 10 extra calories per cooky.

According to the Krusteaz box's nutritional table, the dry ingredients total 2160 calories (120 calories x 18 servings of two 2"-diameter cookies). A prepared mix of dry and wet ingredients total 3060 (170 per serving). Anyway, if I had prepared my 46 cookies with the equivalent fat substitutions, each cooky would have been 66 1/2 calories (3060/46). Instead, each cooky came to about 75 calories (3460/46).

The Krusteaz box displayed a table that listed yields as follows:

• 56 2" cookies (2 t dough)
• 24 2-1/2" cookies (1 rounded T dough)
• 2 3" cookies (2 rounded T dough).

The nutritional table estimated a yield of 36 2" cookies. As my yield was 46, I'm guessing my tablespoonfuls were somewhere between level and slightly concave.

Although I increased the number of ingredients from the box's recommendation, it was by only two. The sesame oil, a favorite additive of mine, gave the cookies a nutty flavor. The cooking oil reduced the amount of saturated fat because of butter. Yes, overall fat was higher. Next time, I'll try to remember to substitute the right amounts. :-)

My pixstrip panels show the following images:

1. Implements
2. Ingredients
3. Pan with raw dough/baked cookies
4. Plate of cookies (yum)

To search for other sweets recipes (most of them EZ), use the search feature at the upper left of the webpage, or click keywords in the index at the upper right.

My Trip Over an Apostrophe

I created and continue to maintain the Austin Heart of Texas (AHOT) Designers Council website. (AHOT is a professional organization for printed circuit board designers.) The other day, I uncloaked a navigation link, then uploaded the javascript file, not expecting hiccups. Surprise! Surprise! Surprise! My heart sank when I refreshed the page and saw the content section suddenly hug the left margin, the navigation menu having disappeared! I immediately thought, "¡Ay, Caramba!"

Doh! I had overlooked saving an archive file of what had previously worked. Memories bubbled to the surface of javascript files being extremely unforgiving for such infractions as extra hard returns and omitted back slashes at the ends of lines. I started to formulate a plan to fix my problem but also—for the benefit of possible site visitors—put forth an indicator that I was fixing the site.

I saved the navigation file to an experimental file, stripping everything except the critical start and end of file lines and one destination link. After saving that minimalist file, I uploaded it to the server, then refreshed the site. I was relieved navigation was again viewable. I decided to keep that file as an initial backup file and experiment with a newer working file. With the newer file, I added a notification line—"troubleshooting in progress"—which would stay viewable until I resolved everything.

My methodology shifted to replicating the information as applicable, referring to an older writing sample of the AHOT site. Processing a few lines each time, I would add the html line item codes and back slashes, upload the file, then refresh the page. I finally encountered the offending line that caused the navigation menu to disappear—"AHOT Members' Resumes". It occurred to me that maybe the apostrophe might be "abnormal" (my word). After googling for html code for an apostrophe and finding "’" (& # 8 2 1 7 ; without spaces), I proceeded to replace the symbol in both places. Another save, upload, and refresh. Woohoo! I sure was happy to see the navigation again!

My final acts on the file included rechecking my information and also commenting out my troubleshooting-in-progress text. My lesson learned (relearned) is to back up stuff—especially a javascript file—before changing it.