Let's begin with a history lesson. The first version of what we now know as Nestle originally began in Aaron's home state, Illinois in September of 1867. The Page brothers founded the company as one to produce condensed milk. That same year, just one month later, Henri Nestlé of Switzerland developed a milk-based baby food, which involved dehydrating milk. In 1868 Daniel Peter began developing a process for producing milk chocolate and needed his milk to be completely dry, thus bringing the Nestlé's work to its ultimate heights. The Pages and Nestlé competed on the market for baby food and condensed milk until the early twentieth century when they merged. They now own over 6,000 brands and are based in Vevey, Switzerland. (Lesson paraphrased from Wikipedia. We must cite our sources as good and honest academics.)
The company started in Aaron's homestate. Switzerland is close to France. Nestlé owns more brands than I own books. So why, why, why can the brands necessary to producing NESTLE Chocolate Chip cookies be so far from Cesson-Sévigné, a mere 850 kilometers from Vevey? Why?
This is not to say that we failed at making cookies. This is not to say we produced bad cookies. We just did not produce what we know and love. Normally, I love a challenge at making substitutions. When I'm out of eggs, out of butter, out of sugar, out of flour even (it turns out ground-up Cheerios function much like flour and impart a lovely oat flavor to a baked good. But alas, even normal Cheerios aren't available here), I can usually get by, but not this time. This time we produced something very akin to a cookie version of chocolate chip quick bread, and this time we are in mourning.
This mourning shall not last long, I do declare! We will rise above this setback and triumph over our loss! We will enjoy this country, and we will show it THE NESTLE TOLLHOUSE CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIE if it takes all year!
In the meantime, see the illustrated kitchen experiment below.
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| 1. Consult recipe, brought from the USofA. |
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| 2. Purchase semi-sweet chocolate from Ikea to replace 12oz semisweet chocolate chips. |
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| 3. Chop what turns out to be bitter- sweet chocolate from Ikea. |
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| 4. Soften 250g unsalted butter. (of course it's cultured, not entirely sweet, like in the US.) 5. Purchase parchment paper to put on broiler pan (no cookie sheet.) |
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| 6. Assemble ingredients from store. a) Levure chimique= baking powder (baking soda is hard to find.) b) Vanilla sugar (extract is hard to find.) c) Flour #55 (somewhere between cake flour and regular flour.) d) Raw cane sugar (brown sugar as we know it does not exist here.) |
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| 7. Let cage-free, organic eggs from market come to room temperature. (Some things are the same!) |
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| 8. Cream butter and sugar by hand. (We did not bring a mixer to France.) |
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| 9. Add chocolate chunks. |
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| 10. Drop cookies onto parchment with tablespoons. (Spoons brought from the US.) |
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| 11. Attempt to enjoy cookies for what they are. |
Nota Bene...
Unmentioned steps include, but are not limited to, the following:
2a) Use 3.5 Ikea bars.
6a1) Use 2.5 teaspoons of baking powder to make up for 1 teaspoon of baking soda.
6a2) We have since found baking soda. It's located in the spice section, not baking section, here.
6b1) Use 2 packets of vanilla sugar to replace one teaspoon of vanilla extract.
6b2) Discover after tray one bakes that this is not enough vanilla, so sprinkle tops of remaining batches with more vanilla sugar.
6c1) Decide that you need to find flour #65 after using 2.5 cups #55 flour to make up for 2.25 cups American flour (a courser grind).
6d1) Use 1.5 cups of raw cane sugar to make up for 3/4 cup white sugar and 3/4 cup brown sugar.
6d2) Discover this is not quite sweet enough and does not have nearly enough brown sugar taste. See 6b2 above.
8a) In a separate bowl, mix together flour, 1 teaspoon of salt, and baking powder.
8b) Add eggs, one at a time, to creamed butter and sugar. Mix well.
8c) Add dry ingredients, gradually beating them in.
8d) Stir in chocolate chunks.
10a) Preheat oven to 190C (=375F).
10b) Bake for 9 to 11 minutes or until golden brown.
10c) Cool on plates instead of cooling racks like at home.
11a) This is only half of the recipe we made. We ate the other half over the last few days, so they really weren't that hard to enjoy.
1. Baking soda, if you can find the French word for it, is probably available at the pharmacy--because people in Europe use it (only) for upset stomachs.
ReplyDelete2. Get a large dark-glass bottle with a screw top like the kind vitamins come in. Get one or more vanilla beans (pods), slit with a knife, and insert into bottle. Fill bottle with dark rum. Wait a month. Voila! Vanilla extract (or close enough).