But you can’t take American style chocolate chip cookies away from her. Despite the many obstacles that prohibit making a true American style chocolate chip cookie here in France, I’ve managed to come up with a pretty tasty recipe (if I do say so myself). The obstacles being that it’s difficult to find many of the key ingredients such as brown sugar, vanilla extract and chocolate chips. You can make your own brown sugar with molasses and regular white sugar, but I hardly ever have molasses on hand as that is not the easiest thing to find here, nor the cheapest. And to be honest, the molasses here tastes weird to me. While they have vanilla flavor here which can be found in the baking section of most grocery stores, it is a freaky concoction of vanilla caramel syrup with sugar added, and is far too sweet.  They also have vanilla sugar, which are little packets of vanilla flavored sugar, but that never seems strong enough and the flavor always seems to just disappear. The pépites de chocolat or chocolate chips which are available in the supermarkets are terrible quality and freakishly small in size. In spite of it all, I have prevailed! Voici, my recette for Chocolate Chip Cookies in France…

Chocolate Chip Cookies in France

200 grams butter
150 grams sugar
2 eggs
2 tablespoons honey
325 grams all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon sea salt (don’t add if using salted butter)
1 teaspoon baking soda
200 grams chocolate, broken into 1 inch chunks (it’s okay if they are not perfectly symmetrical – this adds rustic character!)

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius (375 degrees Fahrenheit). In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs and beat until they are well incorporated. Mix in the honey. In a separate bowl, mix together the dry ingredients (not including chocolate). Slowly incorporate the dry ingredients into the wet ones. Mix in the chocolate chunks. Bake for about 10-12 minutes or until the edges of the cookies are a nice golden brown. Let cool (or else your burn your tongue like I do constantly in my impatience) and enjoy, preferably with some vanilla ice cream or a glass of organic milk!

Bon appétit!