The cupcakes may have looked impressive but these little beauties were the real success of Jesse’s party tea.

The recipe comes from an American book called Bakin’ Without Eggs and I’d thoroughly recommend picking up a copy if you have an allergy like Jesse. It’s not overly pretty (there’s no photographs) but the recipes really speak for themselves, they all sound delicious and are very simple. As the book uses American cup measurements you may want to add some of these to your Amazon basket at the same time, unless you can be bothered to convert the recipes into metric.

I trebled the recipe as I was baking on an industrial scale but it worked to my advantage in the end. I moulded the dough into 3 long 1-inch-round logs, wrapped them in cling film and then froze them. This meant I could whip them out on Sunday morning, slice them into 1/2-inch-thick slices and bake. I think we had nearly 50 cookies on Sunday and I’ve still got one log in the freezer. This means I’ve got access to freshly baked chocolate chip cookies in an emergency!

You will need:
1/2 cup butter or margarine, room temperature
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1 1/2 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1-2 tablespoons water if needed
1x150g packet dark chocolate chips
(the recipe also suggests 1/2 cup chopped nuts and 1/2 cup shredded coconut which I think sounds very tasty!)

1. Preheat oven to 180C/350F.

2. In a large bowl cream the butter or margarine and sugars until fluffy. Slowly sift in the flour and baking soda. Add vanilla and oil and mix until completely combined (for a flatter cookie, or if batter is still too dry, add 1-2 tablespoons of water).

3. Fold in the chocolate chips and the nuts and coconut if you opted to use them.

4. Drop by teaspoonfuls on non-stick cookie sheets spaced 2 inches apart and bake for 8-10 minutes. Cool on wire racks in pans for 3 minutes. Remove with a spatula and transfer onto wire racks and cool completely.