Chocolate Chip Mandelbrot Cookies

I finished the Marvin chapter. Thirty-two pages. I wrote the last paragraph on Wednesday morning, at the kitchen table, with the coffee cold and the sun coming through the window and the journal full of the most honest writing I have ever done — honest about the disease, honest about the love, honest about the brisket and the visits and the windows and the slow, terrible, beautiful work of loving a man who is disappearing. The last paragraph is about the feeding — about feeding Marvin by hand, about the brisket torn into pieces and placed on his tongue, about the intimacy of that act, about the love that is expressed not in words but in the placing of food on a tongue that can still taste, that can still receive, that can still say, through the body's gratitude, the thing the mind cannot: I am here. You are here. The food is between us. The food is the us.

I read the chapter aloud to myself and I cried through most of it, which I take as a sign that it's good, because the crying is the reader's response and I am the reader and the writer and the subject, and the triple role is vertiginous but necessary, because who else can write the book about Marvin? Who else stood at the stove? Who else drove to Cedarhurst? Who else fed him by hand? The book is mine. The Marvin chapter is mine. The crying is mine. The book is ready — or nearly ready, nearly complete, a few more chapters and then the editing and then Rachel and then: the world.

I made a celebratory brisket. A brisket for finishing the hardest chapter. A brisket for the crying that followed. A brisket for the relief of having written the thing I was afraid to write. The brisket was perfect. The chapter is perfect. The perfection is not flawless — the perfection is honest, and honest is the only kind of perfect that matters.

There was no brisket left — I had eaten the last of it standing at the counter the morning after I finished the chapter, cold from the refrigerator, the way you eat food that means something. So when the crying was done and the journal was closed and I wanted to mark the day with something made by my own hands, I went to the mandelbrot. I have been making this recipe since before Marvin got sick, since before the visits to Cedarhurst, since before any of this — and that is exactly why it felt right: because some things stay, some things hold, some things you can still make perfectly even when everything else is falling apart or coming together or both at once.

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 45 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour 5 minutes | Servings: 36 cookies

Ingredients

3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 large eggs
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or almonds (optional)
1 teaspoon cinnamon (for dusting, optional)
2 tablespoons sugar (for dusting, optional)

Instructions

Preheat the oven. Heat your oven to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
Mix the dry ingredients. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
Beat the wet ingredients. In a large bowl, beat the eggs and sugar together until pale and slightly thickened, about 2 minutes. Slowly add the vegetable oil, vanilla extract, and almond extract, mixing until combined.
Combine. Gradually stir the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until a soft dough forms. Fold in the chocolate chips and nuts if using. The dough will be slightly sticky — this is correct.
Shape the logs. Divide the dough in half. On each prepared baking sheet, shape each half into a log roughly 12 inches long and 2 inches wide, flattening slightly with damp hands. If desired, mix cinnamon and sugar and sprinkle over the tops.
First bake. Bake for 25–28 minutes, until the logs are set, lightly golden, and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove from the oven and let cool for 10 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 325°F.
Slice. Using a sharp serrated knife, cut each log on a slight diagonal into 3/4-inch slices. Lay the slices cut-side down on the baking sheets.
Second bake. Return to the oven and bake for 8–10 minutes per side, turning once, until the cookies are dry and lightly crisped. They will firm up further as they cool.
Cool completely. Transfer to a wire rack and cool fully before storing. Mandelbrot keeps well in an airtight container for up to two weeks — if they last that long.

Nutrition (per serving)

Chocolate Chip Mandelbrot Cookies — The Ones I Make When Something Is Finally Done