Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Cookies

Hi if someone has been thinking that I have slacked off, they would be wrong!!
CLEANED up the kitchen, got rid of a lot of debris from decorating, and made room for cooking; we have the 28 lb "Raptor"  in the fridge defrosting; we think it will take 2 weeks ;-) the list of cookies has been "finalized"; which means that we have decided on the basic minimum and if we have time, energy and funds or ingredients, we may do more ;) I was able to put off the paying of the internet bill, Teksavvy, courtesy of a lovely lady at their accounting department, now all I have to worry about is the Gov't being on time with my CPP ;)
    last night I made the decision to try the Noel cookie recipe for a Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe; substituting the Peanut butter for the butter/margarine; well it turns out that the peanut butter is not as moist as the butter/margarine, the dough was crumbly not holding any shape; so I tried adding some soft margarine, but it wasn't working, so a bit of milk, and it came together; this morning I tried the same recipe, to see if it was a fluke, but no, it still happened even though I put 1/3 cup of margarine in with the peanut butter; so I measured 1 Tbsp at a time in, mixing between, for total of 2 Tbsp; I now have two batches of batter in the freezer, with 28 cookies made from them; the picture is from the second batch;

now for the recipe; 

       Preheat the oven to 375 F, but if like mine it is fast (hot) then decrease accordingly

        Blend or sift (whichever is your preference)

              2 cups of either Cake and Pastry flour or All Purpose Flour

              1/2 Tsp baking soda

              1/2 Tsp salt (I use a pinch)

         Cream together

               1 Cup peanut butter (either 1 cup of crunchy or soft, or 1/2 cup of each)

               2/3 Cup white sugar

               2/3 Cup dark or light brown sugar

               (at this point I added 1/3 cup of margarine, more on that later)

         Beat in

              1 large egg

              1 Tsp of vanilla extract

          Beat until it is well mixed and then for 5 minutes longer, on low speed; don't expect it to become light and fluffy, it won't ;-) 

          Stir in flour mixture with spoon, fork or spatula; then beat with mixer or use hands to knead it further; 

           it is at this point you will notice that it is not holding together, even with the added margarine; I added 2 Tbsp of milk, one at a time, mixing by hand in between additions; 

          cooked for 12 minutes at 300 F, because my oven is hot; they came out slightly flat, and crisp; I think that it is a recipe worth working on, so I will try another batch later on; maybe leaving out the margarine, and adding more milk if necessary; last nights batch were raised up and chewy, not crisp; both still edible, but would prefer the chewy ones myself ;-)

         and now I am waiting for Thomas to recover from shaving some wood off bottom of the front door and we will perhaps go get some more ingredients for baking; need either the hard margarine or real butter for the Noel Cookies and a few other recipes; stay tuned, more coming up;