Laurie Colwin's Chocolate Wafers

1. Melt 2 ounces of chocolate.
2. Add 1 cup sugar and 1/2 cup melted butter.
3. Add the yolks of two eggs into the beaten egg whites and stir into the chocolate mixture.
4. Add 1/2 cup flour and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla.
5. Spread on a well-buttered pan. Place in a 350-degree F oven but gradually decrease the heat to 300 degrees F.
6. This recipe does not tell you how long to bake. I would say about ten to twelve minutes. Cut into squares while still warm.

I made these cookies to serve with a fruit salad one spring night and was alarmed at how tasteless they were. No one liked them very much but I could not bear to throw them out, so I put them in a tin and left them for a couple of days. One afternoon when my blood sugar dropped and it was time for tea, I remembered the chocolate wafers. ‘Better than nothing,’I said to myself, biting into one. To my amazement, they were delicious. They tasted strongly and wonderfully of chocolate and were hard and crunchy, too. It had taken a couple of days for the taste to bloom and it was worth the wait. And so I add to Mrs. Simon Kander’s admirable recipe a seventh step:

7. Let cool, put in a tin and do not eat for at least two days.

And of course, for those of you about to give a dinner party for choco-late nuts, you know what bakeries are for: so that, at the end of dinner, you can put your feet up and have the chocolate dessert you didn’t bake.

from Home Cooking by Laurie Colwin -- My favorite cookbook!