My First-Ever Attempt in Baking

I’m a huge believer that you can be anything you want… as long as it involves a strong will and a genuine effort. With that said, I strongly believe nothing is stopping me from being a self-taught baker… as long as everything I bake is only consumed at home.

Last month, I told my mom that I wanted to bake. Her reply was skeptical at best, cynical at worst (to quote her exact words, “You? Baking?!”).

No hard feelings, though. I had never shown the slightest interest in learning my way around the kitchen, so it's understandable that my desire shocked her to the core. Still doubting my sincere desire to bake, my mom asked my aunt for an oven recommendation (since we didn't have one at home). She figured we were lucky that my aunt was willing to lend me her gas oven for as long as I needed.

(Honestly, I had been eyeing this one cute electric oven for weeks, but my mom convinced me that a free oven was obviously the better choice for an unconvincing beginner, so I gave in.)

And that, my friend, is the story of how I had my first-ever baking experience.

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Devina Hermawan is an Indonesian chef widely known for her participation in MasterChef Indonesia Season 5. For us Indonesians, her YouTube channel has become one of our go-to guides for her many homemade recipes. When I found out she had a tutorial on baking cookies, I didn't look any further. I decided to follow (almost) all of her steps, with some modifications here and there. Click here to watch the video and then scroll down to find some useful tips:

Tip💡: I substituted butter with Blue Band Baking Cake & Cookies margarine. It certainly smelled better than the original Blue Band.

Mix, mix, mix. So much fun.

My dough was ready to be shaped and baked:

My decision not to add more chocolate filling turned out to be a good thing since the sugar in the dough was already more than enough to bring out the sweetness. For someone with a sweet tooth like me, the cookies were just right. For my mom and aunts, they were good, but too sweet.

In conclusion? I’ll definitely be making these again.

Tip💡: If you want to add chocolate filling, I suggest cutting back a bit on the sugar in the dough.