Recipe: Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie

It's March Break here in Ontario, and my kids are home for the week.  It's fine during the day, because I am at work, but at night when I come home I find they are bored and looking for something to do, having exhausted all entertainment options during the day.  Luckily a friend of my daughter's will be spending the next couple of days with us, so that should make for a good couple of days.  Kat's friend arrived this evening to spend the night.  I thought wewould kick off the fun fest by making a giant chocolate chip cookie.  I got the inspiration and recipe from a blog post done by thishomemadelife.  I basically followed her recipe but I have tweaked it a little and updated it with some of my observations. 

Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie
2 cups Whole Wheat Pastry Flour (I didn't have pastry flour, so I just used plain whole wheat flour)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup butter at room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips (we used a mix of chocolate and butterscotch chips)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt;  set aside. In the bowl of an electric mixer cream butter and sugars until mixture is light and fluffy.  Add egg and vanilla;  mix until fully incorporated.  Add flour mixture, and beat until just combined.  Add chocolate chips and just stir in until combined. The dough looks a little dry, but don't worry.

The kids had fun smooshing the
dough into the pan.

Transfer dough to 10 inch ovenproof skillet (I used my cast iron pan - it is 12" across the top, but the base is 10") and press to flatten, covering bottom of pan (this is great work for little hands!).  Bake until edges are brown and top is golden, 40-45 minutes (I found 30 minutes was about right- start checking after 25 minutes, and take it out just as it is turning golden brown, mine over baked).  Don’t over bake (again, check after 25 minutes);  it will continue to cook a few minutes out of the oven.  Cool for 15-20 minutes before serving (since I over baked mine, I flipped it out onto a cooling rack so that it wouldn't continue baking). 

I think it would be a great idea to decorate this cookie with some icing, perhaps with a birthday message for a friend.... but we didn't put icing on tonight, it was too close to bedtime and the last thing I needed was to have them pumped full of even more sugar!
As you can see, even though I over baked it a little, it was still enjoyed!  Do you have any fun kid-friendly recipes to share?  I still have the rest of the March Break to go!!!