Preheat oven to 375 degrees. If your butter is coming straight from the fridge, microwave it for about 15 seconds just to barely soften it. I would say use room temperature butter, but when I want cookies, I want them immediately and don't have time to wait for butter to soften on its own.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the butter, sugars, and eggs and beat using a stand or electric mixer until creamy, about 1-2 minutes.

Add flour, baking soda, salt and vanilla and mix just until combined and no streaks of flour remain.

Stir in chocolate chips, being careful not to overmix. Try not to eat all the cookie dough at this point.

Scoop and drop onto a cookie sheet, leaving space to spread between each cookie. I usually make my cookies on the large side and do 12 cookies per cookie sheet.

Bake for 9-11 minutes until the cookies look puffy and just barely start to turn golden brown. Whatever you do, definitely do not overbake these! It's probably the greatest commandment of chocolate chip cookie making, to not overbake the cookies, because it is taking them out when they are slightly underbaked that gives them the perfect, super soft texture. If you were to eat one immediately after removing from the oven, it would look undercooked inside, but once they have had time to set, the center will firm up perfectly.

The cookies will stay and delicious for days. You can refrigerate the dough and make part of a batch one day and the rest of the batch the next day. Or make them all at once and heat up any cookies that make it through to Day 2 (unlikely) for 10-12 seconds in the microwave. They will taste almost like they just came out of the oven.