Oatmeal Cookies

Sweet Sunday's Yummy Lit Review:

Oatmeal Cookies

There's this old recipe book in my house... it is worn and frayed... it looks like it has gone through a lot. And I guess it has - both my Mother and I used this book as teenage girls learning how to bake. I particularly like its Oatmeal Cookie recipe. Well, kinda. I've made these cookies before but I've never completely followed the recipe ingredient by ingredient, step by step.

This is my attempt to do just that.

Let's just say that I failed said attempt.


Here's what Betty Crocker's Cookbook (1975, 0. 137) tells me to do:

3/4 cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar (packed)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup water
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon soda
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1 cup raisins
1 cup chopped nuts
3 cups quick-cooking oats

Heat oven to 350 F. Mix thoroughly shortening, sugars, egg, water, and vanilla. Stir in remaining ingredients. Drop dough by rounded teaspoonfuls 1 inch apart onto greased baking sheet. Bake 12 to 15 minutes or until almost no imprint remains when touched with finger. Immediately remove from baking sheet. Store in tightly covered container. Makes about five dozen cookies.




Right away the shortening is removed from my list of ingredients and replaced with the healthier version of Becel olive oil margarine. Instead of 1 cup chopped nuts I use 1/4 cup finely sliced almonds... and I add a cup of cranberries for good measure.

It all goes smoothly until it is time to put the batter into cookie-shaped form. Usually I don't look at the book by this point. However, I recall the fact that Yummy Lit is supposed to be a recipe review... and I've already messed around with the ingredients... so, I reason that I should read the book as a last-ditch attempt to do this properly.

Betty Crocker tells me to "drop [the] dough by rounded teaspoonfuls 1 inch apart." I figure that since I'm trying to do it by the book (and I feel a little guilty for not following through on the ingredients list) I'll make sure I use rounded teaspoonfuls. I'm so precise I get my teaspoon measurement out, create my cookies, and put them in the oven...

They come back super super tiny. Now, I like small things... but they're the size of my fingertip! I mean, these cookies look like Mini-Wheats. I feel like I should get a bowl of soy-milk and use these freshly made cookies as my breakfast.

I close Betty Crocker. I get my hands dirty. I start forming my oatmeal cookie batter (which tastes really good) into pretty decent sized balls.

After 13 minutes they come out of the oven... and they turn out much better!



It's proof, sometimes you can't follow the rules. Roll up your sleeves, get your hands dirty, be creative, and do it your own way.

Oh, and in total (including those little teeny tiny ones) I get 6 dozen really yummy oatmeal cookies out of the deal.


Hope you have a sweet Sunday! :)