You may have already read (or are about to read) all about Sugar's oatmeal raisin fiasco. Her post is scheduled for today as she is off at some beach enjoying a well-deserved vacay. In her hurry to get packed and ready to go, she got her recipe together at the end of last week.
So I've already tasted her cookies. And she's my friend so I'm going to withhold comment on them other than to say that we are in agreement that I have a pretty good shot at winning this week unless I decided to bake blindfolded.
It's all Martha's fault.
Anyway, my Google search method worked well enough for the chocolate chip cookies, so with a quick plug-in of "best oatmeal raisin cookie recipe" I was on my way.
The original recipe that mine is based on comes from the Simply Recipes site. It was posted by a woman named Elsie who claims that her grandmother used to make these cookies years ago. I just love a good back story.
I made a few slight changes. The cookies were originally regular oatmeal (sans raisins) and contained walnuts. Because I'm not sure if anyone in the office has a nut allergy, I decided to opt out of those and of course added raisins because that's what this contest is all about. If you do feel like adding nuts to the mix, it calls for 1/2 cup.
Someone's Grandma Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
(Does not contain bits of real grandma.)
Yield: About 2.5 dozen large cookies.
Ingredients:
1 cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup white sugar
2 large eggs
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cup flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp cinnamon
3 cups oats (I used Quaker Old Fashioned. Recipe warns against instant.)
3/4 cup raisins
- Preheat oven to 350.
- Cream shortening and sugars. Add in eggs and vanilla. Beat well.
- Sift flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. Add to mixture.
- Add in raisins. Then add oats last.
- Spoon out rounded tablespoons onto a greased cookie sheet.
- Bake 10 minutes. Remove to wire rack. Cool completely.
Depending on your oven, you might want to let them bake an extra minute or two. I left my first batch in for 10 minutes and they were a little too soft in the middle. Now that they are cooled, I'm sure they are firmer, but I haven't tried them out yet.
I have never in my life made anything with shortening in it, so this was an adventure. I tried half of a chewy cookie right out of the oven and thought it had a nice flavor, but who really cares what I think, right?
See you on Wednesday with the results!
3.1 YUMS!
