today on crispybake’s Kitchen we’re making some easy, soft, and chewy oatmeal cookies.

Ingredients

• 1 1⁄2 cups or 180 grams of all-purpose flour is the first ingredient you’ll need for this delicious oatmeal cookies recipe.
• ¾ of a teaspoon of baking soda
• ¼ teaspoon of baking powder
• ½ teaspoon of salt
• 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
• 1 cup or 226 grams of room temperature butter
• ½ cup or 100 grams of granulated sugar
• 1 cup or 220 grams of packed brown sugar
• 2 large room temperature eggs
• 2 teaspoons or 10 mils of vanilla extract
• 2 ½ cups or 280 grams old-fashioned rolled oats
• 1 cup or 160 grams raisins (or M&Ms, nuts, chocolates, other dried fruit, chopped and toasted nuts, chocolate chips, dried cranberries)

Step 1: Prepare Dry Ingredients

First off, we’re going to get our dry ingredients together, starting with 1 1⁄2 cups or 180 grams of all-purpose flour. That goes right into a big bowl. And as usual, I’m using a scale for best results. To puff things up, I want ¾ of a teaspoon of baking soda, and ¼ teaspoon of baking powder. Okay, ¼ teaspoon of baking powder. For contrast, we want ½ teaspoon of salt. Your cookies can’t just be sweet, they need the salt for contrast. And 1 teaspoon of cinnamon. If you want, you can add other spices you enjoy, like allspice, cardamom, the list goes on. I would say ¼ teaspoon max for any of those. Grab a whisk, scale’s done, and we’re going to mix this up. Whisk, whisk, whisk. And these cookies come together so quickly. Oatmeal is one of my favorite ingredients to use in baked goods because I love the chewiness and texture you get from using them. Set that aside, and now we’re on to our butter.

Step 2: Cream Butter and Sugars

Now, into a large bowl, I’m going to add 1 cup or 226 grams of room temperature butter. I’ve actually been keeping it in my apron here so it doesn’t cool down too much on my cold countertop. Room temperature butter should be able to get an indent from your finger fairly easily. You could bend it, and it just doesn’t feel very firm on the inside. A lot of times you can let butter hang out on your countertop for hours and hours or even overnight, and if it’s cold, it’s just going to be rock hard, so feel free to microwave this at half power, 10 seconds spurts, maybe even 5 seconds, until it’s nice and soft. Plop that right in before we cream our butter, and then add both of the sugars in. So I’m saying hello to my scale one more time.

I want half a cup or 100 grams of granulated sugar, and one cup or 220 grams of packed brown sugar. Brown sugar is so delicious, has lovely notes of caramel from the molasses, but this is what you get in brown sugar, lumps, because of the moisture. We don’t want any lumps because it won’t mix up as well, so whether you’re using a measuring cup and packing it in or just dumping it right into the bowl, I suggest you sprinkle it in with your hands, and as you sprinkle it, you can break up any lumps you find. I didn’t zero my scale out, so keeping a careful eye on it. If you’re wondering,

Gaby, if brown sugar is so delicious, why don’t we just use brown sugar all the time? It’s because brown sugar has that moisture in it, and it causes the cookies to spread more. If you ever see brown sugar with white sugar, the white sugar will just control the spread of the cookie and help it keep its shape more. Now our scale is done. Set that aside, and we’re going to beat this on medium for about three minutes until it is light and fluffy. Break all that butter up. It’s going to look like crumbly nonsense at first, but it’ll come together. Unless your butter was too cold, in which case you’re going to be mixing for a little bit longer.

This is coming together really quickly. If you’re using a stand mixer with a paddle attachment, just know you’re going to have to scrape the bowl down a couple times, because that paddle just cannot get all the way to the bottom. If you’re wondering who you have to thank for oatmeal cookies, it’s Fanny Farmer. She was the principal of the Boston Cooking School, and she came up with the first recorded oatmeal cookie. It probably came from England even longer ago, but the first written down recipe is from her. It’s slightly different because it uses milk and cream, which is not how we do it today.

Step 3: Add Eggs and Vanilla

About three minutes later, you can see this looks totally different. It’s creamy, it’s fluffy, it’s totally come together, and it’s time to add two large room temperature eggs. The eggs add a little bit of richness, but mainly they’re binding agents to hold everything together. Now I want to talk about the raisins while I’m doing this, because raisins are different. These ones are really juicy, delicious raisins, if you like raisins. If you’re using raisins in a baked good, it’s always a nice option to either soak them in warm water or soak them in some dark rum. That will infuse a lot of flavor, and you can soak them overnight in the rum if you really want to up the flavor there. Personally, for me, a raisin must be soaked in rum if it’s going to be delicious tonight. Lachlan and George, however, love them, so I’m making a big batch of regular oatmeal raisin cookies for them. First egg is added in and incorporated, so now we’re going to add egg number two. Plop that in. I’m also going to add the two teaspoons or ten mils of vanilla extract. Mix that in once more, and once again, if you’re using a stand mixer, you definitely will be scraping down after each egg. When you use a hand mixer, you’re going to just rake the bottom of the bowl with the beaters, and you really don’t have to scrape the bowl down, maybe once at the very end, just as an insurance policy.

Step 4: Combine Dry Ingredients and Oats

This is nice and creamed up, and now we’re going to add the flour mixture. This recipe is so easy, and if you’ve had an oatmeal cookie out of a vending machine, or from the cafeteria, or from a bakery, chances are it’s been pretty gross. A homemade one is much, much better, and the nice thing is that you can tailor it to be exactly as you’d like. If you just say, John, I can’t do the raisins, you could add some chopped and toasted nuts, you could add M&M’s, you could add perfectly gooey chocolate chip cookies, you could add dried cranberries, the list goes on. Make it your own, just use a similar amount like we’re going to use in the recipe today. On low, you’re going to mix this until it’s almost combined. I definitely want to see some streaks of flour hanging around. I did not forget the star ingredient, it’s the oats, two and a half cups, or 280 grams. One, two, I always use old-fashioned rolled oats, they have the best texture. If you want to use quick oats, you can, but it’s going to be less kind of chewy and amazing and a little bit more dense. Okay, the last of my oats went in, and now we’re going to use our spatula just to combine this so it’s nice and evenly mixed. I want everything distributed, and you’ll notice there’s tons of flour hanging around here. I don’t want to over-mix my dough.

Step 5: Fold in Raisins (or mix-ins)

If you’re using soaked raisins as passes through a strainer to get rid of all the liquid, if you’re using regular raisins, they can get dumped right in one cup, 160 grams. That’s of any mixin’ that you want to use. Now, we’re going to fold this in, get everything nice and distributed, and know that for the tenderest cookie, just like for the tender fluffy chocolate cupcakes, you don’t want to over-mix the flour. So, I’m really just working this together until everything is combined. And by the way, this smells so good right now, just wait until it gets into the oven.

Step 6: Chill the Dough

All right, now we want to scoop two tablespoon-sized portions of dough out. And if you’ve noticed, I never told you to preheat the oven because these are going to get chilled. The secret to a chewy oatmeal cookie is in the chill time and the recipe. So, we have the recipe down, but they need to chill for at least an hour or up to 72 hours, and the longer you chill them for, the chewier the cookie will be. So, this is a great one to make ahead of time. And if you want, because we’re going to make a lot of cookies, you can definitely freeze them. So, instead of these going into the fridge, just pop this right into the freezer, let them freeze solid, and then transfer it to a freezer bag, and then you can bake them from frozen, just adding a couple extra minutes. Cover, and we’re going to pop these into the fridge to chill one hour, up to three days, and the longer they chill, remember, the more chewy they’ll be. Here you go.

Step 7: Bake the Cookies

Towards the end of your chill time, preheat your oven to 350, so it’s nice and hot. You’ll bake these for 12 to 14 minutes, however. The difference between a perfect oatmeal cookie and a dry, sad, burnt one is just one minute, so keep an eye on them. They should be golden, but the centers will appear wet, so they’ll finish baking as they cool. In you go.

Step 8: Enjoy Your Cookies

Your cookies will last about five days in a sealed container. However, it’s best to keep them with either a piece of bread or a couple marshmallows so they don’t dry out. It’ll keep them nice and moist, out of the oven, and just cool enough to eat. They’re ready to enjoy. So chewy, amazing, and they are perfectly sweet. They’re not too sugary, tons of flavor, and the cinnamon really comes through. I hope you get a chance to make these delicious dessert cookies.

[wprm-recipe id=”7706″]