Pantry Collective

John’s new job is giving me a lot of opportunities to bake things I wouldn’t normally make for just the two of us. Last night we attended the first BBQ of the season with a bunch of his coworkers. It’s been gorgeous in Chicago - over 80 degrees some days - so of course on the day of the first BBQ of the season it was freezing. Beautifully sunny but COLD. Thanks, Mother Nature! Oh well, at least there was a bonfire (in the city! Yes!).

Anyway, I was tasked with bringing dessert since my baked goods have been quite popular at the office. I made Oatmeal, Chocolate Chip, and Pecan cookies for his first day, Nanaimo Bars for an Oscar Party, Coconut Banana Bread that I brought to the weekly happy hour… I’ve been busy cooking, but not posting, apparently. Anyway, I was actually asked for a repeat of the Nanaimo Bars but I decided to make these amazing little oatmeal cream pie cookies instead. I found the cream part of the Nanaimo bars to be too sweet, but now that I’ve made this recipe, I think I might try them again with this buttercream instead of the filling the recipe originally called for. LOTS of butter but hey, that’s what desserts are all about! Right? Right!

The cookies are uncomplicated. Oats, a hint of cinnamon and nutmeg, and a touch of salt. The buttercream is amazing. Not too sweet, amazingly silky and buttery and delicious. I’ve never made buttercream frosting before, and have long considered it to be something I didn’t really love, but this - this isn’t the overly sweet, slightly gritty stuff of supermarket sheet cakes. This is heavenly. It’s thick and glossy and, well, full of butter. But you don’t need much to sandwich the cookies together, and hey, if you make them for a party, you’ll probably only eat one anyway. And you will be revered for making decadent, crowd-pleasing desserts. Which is always nice.

:)

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I know that’s a strange name, but these cookies are so full of butter (and therefore amazingly good) we could only make them once per year in my house growing up. I guess since Christmas and Thanksgiving were already full of bad-for-you treats, Valentine’s Day got these cookies. The original recipe, from a set of recipe cards from 1984, calls them “Chocolate Nut Logs”, but for whatever reason we stopped making them with nuts long ago. To make them seem more appropriate for Valentine’s Day my mom would sometimes shape the cookies into hearts. Now that I live in Chicago I’m rarely home for Valentine’s Day and I miss these cookies like crazy, so I convinced my mom to make them with me over the Christmas holiday.

They’re amazing straight from the refrigerator - something about them works best when they’re nice and cold, although you can certainly eat them at room temperature.

For about 4 dozen small cookies or 1 1/2 dozen large cookies

INGREDIENTS:

3/4 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 egg
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 pkgs (12 oz) semi-sweet mini chocolate chips
1 tbsp shortening
(2 cups finely chopped nuts, optional - not used in the cookies we made this time)

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Cream butter, sugar, vanilla, and egg until light and fluffy.
2. Mix flour and salt. Add to first mixture. Using hands (or a wooden spoon and a lot of muscle) mix until well blended.
3. Stir in 1/2 bag of mini chocolate chips.
4. Use 1 level tablespoonful of the mixture for each cookie (for small cookies). Ours are probably closer to 2 tablespoonfuls each. Shape into logs, rounds, hearts, whatever. Arrange on ungreased baking sheets.
5. Bake at 350˚ for 12-15 minutes or until the bottoms of the cookies are just turning golden brown. Remove from oven and let sit on the baking sheet for 2 minutes, then transfer cookies to wire rack.
6. Melt remaining chocolate with the shortening (we do this in short bursts in the microwave, stirring frequently).
7. When cookies are cool enough to handle, dip into chocolate. If using nuts, sprinkle or coat with nuts at this time. Let stand on wax paper until cool, then pop them in the fridge to firm up. We leave them in the fridge and eat them cold.

Success! Despite almost forgetting the eggs and only having quick cooking steel-cut oats and dark brown sugar, these cookies came out really well. I added the eggs after the flour because I get flustered when I bake things; for some reason, I am convinced that I’m not good at baking (well, not “for some reason” - I have several failed scone attempts and a lot of other over-or-under-cooked bakery items that are proof enough). Feeling incompetent MAKES me incompetent, I think. But these came out so well that they are either foolproof or I am not as terrible in the baking department as I like to think.

The cookies came together really easily. 12 minutes in my oven was the exact right amount of time. They don’t look browned enough when you take them out, but trust me, when they cool, the edges get cripsy but the middles are still a little chewy, and they are perfect. The orange zest is a great addition. I didn’t measure it specifically, I just zested about half an orange. It may seem like a strange accompaniment, but I really like it. I got four dozen cookies out of one batch, which is quite a few cookies! I am going to have to pass some off on my friends; I don’t think they’ll mind.

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