Experimenting with Cookies

So today I had to help my brother lug his baggage through the snow and down a slushy road (the sidewalks weren't shoveled) to the bus stop near my house. Driving downtown so he could catch a shuttle to Indianapolis airport was out of the question as the snowy slope of the drive easily defeated our toyota corolla, obviously made for sunnier climes. We got the bush right on time and made it to campus an hour before his shuttle, so sipped chai lattes and caught up some more before his departure.

However, I wasn't feeling so hot already and by the time I trudged through more snow, caught a bus home and then slushed my way into the icy wind back to my apartment I was feeling distinctly under the weather. It was warm in my apartment, WARM and COZY and INVITING and all those words that northerners invented just to make themselves feel better about the fact that they are stuck in frigid temperatures for months out of the year while us tropical folks enjoy 12 months of tan lines.

This particular transplant to the north was ready to collapse into bed, but I had work to do. So I did a little writing on my paper, and then pleasantly distracted myself by cooking. The perfect thing to do when its 10 degrees and blowing snow outside. Plus it helps heat up the apartment without having to raise the thermostat, and produces food! A win, win, win situation. So I made beer bread, courtesy of Susan of the great blog Farmgirl Fare. Then I made a great chickpea pasta soup that I'll blog about later, to go with the bread, of course. And since the oven WAS already on, I decided to do some experimentation with cookies.

I dont usually bake sweets mainly because me and my partner in crime both have serious sweet tooths and would eat way too much sugar if I started churning out cakes and pies every week. So it had literally been months since my last sugary baking project. But I had been thinking about my morning oatmeal and how I could turn it into a cookie. I love my oats cooked with dried cranberries, candied ginger, sunflower seeds, dates and bananas. Sometimes it'll be walnuts or coconut instead of sunflower seeds. Some days I wont have bananas. Some days I run out of candied ginger. But the overall flavour combo is terrific and I wanted an oatmeal COOKIE that could capture that awesomeness in a less wholesome and more desserty kind of way.

My final cookie incorporated candied ginger, dried cranberries, dates and toasted chopped macademia nuts. I also added sea salt for a savory crunch. They need a little tweaking before I post the recipe here, but they were definitely very good and I'm trying to keep from eating them all tonight. I hope to post the final recipe soon. In the meantime, its back to schoolwork for me.