Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

My mom, sister, cousins, aunts and I laid out a pretty great spread for my Grannie's 80th birthday party over the weekend (if I do say so myself). We took a lot of help from Sam's, as life doesn't seem to slow down even when you're planning a party and need to feed 75-100 people.

skewers of cherry tomatoes, black olives, cubed salami, and mozzerella dressed in Italian dressing

from Sam's

What I did make by hand were oatmeal raisin cookies and, let me tell you, these were delicious little bundles of goodness (if I do so say so myself).

I've already posted the oatmeal raisin cookies from Joy of Cooking, but this recipe tops it!

It's from the...um...lid of the Quaker Oats can. Don't judge. They know what they're doing.

Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

makes about 4 dozen

This is worth pointing out-the cookies pictured above were cooked from the freezer, meaning that I made the dough early in the week, rolled them into cookies, froze them in a single layer on a cookie sheet (for about an hour), then placed them in plastic bags and kept them in the freezer until the day before I needed them. When I baked them, I just had to add a couple minutes of cooking time. They stayed nice and thick and chewy. I made them again last week but just made the dough and baked them, all in the same day. The resulting cookies spread much more and were thinner. So, if you like your cookies on the thin side, follow the recipe exactly as below. If you like a thicker cookie (like I do), make your dough in advance, freeze them, and bake them from frozen!

1/2 pound (2 sticks) butter, softened

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp salt (optional)

3 cups quick or old-fashioned oats, uncooked

1 cup raisins

Heat oven to 350. Beat together butter and sugars until creamy. Add eggs and vanilla, mix well. In separate bowl, whisk flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Combine with butter mixture. Mix well. Stir in oats and raisins, mix well. Drop by rounded tablespoons on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 10-12 minutes, until golden brown. Cool 1 minute on cookie sheet then remove to wire rack.