Thursday, December 3, 2009

12 Days of Cookies - Day 3 - Triple Chocolate Cranberry Oatmeal Cookies




Triple Chocolate Cranberry Oatmeal Cookies.  Whew--that's a mouthful.  =)  Welcome to Day 3 of the 12 Days of Cookies.  Today I'm featuring the first cookie recipe I tried.  I actually made these the day before Thanksgiving, when I probably should have been making pie crust.  I wanted a cookie that I could mix up and bake pretty quickly, since there was a lot of other stuff going on.  This was also the first recipe that caught my eye when I was first looking through the slide-show.  I'm not sure how everyone else decided what to make, but I started off by checking out all the names and pictures.  Anything with an ingredient that I really dislike in the title was immediately crossed off the list (bye-bye Coconut Orange Snowballs and Pistachio and Cherry Mexican Wedding Cakes).  Then I took a closer look at the remaining recipes to narrow things down further based on ingredients or techniques.  Next, I  looked at the recipes that were left and tried to pick the 12 that sounded most appealing for whatever reason.  The list has changed a couple times, and may yet change again as I see some of the cookies that everyone else is baking.  I was surprised that my (more or less) final list had quite a few roll and cut types of cookies, since, as I've mentioned, they're not my favorite thing to make.  Maybe this whole project will change that. =)

Anyway, back to the chocolate and cranberry cookies.  This is a drop-cookie recipe, and it was pretty easy to mix up.  The three chocolates are dark, milk and white.  Right there I started making changes.  I didn't have any milk chocolate chips, since I've yet to find one that I really like.  So I used two dark chocolate chips--Guittard regular semi-sweet chips and also some of their extra dark (63%) chips.  For the white chips, I used Ghirardelli.  On an amusing note, I made the mistake of trying to chop fresh cranberries by hand--next time I'll use my food processor, since those little buggers kept bouncing all over the place. =) For these cookies, I used my #40 disher and ended up with 32 cookies.  I baked them at 350 degrees F for 16 minutes.



The verdict?  These cookies were quite good.  The white chips weren't that noticeable, which is fine with me. =)  (not a big fan of white chocolate or things like it)  I like the combination of dark chocolate and cranberries.  If I make these again (which is fairly likely), I think I'll add more cranberries.  Okay, make that when I make these again, since Jamie just informed me that he definitely thinks they're a make-again.  I enjoyed the bits of tartness that the cranberries contributed, but would have liked more.  And hey, I might even remember to drizzle the chocolate on top next time!

If you'd like to try these, you can find the recipe here.




And be sure to check out the other bakers participating in the 12 Days of Cookies to see what they've baked up for today!



Andrea of Andrea's Recipes
(honorary member and our founder but not participating this year)
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Michelle of Big Black Dog
Tiffany of The Nesting Project




12 comments:

  1. These are my favorite cookie so far! I love a chewy cookie and these fit the bill wonderfully. Love the red bow...so cute!

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  2. I think they are pretty without the drizzle of white chocolate! And the bow makes a great presentation!

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  3. Yay! I bought boatloads of cranberries and stored them in the freezer. Dying to try these :)

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  4. Very nice, I have to say these are my favorite thus far!

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  5. This cookie looks so good - chewy from the oatmeal, lots of chocolate, and with cranberries too! I agree: if I'm going to put cranberries in something I want them to really make their presence known. I'd be tempted to skip the white chocolate unless you say it's necessary.

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  6. Mmm, cranberry and oats, my favourite! Sounds perfect for the season.

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  7. These are so pretty. I like really different looking cookies, and these are definitely intriguing. I can think that this a recipe I should try. Love the way you styled them!

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  8. I got started after Thanksgiving and was cookied out by Sunday evening! The ingredient I see MUCH too much of is peppermint. Ick? But I sucked it up and bought some anyway just in case I want to pander myself to a flavor I'd rather not put in a cookie. ; ) These sound good and I know we'd like them, but they're probably not on my list.

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  9. I tried to choose a mix of types of cookies, and then tried to weed out the ones that sounded to similar to each other. I'm still not sure in the end, what's going to make my finals. :-)

    These were not on my original list, but I may change my mind. Yours look so goooooood!

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  10. I can't say that I've ever had fresh cranberries in a cookie, but I'm definitely intrigued and I still have a zillion cranberries, so, putting these on the list! Glad Jamie loved them so much! They look wonderful!

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