Thursday, April 14, 2011

the cookie conundrum

i CANNOT bake. i mean the thought of making a bread is enough to make me curl up in fetal and just pay kiss their money. i suck at anything that requires me to kneed flour. like dumplings. but they say practice is the key, so from time to time i try my hand at it. i remembered that i had some oatmeal packs in the cupboard, so i thought... why not try some oatmeal cookies? sounds good. one problem. i don't really like cookies. not into sweets that much. then again, i have some friends that do. so i sent a text to 6 friends from work telling them that i was making some cookies and i would like them to taste them. as in, i'm not going to taste them. they will taste them and post their comments here. talk about setting up yuhself for a publicly recognized epic fail right? excitement!



i thought a good place to start would be a bowl. yuh know... something to put the ingredients in.



flour. not something i use a lot of anymore, but something i keep around for times like these.



i used this small strainer to scoop, measure and sift the flour in one motion. cool eh? didn't want to use too much flour so i used just one scoop.



i used 4 packs of oatmeal though. one maple & brown sugar and 4 cinnamon & apple. so at this point i realized that i was making cinnamon apple oatmeal cookies. sounds cool.



dumped that in the bowl and mixed it with the sifted flour.



oh yeah... baking powder. we baking right? so i guess we need a little bit of this in the mix. inside wid dat!



i heard you have to use some butter in it as well. this is what i had in the fridge so... yeah. that.



then a little sprinkling of salt to taste.



after mashing the butter around in the dry ingredients for a while, not really sure i was making much sense, i added some water. was looking for a thick but smooth dough. really based on a mental image of cookie dough.



the mixture was looking a lil plain, so i grabbed a handful of granola. basically more oats, some raisins, a few nuts... i think i could rock with that.



as i had some apple cinnamon flavor in there, i thought some apple chunks might bring something nice to the table.



i used half of a small apple. just rough chunks. thought it would help with the sweetness as i wasn't adding any more sugar. the maple & sugar oats with the cinnamon oats would have to work with the apple to make things sweet. anyway, at this point i realized that i had to adjust my description again to say apple cinnamon cookies with granola and apple chunks. wow! somebody could actually hear that and think i knew what i was doing or that i set out to do that. HA!



oh... forgot to preheat the oven. better late than never.



then i remembered... i don't have a baking sheet. well, whatever. i lined two baking pans with foil (easy for cleaning up after the fun) and gave them a lil cooking spray.



i spooned out some cookies onto the foil and placed them in the oven. in no time flat, i could smell them. the place had the fragrance of real baking. hm... impressive.



i baked them for about 18mins at 250. the bottoms came out a lil darker than i would like, but the tops had a nice color to them. not bad looking for a first time. but the real test will be when i give them to my friends to let me know how they taste.

well... my first piece of real baking. it was fun. check the comments to see what my friends say about them.

leh we bake.

18 comments:

  1. not bad, not bad. looking nice.

    next time, beat the butter with egg and sugar together till it smooth... sift yuh dry ingredients together... you could cook the apple in some butter with fresh cinnamon and nutmeg. use baking soda instead of baking powder... doh use any water in the mix.

    see how that turn out.

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  2. cookies look like they might be on the dry side tho Q. 250C is very high for baking also that is why you got it brown on the bottom
    dont necessarily have to put egg tho eh kicker but i liking your ideas

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  3. actually, doing the mixture with the butter and sugar is what will keep it from drying out.

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  4. thanks!! ah will try that this weekend self!! the baking bug jus bite mih. i will use the opportunity to try a sugar substitute and use just plain oats. keep it healthy nah!

    ah headin to the test in a lil bit. i'll save one in case yuh pass tru work dawi.

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  5. yeah baking is a nice scene... it challenging in a sense... ah made a banana bread the other day, came out real nice.

    save mih a cookie or two, doh give belinda none eh. daz WE cookies!!! hahahaha

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  6. Nice Q, of course bottom could be a little less " dark" and I needed more apple..chewy is the way to go rather than crumbly. Very interested in being part of any subsequent tast tests! PAP

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  7. Paul allyuh doh be eating out my cookies nah!

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  8. daz pauline dawi.
    but ahmmmm... dawi. we have a problem.

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  9. or hor...

    ....Pauline allyuh doh be eating out my cookies nah!!!

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  10. yeah ahmmm... about dem cookies. ahmm... well ah makin a nex batch tomorrow so ahmmm.

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  11. STTTTEEEEEEEEEEEEUUUUUUUUUUUPPPPPPPPPPPSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Belinda get?

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  12. yeh after the tasting i was surprised to have it so oatie...but i guess the extra handful did that. the char was the only downfall and i think it shudda be chewy and not as rigid. rigidity should be left for coconut drops. but i think the 2nd attempt will yeild better results. and let the apple just melt enough to be gooey and u won't need to add any more sugar or sweetener.

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  13. YES i got and you did not! HA!

    Anyway, to me it was a bit dry and too crumbly and i think you may have used too much baking soda as it left a weird after taste. I don't agree with fishfoot, to me if i didn't know it was oats you made it with, i wouldn't have know what i was eating. i got the occasional taste of apple but other than that there was no actual definite oaty taste. good try though. i anxiously await the second batch.

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  14. Nobody cares what you think Belinda.

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  15. I enjoyed the cookie. I did find it was too crumbly and I agree with Bee after a few bites for me I got the weird taste (from the baking soda). However I enjoyed the apple and cinnamon combination. Looking forward to a chocolate chip soon :)

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