As I’ve said before, when I get bored, I bake. Since it’s usually a spur of the moment thing and all I really want is a sweet diversion, I try to take it as an opportunity to test out a new recipe, rather than just make the same old chocolate chip cookies. This time, I decided to try to COMBINE two of my favorite types of cookies, oatmeal raisin and peanut butter, into a beautiful marriage that would taste something like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. These would be great with raisins or other dried fruit instead of cranberries, but don’t skip the peanuts – they really give that crunchy peanut butter taste! Also, a note about the instruction to hit the pan on the counter halfway through baking: I didn’t make this up but I hoped it would help with chewiness. To hear about the origins, see this New York Times Cooking article.
Peanut Butter and Jelly Cookies
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- ½ cup unsalted butter, softened
- ½ cup vegetable shortening
- 1 cup peanut butter
- 1 cup packed brown sugar
- 1 cup white granulated sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2.5 cups all-purpose flour
- 1.5 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 cup rolled oats
- 1 cup dried cranberries
- 1 cup roasted unsalted peanuts
- Preheat the oven to 300ºF.
- In a large bowl, cream the butter, shortening, peanut butter, and sugars.
- Beat in the eggs and vanilla.
- In a medium bowl, sift the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
- Beat the dry ingredients into the wet until just combined.
- Fold in the oats, cranberries, and peanuts. It will be very stiff.
- Roll the dough into 1” balls and roll in more granulated sugar or freeze on a baking sheet.
- Place balls 2 in apart on a parchment lined baking sheet and bake 7 min.
- Remove the baking sheet and give a whack on the stove or countertop to deflate the cookies.
- Return to the oven and bake 7-10 more minutes until browned but still soft in the middle.
Rating:
4/5 stars.
These are pretty good! I definitely like the flavor combinations, although I would probably reduce the peanuts and oats by half next time to make the dough easier to work with. As with all my cookie recipes, I have real trouble getting these to be my preferred cookie texture – crispy on the outside and chewy in the middle. Cooking them at such a low temperature helps with this, but I might replace some more of the granulated sugar with brown sugar in the future as that is supposed to help with chewiness.