Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies

Am I the picture of domesticity or what? Baking in my pearls, it's just too much-- Nat had to take a picture.

I have about one cookie recipe that I ever make. (My neighbors in Maryland were probably sick of them by the time we left.) It's the Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookie recipe from Quaker. (Only I always omit the cinnamon and raisins and use chocolate chips instead.) I had only ever had limited success with other cookies recipes but this one is perfect every time. I never use shortening and so I am limited to all butter recipes which tend to be a little bit more fickle. Ashley and I stumbled on a recipe for Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies earlier in the week, tried it and weren't terribly impressed. The taste was good but they were too thin. We played with the dough a little bit by adding more oats and they were slightly improved.

Well Nat and I had to do the sick kids Sunday shuffle today, I attended Sacrament meeting with Noah and then came home so he could go and teach his Primary class. So, I found myself home with Luke, Addie and Isaac and we all thought baking sounded like an appropriate home sick from church activity. I experimented and combined ingredients from the pumpkin cookies with my favorite Quaker recipe and tweaked the amounts so that I could get the consistency I wanted. I have to say, I nailed it. These are the perfect harvest cookies.

Here is the recipe with my changes:

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

2 cups flour
2 cup oats
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 cup softened butter (It's best to leave the butter out to soften the night before rather than softening in the microwave. I don't always remember the night before, however.)

1 1/2 cups semi sweet chocolate chips

Combine dry ingredients well. Mix wet ingredients separately. Combine. Then fold in chocolate chips.

Chill the dough-- this is crucial. Butter is, as I stated earlier, fickle. You have to be careful with the temperature or you will get flat cookies.

Drop by rounded teaspoon full onto cookie sheet.

I found that they needed to cook for between 15-18 minutes on the oven here. Take them out when the edges are starting to brown.

Allow them to cool about five minutes on the cookie sheet and then move them to a cooling rack.

Enjoy!