Caramel Apple Oatmeal Cookies

This recipe for Caramel Apple Oatmeal Cookies came from my Cooking Light daily calendar – It was featured back on March 18-19 and I threw the recipe card in my purse thinking I’d make them the following weekend. I switched purses mid-week and lost track of the recipe… until now.

I love caramel, it’s my first choice as an ice cream sundae topping. I also eat an apple every day. I’ve always thought caramel apples were amazing and caramel apple lollipops are my favorite at Halloween. Yes, I realize that it’s Spring with weather inching into the 90’s here in Sacramento,  but some baking needed to happen this past weekend and these cookies were it!

Ingredients:

• 1.5 Cups All-Purpose Flour
• 1.5 Cups Old-Fashioned Rolled Oats
• 1 Teaspoon Baking Powder
• 1/2 Teaspoon Baking Soda
• 1/2 Teaspoon Salt
• 3/4 Cup Granulated Sugar
• 3/4 Cup Packed Brown Sugar
• 6 Tablespoons Unsalted Butter, Softened
• 2 Teaspoons Vanilla Extract
• 1 Large Egg
• 3/4 Cup Finely Chopped Dry Apple Slices
• 3/4 Cup Caramel Bits or 16 Small Soft Caramel Candies, Chopped

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350° F.
2. Measure flour, level with a knife. Combine flour, rolled oats, baking powder, baking soda and salt  in a bowl, stir well.
3. Place sugars and butter in mixing bowl, beat with a mixer at medium speed until light and fluffy. Add vanilla and egg; beat well. Gradually add flour mixture; beat at low speed until just combined. Fold in apple and caramel bits.
4. Drop dough by 2 teaspoonfuls, 2 inches apart onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Flatten balls slightly with hand. Bake at 350° F. for 9 minutes. Cool on pans 3 minutes. Remove cookies from pans; cool completely on wire racks.

I ended up using Werther’s Originals Chewy Caramel Candies and may or may not have eaten 4 or 5 in the process. I’m thinking the Kraft Premium Caramel Bits would be a much better choice for next time. More on that later.

I combined the flour, rolled oats, baking powder, baking soda and salt  in a bowl and then got to work on the sugars.

I’m not so sure about the sugar and butter becoming “light and fluffy” like the directions mentioned. That never really happened. Creamy would have been a better description.

I combined my vanilla and egg and then added that into the sugar/butter mixture before adding my flour mixture.

Please take note of the size of the caramel pieces… make yours SMALLER! I had some cookie blow outs during the process, especially when a big piece of caramel was on the sidewall of a cookie.

I had purchased Bare Fruit 100% Organic, Bake-Dried Granny Smith Apple Chips and Fuji Apple Chips. I was going to do a combination of both to see which ones I liked better, but knew once I tasted them,  I was going to go with the Granny Smith flavor, they were delicious! Again, take note of the apple pieces… WAY TOO HUGE! I ended up breaking them up smaller, but could have even gone much smaller than below.

Lesson learned… next time I’ll actually follow the directions :).

I used a two tablespoon cookie scoop to form my dough balls.The caramel to dough ratio ended up being all wrong… due to the huge chunks of caramel… so I adjusted and made much bigger cookies. Oh darn! So much for Cooking Light, I went with monster cookies and man were they delicious. Dan and I determined that they were at their best about 10-15 minutes after coming out of the oven. Think caramel strings from cookie to face… Oh yes!

In this case, bigger was better. I was able to make 2 dozen cookies from the recipe and my dough balls were more the size of a golf ball and once pressed down, about 3 inches.

These would be great “Fall Festival” cookies, but they pretty much rocked the Spring season too. I did have some failures though… think caramel molten lava flowing out the sides and bottoms of cookies… I had about two non-photo-worthy cookie failures per baking sheet. I took care of the extra caramel after it cooled… just trimmed it off the edge of the cookies and then ate it. Yep, no shame in my cookie game.

We both could have had cookies for dinner, but went with a healthier option. I will definitely be making these again.