Oatmeal Cookies, with plenty of raisins, are one of my favorite cookies!
While reading the King Arthur Flour baking blog; Flourish (I found the post on reducing sugar in cookies fascinating); I came across the mention of molasses in oatmeal cookies. Sounded intriguing to me!
A look through the cook book collection turned up these two recipes from Good Housekeeping's Book of Recipes and Household Discoveries. I was delighted to see that version 2 used molasses and cooked oatmeal. What I didn't realize is the recipe called for a half of cup of molasses!
Yes, they turned out to be molasses cookies with raisins and odd lumpy bits of oatmeal. Not too good. The cooked oatmeal also gave the cookies an odd texture. Perhaps I didn't cook the oatmeal enough, but the dough was very sticky and I had to drop by spoonful onto the pan. Once on the pan, they cooked just like I had dropped them.
Not really cookies with a spongy-gummy cake-like texture. I decided not to waste time and put the dough/batter into a 9 x 9 pan. It made a not too terrible molasses cake.
Now that I had a taste for Oatmeal Raisin cookies, I decided to go ahead and give version 1 a try. They turned out lovely! Lots of raisins, a bit crispy on the outside, but soft inside.
I found it interesting the recipe called for rolling and cutting out the cookies, even though I just rolled the dough in balls and flattened onto the cookie sheet.
I have never come across a recipe using molasses for cookies before you now have me intrigued so I well check out some of my recipe books.
ReplyDeleteIsn't it intriguing? I am wondering what a few tablespoons of molasses in the version 1 recipe would do?
DeleteI will have to go through the cookbooks at home. I feel like I have seen several recipes that do this but they may be in the "community cookbooks" put together by groups. I don't remember seeing in any of the "standard cookbooks".
ReplyDeleteOh! Yes please, let me know what you find! I was wondering if it was a homespun or poor man's version. Making the sugar stretch. I will have to try my "community cookbook" too.
DeleteMolasses may have been used before brown sugar was commonly available? I've a 1957 cookbook ('Virginia Cookery Past and Present' by the Woman's Auxiliary of Olivet Episcopal Church, Franconia, VA) that has a recipe for Oatmeal Bread which uses molasses only & also an old British farm recipe for Oatmeal Raisin Pie that uses black treacle (dark molasses). My Mom's oldest Sunset Cookbook (1930s) uses brown sugar & Mom insists on dark brown sugar: she says the light has too little molasses taste - a clue to tastebuds formed on older molasses recipes, perhaps?
ReplyDeleteHow very interesting! Thanks for sharing your research with me. It might also have been before there was a reliable baking powder. Molasses is acidic enough to react with baking soda, so it could be used for leavening.
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