American Dream Cookie

29/04 AMERICAN DREAM COOKIE

It's a mythical thing, the perfect American cookie. Recipes like enduring myths tend to change and take on the life of those making them. This recipe is no different, it is in part inspired by a close friends prefect cookie recipe, but has been altered to accommodate my raisin obsession. The raisins were implanted in my head during a long day in San Francisco Bay, where I had the cookie I had always imagined. A big oat filled country cookie flecked with dark raisin beads.

Here it is in all its Dolly Parton hometown glory, I'm not sure if that sentence makes sense even to me. American life. American Dream. Things are not always as they seem... Try some, buy some. 

Ingredients (not-so-approximate) - 

2 1/3 Cup Plain Flour
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 Cups Castor Sugar
1/2 Cup Brown Sugar (Muscavado/Dark)
175g Butter
2 Large eggs
2 tsp Vanilla Extract
1 Cup Oats
1 Cup Raisins

What I did - 

Its best to start with everything you need at hand, strewed across the kitchen counter like its posing for a Home & Garden centrefold. Just makes the wholesome cookie cooking experience more straightforward and as rhythmically calming as it should be. Also this recipe wont work without the right ingredients, and there is nothing more frustrating than some molten lumps in the oven.

With a good stand mixer (preferably red and named after Nigella) or a strong beating arm combine the butter and sugars until pale and fluffy. There will be flecks from the dark sugar, but it is an essential part of the nutty sweetness. Add the vanilla and eggs (one at a time if doing by hand to make your work easier) until completely beaten through and slightly aerated - at the very least not a thick gloop. Now its time to stir in all the dry ingredients, flour, baking soda & salt. Stir gently first so there isn't a flour atom bomb suddenly enveloping the kitchen. Once its less airborne beat firmly until it becomes a dark golden cohered dough.

Here its time to add the 'bits' which for these rustic biscuits takes the form of a dense cup of rolled oats and another of plump raisins. You can substitute and add anything at this stage, other fruits, nuts, spices, chocolate. Just be mindful of not making the dough too dry. Use an ice-cream scoop to make perfect half spheres and arrange them on a lined baking tray*. Make sure they have enough space to grow in the oven, about 5cm between each one.

Bake for 15 minutes in a well heated oven (180degrees). They should be golden with a slightly darker bottom, give them a few more minutes to tan if they look too pale. Rest them on a cooling rack. Don't put them in a tin until they're completely cooled or they will perspire and no one likes a sweaty cookie.

Be proud of your home-grown (baked) family recipe (handed over at gunpoint) country (suburban) cookies.

*These can be frozen for about two weeks, just add an extra 5 minutes baking time for defrosting.

JG