Salty 'n' Sweet

If you like candied bacon, chocolate covered pretzels, or any other combination of salty and sweet, these cookies will be just up your alley! If you like oatmeal cookies, you’ll like them too.

I was looking for a quick recipe to whip up this week, but still wanted it to be a little “different”. That’s when I came across Smitten Kitchen’s Crispy Salted Oatmeal White Chocolate Cookies. 

These came together in about 10 minutes, and only took about 15 to bake, so in no time I had a delicious cookie that can also satisfy that salty craving. 

As a side note: I would normally have more pictures in this post, but for some reason the blog software won't let me load pictures that are portrait orientated...

I adapted this recipe from one posted by Smitten Kitchen, and just changed it to my tastes. I didn’t have white chocolate on hand, so I used cranberries. Not to mention dried cranberries in oatmeal cookies is heavenly! And I changed the sugar ratios and amounts to what I thought would work. 

Crispy Salted Cranberry Oatmeal Cookies

Makes about 34 cookies

1 cup all-purpose flour
¾ tsp baking powder
½  tsp baking soda
14 tbsp (1 3/4 sticks) unsalted butter, slightly softened
½ cup sugar
½  cup packed brown sugar
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 ½ cups old-fashioned rolled oats

½ heaping cup dried cranberries

flaky sea salt (for sprinkling on top)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line baking sheet with parchment paper. Whisk flour, baking powder, and baking soda in a medium bowl.
2. Beat butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Scrape down bowl with rubber spatula, then add egg and vanilla and beat until incorporated. Scrape down bowl again. Add flour mixture gradually and mix until just incorporated and smooth. Gradually add oats and white chocolate and mix until well incorporated.
3. Roll dough between palms to form a-2 inch balls, then place on lined baking sheets about 2 1/2 inches apart. Using fingertips, gently press down each ball to about 3/4-inch thickness.
4. Sprinkle a pinch or two of sea salt on each cookie
5. Bake until cookies are deep golden brown, about 13 to 16 minutes, rotating baking sheet halfway through. Transfer baking sheet to wire rack to cool.

Modifications: I found these cookies a little sweet, so if you really don’t have a sweet tooth I would suggest cutting back on the amount of sugar (perhaps to ¾ cups total). Second, if you don’t sprinkle enough sea salt on top, you don’t get that sweet/salty contrast – so don’t be too stingy with the sea salt on top.

These cookies are really simple, and can easily be modified to your liking. If you don’t like cranberries, you can substitute in raisins or any other dried fruit. You can put chocolate chips like the recipe originally said – I’m sure they’d be fabulous as well.

As a side note, I got the coolest kitchen gadget recently. No one else may think it’s that cool, but I love it! It’s a butter measurer! You know how on the side of the butter they have the measurements for 1 cup, ½ cup and ¼ cup, but as soon as someone starts into the butter the wrapper gets thrown out and you have no idea how much you need? Well for a couple dollars you can get this little metal rectangle that tells you how much butter is a cup, in addition to tbsps, oz, grams and any other measurement you could want! And my trick to keeping it clean (cause really you only use it once when you are baking) is to wrap it in saran wrap and then throw the wrapping out when you are done!