See? I wasn’t kidding about the pumpkin madness.
How does one run a baking blog and not gain tons of weight? Answer: bake something, have a little of it, then give the rest of it the heck away! (and the rest of the time, try to eat on the healthier side…)
For me, this is especially true with cookies as they seem to be both my specialty and my weakness. When I made Chai-Spiced Snickerdoodles a couple weeks ago, I may or may not have ruined my dinner a few nights in a row because I had no one to give them to. Definitely should have halved that recipe, or at least put half the dough in the freezer…there’s another idea!
Being an orchestral musician, symphony concerts are the perfect excuse to bake. I just bring the cookies backstage with me, and hungry musicians gobble them up during intermission and after the concert! It really is a win/win situation.
I’ve actually made these cookies for that specific purpose about two years ago, and while delicious, they were extremely soft and cakey, almost to the point of seeming under-baked (they weren’t). Nobody else seemed to mind!
Recently, I learned from Kylie about first cooking the pumpkin on the stove to reduce its water content for less-cakey cookies (try her vegan iced pumpkin cookies!). Brilliant! Since then, I’ve been planning to bake these oatmeal cookies using that method, and what a difference! They’re still really soft and a little bit cakey, but the consistency is more like regular oatmeal cookies than the previous batch I made.
I love these little cookie dough scoops! The cookies were the perfect size for sharing with a lot of people.
Pumpkin Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
adapted from AllRecipes.com
Cooking down the pumpkin takes a bit of time, so I did this step the day before. If you prefer, you could play around with these and add in cranberries, raisins, and/or walnuts. I’ve always had a soft spot for oatmeal chocolate chip cookies though, and the chocolate goes really well with the pumpkin and cinnamon. These babies are seriously addictive…
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/3 cups quick or old-fashioned oats
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 cup granulated sugar
1 15-ounce can pumpkin (or about 2 cups pureed pumpkin)
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 to 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips (I went with 2 cups!)
Cook the pumpkin puree in a saucepan over medium heat for 30 to 45 minutes or until it has cooked down to 1 cup. If the pumpkin starts bubbling, turn the heat down, but make sure it’s still steaming. Set aside to cool, or cover and store in the refrigerator if you’re doing this the day before. (If you’d rather not reduce the pumpkin, then just use 1 cup of it straight from the can.)
Preheat oven to 350F and line two cookies sheets with parchment.
In a medium bowl, combine flour, oats, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. In a large mixing bowl, cream together the butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Add the pumpkin, egg, and vanilla, and beat well. Pour in the dry ingredients and beat until thoroughly combined (I added them in about 3 batches rather than all at once). Mix in the chocolate chips.
Drop the dough by rounded tablespoons onto the cookie sheets. These cookies don’t spread very much and I was able to get 16 to fit on a standard cookie sheet. Bake for about 12-14 minutes, or until the edges start turning golden. Transfer the cookies to a cooling rack, and then store in an airtight container. I thought these were even better the second day!
This made 7 dozen small cookies. Seriously. And they’re all gone!
(my container that I bought exclusively for concert-cookie-toting purposes ;))
Rachel said:
Weekend project, here I come. I, too, am a classical musician in love with all things food :) Thanks for sharing the recipe!
Jessica said:
Oh, awesome! What do you play (or sing)? I play viola. :)
Kylie @ A Hungry Spoon said:
So glad you enjoyed the pumpkin-reduction tip! Your cookies look scrumptious, and I can’t wait to make them…Adam’s favorite cookie of all time is oatmeal chocolate chip, and I love all-things-pumpkin, so this will definitely be a winning combo in our house :)
And, I can totally relate to your concern about what to do with all of the baked treats! I love sharing them with my students, co-workers, and neighbors, but I have to admit that I’ve been eating more treats than ever since I started blogging :)
Georgia @ The Comfort of Cooking said:
These look SO good, Jessica! It’s a funny coincidence – I just baked pumpkin chocolate chip granola bars the other day… I’ll have the recipe for those up tomorrow! Thanks for sharing these deeeelish cookies… I wish I could be one of your taste-testing musician colleagues! ;)
girl paraphernalia said:
OH.. bring out the pumpkin… I could eat kabocha all year round.. they don’t have canned here, so I use squash …. oh I love oatmeal cookies.. double yum for the pumpkin… it sure is that time of year.
Mary said:
These look fantastic! I’m a big fan of oatmeal chocolate chip; can’t wait to get some pumpkin-action goin’ on with them. :)
My hip-reducing strategy when I’m baking is to give the food away to coworkers…but unfortunately this only works half the time as many of them see through my schemes and give me the “I’m watching my waistline” excuse. Drat my coworkers for not being bigger pigs!
Jill said:
I want to marry those cookies.
megan @ whatmegansmaking said:
I tend to give most of my baked goods away as well – otherwise I would gain so much weight! These look delicious :)
Jessica said:
Kylie – Thanks for sharing that tip! Oatmeal chocolate chip is also my favorite. Hope you like them! And yep, blogging has definitely upped the amount of sweets I normally eat. :)
Georgia – pumpkin chocolate chip granola bars sound awesome! Will have to check those out.
girl paraphernalia – I’d really like to try kabocha!
Mary – I actually have the same problem! Usually there are a few people who will take half of a cookie, so this time I made them small. ;)
Jill – Me toooo. I might be making them again soon to mail, so I’ll save some for us if so!
Megan – It’s the only way to go! And people think we’re just being nice… :D
Mary said:
“Half a cookie”? Whoever heard of such a thing… >.>
Walnut Lovers said:
Such a great post. Thanks for sharing this with everyone. I will enjoy this one of these days! Happy WalnutWednesday.
Taylor said:
I love the pumpkin madness!! I agree about giving baked goods away…it makes people happy and keeps my pant size the same from going up :)
blackbookkitchendiaries said:
this looks very yummy :)
Janae said:
Oh man, you’re a girl after my own heart! I’m having a bit of a pumpkin frenzy over at my own blog, but I’ve been looking for a pumpkin choc chip recipe. The addition of oatmeal sounds great too; I will definitely have to give it a try!
Jessica said:
Walnut Lovers – saw your tweet…thanks!
Taylor – Yep, in the end, everyone is happy. :)
Janae – I’d love to check out your blog! If you see this, leave your link. :) (p.s. I bet Joy‘s pumpkin choc chip cookies are great!)
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UrMomCooks said:
Totally appreciate the pumpkin tip… I have a container of butternut squash in the fridge and I am going to reduce it down and make these babies! Thanx!!!
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Amy said:
My life is more complete now, thanks to this recipe. Yum
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Syd said:
Oh yum…I just made these and they are AMAZING! Thank you so much!
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Lizzy said:
I just made these and these cookies are DELICIOUS. Truly, they’re amazing with just a hint of pumpkin and fall flavors to the usual chocolate chips cookies– which is exactly what I was hoping for. I think cooking down the pumpkin really made all the difference.
I know this post is a couple of years old, but since I googled and found today (and I hope others do the same!) a couple of thoughts:
– I added a bit more salt to my second batch. I used unsalted butter as well and found it needed a bit more to perfect.
– Just a watch out: For me, the batter looked wetter, more like pumpkin bread than a typical cookie. I kept wanting to add more flour. I did add some, but the still semi-wet batter produced a great end result.
Other 2012 googlers: make these—you won’t be sorry! :) Thanks Jessica!
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Persnickety said:
A great recipe I can’t wait to try out. It looks incredible. I love Pumpkin and those adventurous enough to use it! I wish more would.
I came up with my own version of a Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cooks. While different from your own, I think mine is a unique take on the dish. I’m new to the Food Blog scene and would love some feedback from a pro like you. Check out my recipe if have time.
http://persnicketypanhandler.blogspot.com/2013/11/pumpkin-chocolate-chip-cookies.html