Chocolate-chip cookies are good, but they have a big flaw: any bite without a chocolate chip in it might as well be broken off and tossed into the trash. I am always on the lookout for cookie recipes that have other stuff in them (I’m partial to oats), so that the “in between” bites are worth eating, too.
One of my favorite recipes is Ranger Cookies, from the Better Homes and Gardens cook book. I’ve made a few small modifications: chocolate chips instead of snipped pitted whole dates, for example–a no-brainer.
Ranger Cookies
1/2 c. margarine or butter (I use butter)
1-1/4 c. flour
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. brown sugar, packed
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
2 c. crisp rice cereal or 1 c. rolled oats (I’ve always used oats)
1-1/3 c. flaked coconut
1 c. chocolate chips
Beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add about half of the flour, then the sugars, egg, vanilla, baking powder, and baking soda. Beat until thoroughly combined. Beat in remaining flour. Add cereal/oats, coconut, and chocolate chips. Drop by rounded teaspoons onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 375 for about 8 minutes. Cool on cookie sheet 1 minute, then remove.
***
They’re chewy and hearty, and they hold up pretty well if you’re determined to send someone cookies in the mail. I would like to say that even people who don’t like coconut would like these cookies, but I do like coconut so what would I know? However, William doesn’t like coconut, and he does like these cookies. Besides, you could always use the “crisp rice” (hm, what cereal could they be thinking of?) cereal instead.
I usually double the recipe, but it does strain the capacity of my mixer. Sometimes emergency dough-eating measures are required, to alleviate the crisis.
Does anyone actually eat dates anyway?
Sounds like a great recipe, now if I only baked…
Hey Jen, dates and walnuts are EXCELLENT in oatmeal!
These sound good, I will have to try them soon, thanks!!
cookies! yum!
We have a similar recipe, Montana Monster Cookies, but it has peanut butter and no coconut. I like the coconut idea.
so is this like a hybrid oatmeal/choc chip cookie with coconut?
Husband is allergic to coconut and I like oatmeal better, so I’ve been thinking of making oatmeal cookies and throwing raisins AND chocolate chips in there but that might be disastrous… but at least the husband wouldn’t eat them and it’d just be me a nd the kids. ;) (not allowed to give them coconut though.)
Jen– Yeah, the effect is of a cookie with a lot going on: a tangle of coconut and oats and chocolate chips. And they come out like little domes (not all flat), which increases that feeling. You know, I haven’t tried it, but I wonder if you could substitute oats for the coconut, and then use rice cereal instead of oats. That might give the same nice tangley effect, but without the coconut.
hmm I might try that! I can’t imagine it would be unedible, the kids will eat anything hehe. And then he can’t say I never make him cookies.
I love chocolate chip cookies, but I love the in between parts as much as the chocolate chips bites. I like to eat the parts of the cookie with the chips first and then eat the “in between” non-chip bites last as to cleanse the chocolate palette. Mmmm, maybe I’ll make some cookies today.
I’ve always pondered making a batch of chocolate chip cookies without the chocolate chips. I love the inbetween pieces THAT MUCH!!
Your Ranger Cookies sound pretty good though. If I wasn’t up to my eyeballs in carrot cakes that need to be be baked, I would make some. Until then the oreos are disappearing at a rapid rate.
Bunny and Shannon: *stunned pause* Okay, I GUESS I can see Bunny’s point: if I want to stop eating cookies, it does seem like a good idea to eat some plain cookie last, so as not to be driven back to the cookie tin by the lingering taste of chocolately goodness. But Shannon’s idea of…making them WITHOUT the chocolate chips? *blink* That’s crazy talk.
I think it is a texture thing for me. Nice soft cookieness mixed with big hunks of hard chocolate. I adore the chocolate part if the cookie is still warm, otherwise, I’ve been known to eat around the chips. It isn’t that I don’t like chocolate though…so I’m blaming it on texture issues.
Swistle, these sound great. The way you make them of course. So next time you make them, bring some my way. ;)
Shannon- I do make chocolate-free chocolate chip cookies. My husband likes them like this once in a while. He calls them “No chocolate chip cookies”. Ha. But, I’m with Swistle, what’s the point without chocolate. So I make half a batch with chocolate and the other half without.
Why would anyone ruin a cookie by putting dates in them?
Julie: I KNOW! Dates! In cookies! What on earth? It reminds me of the family I used to babysit for, who had me add wheat germ, raisins, and green peas to Kraft macaroni and cheese. Some unions are unholy, that’s all there is to it.
Okay, the wheat germ and peas I can sort of see, and maybe the flavor combos wouldn’t be entirely unbearable. But the raisins!!? Unholy is indeed the word. We do not combine dried fruit and powdered processed cheese, people.
Oh that just sounds too tempting.