2nd attempt at Baking - Super-quick Oatmeal Cookies

Ok, so I know I seem to be on a Cookie overdrive, but haven't you ever had that obsessive compulsion to keep making something till you perfect it? No? Ok then, you have no clue what I'm talking about.

Anyway, I know the post heading says 2nd attempt at baking, but to be honest, the picture you see actually documents my 3rd struggle with cookies. After the Dark Chocolate Cookies which were too bitter and soft for my liking, I got this super simple recipe from my friend SM for Oat and Chocolate Chip Cookies. But in spite of following the directions and measuring all the ingredients meticulously this time, the cookies got burnt to almost a cinder :( I barely managed to save 2-3 cookies and proceeded to gnaw at their tops. Oh what, you don't do that? Well, how else are you going to know if the cookies would have tasted good when not burnt? (You can see 2 of the burnt cookies lurking in the right-hand corner of the photograph.. see, I had even decorated them with colorful Gems in the centre!)

So anyway, I was quite despondent by now and was telling myself I'm no good at this baking thing. So I lolled around depressed, watched an episode of True Blood, called up Sid to check what time he was coming home... and then decided what the hell, let me try it one last time. Of course by now I had run out of chocolate and I had to almost dust out the remaining oats to make sure I had enough. But surprise! Miraculously enough, the 3rd attempt produced wonderful results! :) Don't ask me what I did wrong the previous time. I still have no clue...

Ingredients:

Quaker Oats - 1 cup
Whole wheat flour/Aata - 2/3rd cup
Brown Sugar/Jaggery - 6 tbsp (By my 3rd attempt I had run out of jaggery too, so I just used refined white sugar)
Butter - 3/4 cup
Vanilla Essence - 1 tsp
Almonds - 4-5
Chocolate Chips - Handful

In a mixing bowl take the oats, flour and sugar and mix well. Make sure the butter is warm or at room temperature and add it to the dry ingredients. Pour in the vanilla essence and knead the whole mixture till the butter and sugar seem to have dissolved well. Add the chocolate chips. Refrigerate for 15-20min.

Preheat the oven to 160°C. Brush the baking tray with butter or line it with aluminium foil brushed with butter. Take out the cookie dough from the fridge and scoop out small amounts and place them on the baking try. This recipe should make for around 12 medium-sized cookies or more.

Press in chopped almonds in the centre of each cookie, pop the tray into the oven and bake for 40min. Take out the tray when done and let the cookies cool on a wire rack. Store in an air-tight container.

The way I like it:
Yummy with some hot Tulsi-Jasmine Green tea or a cup of regular chai.

If you look carefully at the picture, you can see one poor pock-marked cookie which was subject to my poking and prodding every 10min... I was that scared of burning this lot too! But thankfully they turned out just fine and were polished off the same evening by Sid and G.

And did I mention that this has given me enough courage to actually bake a carrot cake? Yeah, I did :) But that's for another post another day...