Category: Cookies and cakes

Banana Raisin Oatmeal Cookies

Will I never learn? Bags of bananas on sale. I was supposed to buy two bananas. Instead I came home with four pounds of the yellow fruit.

“What am I supposed to do with all those bananas?” asked Jerri.

“I’ll bake some banana oatmeal cookies to help,” I said. “And I could make a banana milk shake.”

“You can also walk to the store and get me a box of vanilla wafers,” she told me.

After Jerri made her banana pudding dessert, I used three bananas to make some really addictive cookies. If you like soft cookies that aren’t too sweet but have a lot of flavor, you should put this recipe in your recipe box.

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup shortening
1/4 cup butter
1 large egg
3 ripe medium bananas
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 cup plus 2 T all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 cup plus 2 T old fashioned oatmeal
1 cup raisins

PROCEDURE:

Preheat the oven to 400º and lightly grease a cookie sheet.

Using a wooden spoon and a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and shortening with the sugar. Beat the egg into the sugar and shortening. Peel and mash three bananas. Beat the bananas and vanilla into the sugar mixture until you have a smooth batter. If there are a few small chunks of banana in the batter, ignore them.

Mix the flour, salt, soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, oatmeal and raisins together in a small bowl and blend the dry ingredients into the banana batter. If necessary, you can add a teaspoon or two of milk or half and half if there is not enough liquid to moisten all the dry ingredients.

Drop by heaping teaspoonfuls about two inches apart on the cookie sheet and bake on a center shelf for ten to twelve minutes until the cookies are lightly browned.

NOTES: Bananas vary in size and moisture content. You should have a stiff batter. You can add a little more flour and oatmeal if the batter seems too thin. This recipe makes about three dozen cookies.

Incidentally, though it certainly wasn’t a conscious decision, maybe I bought that bag of bananas to motivate Jerri to make her banana pudding. It’s just like Mom used to make, and we hadn’t had it in three or four years. I will post her recipe in a week or so.

Nancy’s Caramel Pecan Squares

Jerri and I both like to read and we value libraries, but she is more generous of her time than I am. That’s why she has been active on the Board of Directors of Friends of the Friday Memorial Library for the past twenty years or so. I just show up for the annual meeting to listen to the speaker and enjoy the snacks.

One time many years ago Nancy, who was an officer of the group, brought two plates piled high with some tasty dessert bars loaded with pecans and caramel. Those bars were a big hit, and we asked for the recipe. She emailed it to us, and here it is.

INGREDIENTS:

1 yellow Pillsbury Plus cake mix or equivalent
1/4 cup butter
4 cups pecan halves
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 cup butter
1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup whipping cream

PROCEDURE:

Preheat the oven to 350º.  

Put the cake mix into a large bowl.  Use a pastry blender to cut in a quarter cup of butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.  Line a ten by fifteen-inch jelly roll pan with heavy duty aluminum foil.  Make a bottom crust by pressing the cake mix evenly into the bottom of the pan and top it with the pecan halves.

In a large heavy saucepan, combine the sugars, butter and honey.  Bring the mixture to a full boil over medium heat, stirring constantly.  Boil for three minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the whipping cream until it is well blended.  

Pour the mixture evenly over the pecans.  Bake for seventeen to twenty-two minutes or until the entire surface is bubbly.

Cool completely and cut into bars.

NAN’S NOTES: “Be sure to line the pan with wide heavy duty foil so that you have at least a two inch overhang.  This prevents spillovers, and makes cutting and removal of the bars easier. I have used half and half instead of whipping cream.  Seems to work just fine.”

MY NOTE: These bars are very rich. One and a half-inch squares are big enough. You can always take two.