Chocolate Caramel Oatmeal Cookies

I made these cookies in order to use up a bunch of random candy I had stockpiled from Valentine's Day and Easter, so really you can use this dough base to put in whatever type of candy, chocolate, nuts, etc. you want! These aren't like traditional oatmeal cookies because you grind the oats into almost a flour before adding them into the batter - it's just enough to make the cookies super chewy and dense! 

Ingredients:

1 cup butter

1 cup brown sugar

1 cup white sugar

2 eggs

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

2 and 1/2 cups oat flour (or rolled oats that have been finely ground in a food processor or blender)

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

Any variety of chocolate caramels (I used a mix of Caramilks, caramel filled chocolate hearts, Turtles, and Purdy's caramel filled chocolates) OR substitute with 2 and 1/2 cups any other add-ins (e.x. nuts, raisins, chocolate chips, etc.)

Directions:

In a bowl, cream together the butter and white and brown sugars with an electric mixer until smooth. Add in the eggs and vanilla extract and mix until combined. If you don't have oat flour, then use a food processor or blender to grind your oats until they are the consistency of coarse flour. 

In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, ground oats, baking powder, and baking soda. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix until evenly combined. If using chocolate chips then stir them in at this point, otherwise leave the cookie dough as is. Cover the dough and refrigerate for approx. 1 hour - this will prevent your cookies from flattening out while baking.

Just some of the candy I had at my disposal when making theses cookies! I used a mixture of the Caramilk eggs, chopped caramel chocolate hearts, chopped Turtles, and the caramel Purdy's chocolates for these cookies - thus Chocolate Caramel Oatmeal Cookies were born!

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F and line baking sheets with parchment paper. Chop up your chocolate into large chunks (depending on what type you're using). Roll approx. 2 Tbsp. worth of dough into balls and press a chocolate caramel into the centre of each dough ball. You may want to push dough up around the sides of the chocolate to secure it. Place on the prepared baking sheets. 

Bake for 8-10 minutes or until the cookies are just slightly golden. Remove from oven and place the baking sheets on wire racks to cool for 2-3 minutes, then transfer the cookies onto the wire racks to finish cooling.

*Recipe by Brooke McMillan