Whole Wheat Oatmeal Cranberry Cookies
January 23, 2009 by Andrea 
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Filed under Dessert
After the cookie marathon in December, I begged off from making anything sweet for a while. Like many, we just needed a sugar break and I admit I didn’t even want to make my birthday cake. I’d had my fill of sweets and didn’t miss it. Usually I’ll make one sweet dessert a week that we enjoy on the weekend, but that’s it for us, so Michael was quite surprised when he came home from work and found these on the counter.
One of my life hacks for this year is to incorporate more whole grains into our desserts and I’ve been going through my cookbooks again looking for ideas on how to do that best. Due to the way whole wheat flour absorbs liquid, it’s not always a 1:1 swap for unbleached all-purpose flour, so I decided to start with some tested recipes and then go back to some of our favorites and hack them.
This recipe from King Arthur Flour is easy to make and doesn’t use any white flour at all. Because oatmeal cookies tend to be more hearty and substantial anyway, I think these are a good way to introduce whole grains in desserts if you aren’t used to it. The butter and sugar still keep these firmly in the occasional treats category, but they are more healthy than a white flour version. Other dried fruits will work well, too, and I look forward to trying them with dried cherries and apricots.
More Oatmeal Cookie Recipes (white flour)
WHOLE WHEAT OATMEAL CRANBERRY COOKIES
Makes about 48 cookies.
Equipment
stand mixer with paddle attachment (or hand mixer and bowl)
baking sheets, lined with parchment or lightly greased
Ingredients
3/4 cup (1-1/2 sticks/170g) unsalted butter
1-1/2 cups (165 g) brown sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ginger
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 large egg
1-1/3 cups (105 g) old-fashioned rolled oats
1-1/4 cups (160 g) whole wheat flour
2 cups (320 g) dried cranberries
1 cup (113 g) diced pecans or walnuts (optional)
Preparation
1. Preheat the oven to 350° F/175° C.
2. In the bowl of the stand mixer, cream together the butter, sugar, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and vanilla. Beat in the egg and mix in well.
3. Add the oats, whole wheat flour, cranberries, and nuts (if using), and mix on low until thoroughly combined. (If you don’t have a stand mixer, I recommend doing this part by hand as most hand mixers don’t have enough power to combine this heavy dough.)
4. Drop the dough by heaping tablespoonfuls onto a prepared baking sheet.
5. Bake the cookies in the preheated 350°F oven for 7 minutes. Rotate the baking sheets and bake for an additional 7 to 8 minutes, until cookies are beginning to brown around the edges, but are still soft in the center. Remove from the oven, and allow to sit for a couple minutes on the pan. Transfer to a wire rack and cool completely.
Variations
Use diced apples, chopped dates, raisins, chopped apricots, dried cherries.
More Oatmeal Cookies Recipes From Around the Blogs
Bake or Break – Dark Chocolate Chunk and Dried Cherry Oatmeal Cookies
Karina’s Kitchen – Vegan Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
101 Cookbooks – Pistachio Apricot Oatmeal Cookies
Kitchen Parade – Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
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Source: adapted from King Arthur Flour
These cookies look gorgeous! Flavorful and highly enjoyable!
Cheers,
Rosa
Healthy and beautiful! A friend of mine brought me some dried cranberries from Canada after she found out one day on skype chat that the best cookies I had were made with cranberries, I thought it was so sweet, and now you have a recipe here…
Works for me… I’m doing the same. Whole grains all the way. These look great
we love this cookbook at our house. My husband has found a particularly good recipe for scones with chocolate chips and oats. Wonderful!
I will have to try this recipe – I too, am feeling sugar fatigue after all that holiday baking….
These sound wonderful, and you dont have to feel so guilty about eating more than one, with the whole wheat and all:)
Those look so tempting! Guess I’ll be making cookies tonight..
I used dried cherries instead of cranberries and added cinnamon chips. They were yummy!
These look quite yummy! Do you think a good variation would be using steel cut oats? If so, should they be soaked first?
I was looking for some whole wheat cookies and I found this marvellous recipe:) They’re yummy plus making them was really quick and easy! I also really appreciate you give units of measurement in grams and Celsius degree – this makes cooking easier for people who use decimal system! Thanks!