Oatmeal Coconut Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ok, so in my blog description I said that I'm passionate about healthy cooking, and yet my first post is for cookies - what gives?  Well, I should further explain what I mean by "healthy cooking":  as much as possible, I am committed to preparing foods that are organic, whole grain, and recognizable, with minimal proccessing and no trans fats, excess sodium, flavorings, or other chemicals.  That's not to say that everything I make comes from local organic farms, but I do obsessively read ingredient lists when buying packaged foods to look for the highest quality possible.  After all, I am a new mom in NYC - looking for convenience is a big part of my life!  So my goal is to prepare foods that are wholesome, nutritious, delicious, AND do not take hours and hours to prepare.  Because labor intensive foods will not get made in my house, and above all I think home cooked trumps take out or processed!

That being said, this weekend I had a craving for oatmeal coconut chocolate chip cookies.  And they DO qualify as healthy cooking in my book - I can use almost entirely organic ingredients, they have whole grains in them, they can be on the plate quickly without any fancy equipment (my rule with baking is that it can't require a stand mixer, flour all over the place, or time to rise), and they are delicious!  After a quick web search, I found a recipe on a blog with the cutest title - Two Peas and Their Pod.  As it turns out I had every ingredient on hand except chocolate chips, so after the baby went to sleep, I left hubby in charge for a few minutes while I ran down to pick some up.  About an hour later, we had hot cookies!

And they were good, but did not quite live up to my expectations.  You see, in my mind these cookies were going to be dense, soft, and chewy, and this recipe produced cookies that are light and crisp.  If that sounds good to you, by all means check out the recipe below.  But for me, the quest for the perfect Oatmeal Coconut Chocolate Chip Cookie is still on.  Luckily, after just searching for chewy oatmeal cookies, I found a recipe on Smitten Kitchen, one of my favorite food blogs!  The recipe doesn't have chocolate or coconut in it, but the description sounds like exactly what I am looking for.  I figure I can easily sub chocolate chips for raisins, and (hopefully) add some coconut without changing the texture too much from what Deb promises. 

In the mean time, the first batch is sitting happily in my freezer waiting to answer a dessert craving, but I'm looking forward to trying again...I will let you all know how it goes!

Coconut Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
from Two Peas and Their Pod

1 1/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup shredded coconut (unsweetened)
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350.

Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into a bowl.

Cream together sugars and butter with a mixer. Add egg and vanilla and beat until smooth, about 2 minutes.  Add flour mixture and beat until combined.  Stir in oats and coconut, and then chocolate chips.

Shape to form 1 inch balls (I used a 1 tablespoon cookie scooper).  Place on ungreased cookie sheet about 2 inches apart and bake 10-12 minutes or until tops are just golden. They will still be jiggly but will harden as they sit.

Makes approximately 40 cookies.