My son and I live alone, so I’ve been lucky when it comes to finding groceries and other household necessities. I don’t need to buy a lot and I’m pretty good at making what I’ve got stretch. But my son is a growing boy and we go through milk like it’s going out of style. Inevitably I was going to run out. Inevitably, meaning of course, four days after my last grocery delivery.
Unable to secure a time slot for more groceries, I turned to one of my friends. He offered to do a store run for me, and then refused to let me pay him back. So I decided to make him a batch of cookies and leave them outside my door for him like he was some kind of milk Santa.
Oatmeal cookies are the only ones I know how to make. I also make them really well. Normally I add lime juice and shredded coconut. I have neither of those, but I do have lemon curd, so instead I made lemon oatmeal cookies.
You should let the butter come to room temperature before mixing it with the sugar, but if you’re impatient like me you’ll end up with little chunks of hard butter everywhere. It didn’t hurt the taste at all, but my cookies ended up with little craters where the butter melted and flowed out during baking. Also, if the dough ends up a little too stiff you can add water to loosen it up a bit. Milk is better, but not all of us have that luxury.
Lemon oatmeal cookies
Makes 18 cookies
Ingredients:
½ cup butter
½ cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon lemon curd
1 egg
1 cup flour
¼ cup oatmeal
Directions
Mix butter and sugar until blended. Add egg and continue mixing. Add in lemon curd and continue to mix.
Add flour, and mix until incorporated. It’s OK if there are small chunks. Add oatmeal.
Spoon drop cookie dough onto parchment-lined cookie sheet.
Bake at 350° for 20 minutes or until bottom of cookies begin to brown.
Audria Ruscitti is a designer for the NorCal Design Center, which designs this newspaper and 10 others across the north state. She can be reached at aruscitti@norcaldesigncenter.com, or you can follow her on Twitter @audriaruscitti.