For quite some time I’ve been wanting to do a series of desserts made with meat or meat drippings. This were very common, everyday “make do” recipes that lots of housewives would make for every day desserts, especially during tough times. I’ve make pork cake before, but I’ve been wanting to make it’s cousin, pork sausage cake. I’ve also had my eye out for a chocolate cake made with chicken fat and cookies made with bacon fat.
And now, the cookie part of that dream has come true.
Let’s make some Oatmeal Cookies!
AuthorRetroRuth
From A Touch Of Home, Wausau Bible Church, 1965
Tested Recipe!
[cooked-sharing]
Pour the melted shortening (or drippings) over the oatmeal and allow this to stand 5 minutes or until well soaked. Then add the other ingredients, adding the flour last. Mix well and drop a tablespoon or a regular cookie scoop-sized ball onto a cookie sheet. Bake at 350-degree oven for 12 to 15 minutes or until lightly browned.
Ingredients
Directions
Pour the melted shortening (or drippings) over the oatmeal and allow this to stand 5 minutes or until well soaked. Then add the other ingredients, adding the flour last. Mix well and drop a tablespoon or a regular cookie scoop-sized ball onto a cookie sheet. Bake at 350-degree oven for 12 to 15 minutes or until lightly browned.
Notes
This recipe is from the community cookbook A Touch Of Home, which was published in 1965 by the Wausau Bible Church of Wausau, Wisconsin. The cookie section of this book was actually full of interesting cookies to try. Some even I had never seen before. But I chose this recipe because it is BLT season over here and, though I cannot eat them until my jaw heals, Tom and Alex have been eating lots and lots of BLTs. Enough BLTs to make coming up with a cup of bacon drippings (for a halved recipe) no big deal.
Mmmm…oatmeal soaking in bacon fat.
Now, I am sure for this recipe you could do half bacon drippings and half shortening or butter, depending on how the spirit of fat moves you.
But since my spirit of fat hasn’t gotten any BLTs this tomato season, I decided to go with all bacon fat.
It was at this point I realized I had made an error. They seemed a bit runny, and when I double-checked the recipe I realized I had added the raisins, but I had added them whole and not ground.(Stupid pain meds!) So perhaps the ground raisins added more body to the recipe to keep it from being so runny? In any case, they were pretty runny and I was a little worried.
Plop.
In the end, they spread a lot and were large and thin, but weren’t a complete disaster like I thought they were going to be. The came off the sheet pan very easily, likely because they were mostly bacon grease. Unsurprisingly, they were also very crisp.
“What do you think?”
“It tastes like a regular oatmeal cookie. Then bacon.”
The Verdict: Then Bacon
From The Tasting Notes –
These were thin and crispy, and tasted like regular oatmeal cookies until the bacon aftertaste hit you. As they cooled, the bacon aftertaste got a little less intense, but it was definitely still there. These weren’t fantastic, but they weren’t bad at all. Sort of a middle of the road oatmeal cookie. With bacon. They would be good for breakfast with a cup of coffee if you are in a hurry. If you are going to make these, be sure to give the cookies lots of elbow room because they spread out a lot as they are baking!
Given the past two recipes, this feels like a good place to leave one of my favorite shower thoughts:
If you say “bacon” in a Jamaican accent, it sounds just like saying “beer can” in a British accent.
I feel like these cookies could, like the bacon muffins, eventually be turned into some sort of delicious mad breakfast cookie with a little tweaking…
I think that maybe grinding up the raisins (WHY!?!?!???) would have helped somewhat with taking the meaty flavor of the bacon down to a more neutral “meatiness” in the cookie. I have a few older+foreign cookbooks that do use pressed/mashed raisins as a cover for the meaty taste of drippings or fat pork (but since I don’t eat a lot of pork, I can’t say how successful they are.)
Thank you for paying homage to both my favorite sandwich and my favorite cookie. Hopefully, you’ll soon be able to make up for lost BLT time. 🙂 My grandfather used to put bourbon in his oatmeal raisin cookies, but never bacon drippings.
Even if I were not vegetarian (have been for most of my life), I would still say NO! Yes, I am a strong believer in “use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without” but some stuff is just kinda icky. It’s much, much better to save you meat fat for making soap. That’s what I was raised to do (back in my non-veggie days).
If you substitute baking powder for baking soda, you might have less spreading. However, the amount of flour seems small to all that liquid. 2 cups of fat!!! Wow.
My Mom who had grown up during the depression and WWII, made these when I was a child. They were absolutely disgusting. I thought so then, and, although I haven’t tried them, I’m thinking they would still be. To each his own, right?
My version of Bacon Oatmeal Cookies
Pre-heat oven to 375
1/2 C quick oats
1/2 C all-purpose flour
1/4 C packed brown sugar
1/8 C white sugar
1/4 C almonds or walnuts
1/4 C cold bacon grease (solidified, not liquid)
1 egg
1/4 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/4 t vanilla
1/3 C raisins
Cream grease and sugars. Beat in egg. Stir in remaining ingredients.
Drop by tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheet, 2 inches apart. Bake for 12-15 minutes. Makes 1 1/2 dozen cookies.
These cookies have no bacon after taste, and are much healthier than using shortening.
I have never heard of Lemon Extract in oatmeal cookies. I would think they would taste like a lemon oatmeal cookie.