White Chocolate and Cherry Oatmeal Cookies

Super soft and chewy white chocolate and cherry oatmeal cookies. These amazing cookies are jam packed with dried cherries, white chocolate chips and are filled with warming spices. The perfect cookie, if you will.

If offered the choice of any cookie in the world, I’ll always choose a variation of the classic oatmeal cookie. They’re comforting, substantial and full of tangy bursts of dried fruit. Everything I’m looking for in a cookie.

I’ve told you about my addiction to having a freezer full of cookies many, many times before. In fact, when I do talk about it, these are the cookies my freezer is jam packed with. I always have frozen oatmeal cookies to hand. They’re perfect for a quick breakfast when you can’t face another bowl of cereal, for a relaxing afternoon cuppa or for whenever unexpected guests pop round. 15 minutes and you’ve got freshly baked cookies in the kitchen, and let’s not mention the smell. No plug in can beat that fug.

Here’s what you’re going to need:

• Unsalted Butter – Make sure your butter is at room temperature before you start, this makes blending the sugar much easier.
• Light Brown Sugar – I prefer to use light brown sugar as it gives a subtle caramel flavour to the cookies. You can use caster in place but the cookies won’t be quite as tasty.
• Caster Sugar – A little bit of caster sugar helps with the structure of the cookies.
• Eggs – Always large, always free range!
• Vanilla Extract – Always use a pure vanilla extract, there’s nothing worse than vanilla essence. Yuck!
• Plain Flour – Sometimes called All Purpose flour.
• Baking Powder – This gives the cookies a little rise
• Salt – You always want a little salt in your bakes, this really enhances the taste.
• Cinnamon – I go a bit heavier handed than most oatmeal cookies recipes because I love it. pair it back to 1.5tsp if you’re not as much of a fan.
• Oats – Use rolled oats for these cookies as they give the best texture. They’re the most commonly available oats.
• Dried Cherries – You can find these in most supermarkets. They can be substituted with any kind of dried fruit if you prefer.
• White Chocolate – I use chips but you can use chunks or even a chopped up bar of chocolate if you prefer.

Tips for making White Chocolate and Cherry Oatmeal Cookies:

• Substitutions – You can substitute the cherries or chocolate for whatever dried fruit and chocolate chips you have to hand. Raisins and milk chocolate, blueberries and dark chocolate. Whatever flavour combo speaks to you.
• Chilling – It is essential to chill the cookie dough for at least an hour before baking but you can keep it in the fridge for up to 2 days. If chilling for longer than 1 hour, let the dough sit at room temperature for 30 minutes before scooping.
• Shaping the Cookie Dough – I use a medium ice cream scoop (this OXO one is great!)to portion out the cookie dough. This meals you don’t have to get your hands all sticky and you get uniform sized cookies.
• Freezing – I always freeze raw cookie dough. It’s perfect for when you fancy a freshly baked cookie but can’t be bothered to make a whole batch. Just line a cookie sheet with baking parchment and pop the balls of cookies dough in rows. Freeze on the tray for a few hours before transferring the frozen balls to a zip lock bag. To bake just add an extra 2 minutes to the original baking time.
• Drizzle – These cookies are delicious with or without a drizzle but if you want to add one I’ve got a great tip. Just pop 100g of chocolate chips in a sealed piping bag, place the bag in a mug of boiling water until the chocolate is melted, snip the end off the bag and drizzle away.
• Piping Bag – If you don’t have a piping bag and zip lock bag will do the trick, just snip the corner off instead.

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