Recipe: Buttermeal Cookies

Yield: Approx. 4 dozen
Time: 12 minutes at 300F per ovenload

This dough is a very stiff dough, so either use a very sturdy metal spoon, if mixing by hand, or use a countertop mixer, if you're lucky enough to own one. The latter will probably save you half an hour vs. mixing the dough by hand. Don't even try it with a hand-held electric mixer. See "notes" at the end of the recipe.

I cadged this recipe off my grandparents' next door neighbor about 35 years ago. For the life of me, I cannot remember the woman's name. At the time, they were the best cookies I'd ever tasted, and boy do they withstand the test of time. Yum!

Ingredients:

• 2 sticks of butter, softened (1/2 lb.)
• 1 heaping cup. of dark brown sugar
• 2 Tbs. of dark corn syrup
  
• pinch of salt
• 1 scant tsp. of baking soda
• 2 cups of flour
• 2 cups of quick oats

Method:

1. Cream together the butter, brown sugar, and corn syrup
   
2. Mix in the salt and baking soda
3. Stir/cut/cream/blend in the flour, about 1/3 cup at a time (whatever works best for you), until it's all incorporated
4. Repeat step 3, with the quick oats
5. Grease a cookie sheet, and plop about 1 Tbs. of batter per cookie on it, about 3" apart, center to center
   
6. Score each cookie with a fork, in cross directions, to press it down to 1/4" thick, or less
7. Bake at 300F for 12 minutes

Notes:

1. I only had light brown sugar on hand this afternoon, so I substituted molassas for dark corn syrup, and they came out tasting the same as always
   
2. The original recipe calls for dropping the batter off a spoon onto the cookie sheet, but it's not a sticky batter, so I find it much easier to form the batter into flat patties by hand first, then toss them on the sheet
3. Do let these cool for a minute or two on the baking sheet before removing them
4. Truth be told, you could easily get away with 1/3 to 1/2 cup less quick oats than the recipe calls for
5. They're supposed to come out crunchy