Chewy Oatmeal Cookies, to Stave Off the Ennui

For those of you who notice such things, my other blog, the impractical one,  has been lying fallow for a while now. I have no excuses. It’s not as though I’m swamped with work these days either.  In fact, October is turning out to be quite possibly one of the laziest months of my entire life, after infancy and possibly early toddlerhood. No, the blog is just sitting there, all lumpen and bloggy,  losing followers because I think I’ve run out of things to say about Shanghai or about expattery or mops or whatever.

We’ve been in Shanghai nearly 3 years now. Three years! And in our current flat for nearly 17 months– a record of stability for me. In Turkey, I changed flats every single year for six years.

But here…things are very stable. We have appliances! We have (get this!) a vacuum cleaner. We have a beer shop around the corner who know me by name (Hiya Cedric! Hi CheersIn!).

We’re kinda settled, at least for another year, if not more. And it’s pleasant. We have a lovely flat. Our neighbourhood is interesting, with old lane ways draped with laundry and feathery chicken executions and floppy fish in baby bath tubs, scores of bound crabs, and lots of bicycles. It’s noticeably China but not overwhelmingly so.

But, if you’ve been reading my blogs for a while now, you already know these things. I’ve already written about them. Months ago. Many times, in fact.  And I really don’t want to get repetitive here.

As you may know, my career track (*ahem*) has shifted somewhat in the past few months and I now have a lot more free time than I’d anticipated. This month, I’ve, um, marked 17 essays so far. And this weekend I’ll do a day and a half of speaking tests in HangZhou. And next week, I’ll mark about 45 essays. And that, my friends, will be my total output for the month of October.

So you’d think with all this time that I’d be writing up a storm, being productive, finishing my novel about water monsters and goats, going to the gym and making full use of my oft neglected membership  (I mean, really, it’s only a ten minute walk away!). But you’d be wrong.

I have nothing to say. Really. Or rather, nothing new or interesting or intelligent to say. About Shanghai. About China. About water monsters or goats. Empty.

About chapatis and aioli and pumpkins, I still have many words left to burble out. Which is why this particular blog is getting a lot more action than the other one.

Most days, I have to remind myself to leave the house at least once, because left to my own devices I’d just stay inside all day, reading and cooking and staring at the walls. I don’t feel a huge desire to interact with the outside world. Maybe this is just a temporary phase, an equal and opposite reaction to a decade spent in the classroom, trying very hard to be extraverted and succeeding, at least in appearance. By the end of June, I was fried. Now? I feel much better thank you.

So I made cookies. These cookies were for Doug, because he’s still out there in front of the classroom and it’s a lot of hard work. Cookies help. Especially really lovely, chewy oatmeal cookies. I added dark chocolate and coconut to the second half of the batch. They are AMAZING.

 Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the cookies which stave off the ennui.

Chewy Oatmeal Raisin Cookies (though I had no raisins)

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. Your cookies turn out so much better with parchment paper. Believe me! Buy some! [I just used my cookie sheet and 2 crappy disposable cake pans]

Melt butter and let cool slightly. [I added sunflower oil to make up for the fact that I only had half the butter that was needed]

Mix flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.

In a medium bowl, cream together the melted butter, brown sugar and white sugar until well blended. Beat in the cinnamon, vanilla, egg, and egg yolk for 2-3 minutes until light and creamy. Mix in the flour mixture until just blended. Add the oats, nuts, and raisins. Mix until just blended.

Place 1/4 cup balls of dough onto parchment lined cookie sheet and bake for 14-16 minutes. Do not overbake. Remember I’m at sea level so if you aren’t you may need longer. The edges should look brown and the centers still slightly soft. Let the cookies rest on the cookie sheet for a couple of minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.

A few things worth noting: I used rye flour; I stupidly forgot to check how much butter I had left before I started making the cookies and realized too late that I only had half of what was called for; I used partly brown sugar and partly date-chili red sugar; I didn’t add nuts or raisins but I did add some desiccated coconut and half of a big dark chocolate bar that we got from the half price nearly-expired table at City Shop (it was a bit, um, whitened with age but still edible).

Here are the photos. Some are blurry and awful because I was totally covered in cookie dough by the end.