Chocolate Hazelnut Latte Oatmeal cookies

With all the spring in the air it seemed appropriate to do a little Spring cleaning and organizing! The cleaning ... not a fan, but the organizing I like!! So, what better place to start then my pantry! I heart food!

So, here I am, rotating cans from front to back, refilling my olive oil bottle, combining half empty containers of brown sugar into one, and clearing out the empty boxes and bags my kids leave behind when crackers and chips are empty (I swear they think the dang box refills itself)! 

As I am checking through the inventory of culinary possibilities, my eye catches a box of instant oatmeal in the far back. I bought it a while ago for two reasons I thought : 1) oatmeal is good for you, and 2) the flavor was calling my name - "hazelnut latte"...can't go too wrong with that!

Now, I am usually a whole foods, unprocessed kinda girl, and live off the big round container of whole grain rolled oats. The one that takes a whole 5 minutes to cook, and has no flavor until you top it with healthy, fresh and fruity deliciousness such as blueberries.  Whatever possessed me to shave off another 2-3 minutes of my morning routine and go "instant"? I don't know?!?!                    

There were 6 little pouches left in the box. But the thought of tossing them in the trash just gives me the chills. I am a HUGE fan of re-purposing. I hate throwing away food! There seems to be always some kind of mystery meal that could be invented with that sad leftover ingredient!

So, the wheels were turning and an old trusty friend was re-invented.

Happens to be that 6 pouches make about 2 to 2 1/3 cup of oatmeal which happens to be the correct amount of oats needed in my good ol' oatmeal chocolate chip recipe!! Tadaaa!!

The end result promised to be the perfect marriage between my favorite Cariboo "Foofoo" coffee (hazelnut, mocha with whip cream) and an old fashioned oatmeal chocolate chip cookie that would have been dunked into the aforementioned anyways sooner or later!

Now here comes the real highlight!! Do you know how many different kinds of instant Quaker oatmeal are out there?!?! Can you just imagine the oatmeal cookie possibilities?!?! Apple Cinnamon, Peaches and Cream, Raisin Walnut, Wild Blueberry Muffin, etc! The add-ins are endless!!!

What's there to think??? Oh yeah, last minute it occurred to me that the flavored oatmeal pouches already have some sugar in them - so, reduce the sugar from old trusty recipe!!!

And, one more thing, if you only want to sacrifice 3 bags of your trusty oatmeal pouches, or feel like experimenting without wasting a bunch of ingredients - just go ahead and half the recipe! You can keep the 1 egg, reduce sugar to a heaping 1/4 cup, 1 stick of butter, ...you get the idea?!

Here is the modified version:

Ingredients (makes 16-18 big cookies)

1 cup of softened butter (2 sticks)

3/4 cup brown sugar

1 egg

6 packs of flavored oatmeal (Hazelnut Latte or any other kind) about 2 1/3cup

1 cup flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 bag of chocolate chips (5-6oz)

directions

Preheat oven to 350F. 

Beat soft butter and sugar until creamy. 

Add egg and combine. 

Add dry ingredients and chocolate chips and mix until all ingredients are fully incorporated.

Drop big plops of dough ( I like them a heaping tablespoon full) onto a baking sheet covered with parchment paper for easy release.

Bake 9-10 minutes. Cookies might seem soft when time is up. 

Don't over bake or they will get hard!

Cool on a rack and store in a closed container.