Tuesday Treats: Ooey Gooey Chocolaty Goodness or No Bake Cookies

So Today's treat is a classic. No Bake cookies are easy to make and are wonderful when it's hot because you don't need to turn on the oven. They are also a great way to satisfy a chocolate craving. I like my chocolate plain, so these do not have peanut butter (if you do like peanut butter in your cookies, add 1/2 cup peanut butter and reduce the oats to 3-1/4 cups).

These take me back to my early days in college (about 7-8 years ago). My roommates and I at the time would make these a lot. We even tried to justify them as a complete meal (with all the basic food groups except fruit - of course this was with the OLD food guide.) Ok, so we stretched it a bit, but here's basically how it went: Grains: easy, the oats; Dairy: milk; Proteins: Peanut Butter (I don't think they shared my view of unadulterated chocolate); Oils & Sugar: margarine (we were poor college students, butter was out of the question) and sugar; here's the point where it went silly (and we all knew it): the last ingredient is vanilla, vanilla is made from vanilla beans, beans are a vegetable, hence it has that food group (by that same logic it could have been another protien). The real problem with the vanilla was that we used imitation vanilla (like I said, poor college students) so there was no basis for the argument. It was still fun to rationalize the rapid consumption of a whole pan of these. I don't think they lasted more than 24 hours in our apartment. Those were good times.

No Bake Cookies

In a large saucepan over medium-high heat, melt one cube butter (1/2 cup). Add 2 cups sugar and 1/2 cup milk. Stir until sugar is dissolved. Add 3 Tbsp Special Dark baking cooca and 3 Tbs regular baking cocoa and a pinch of salt.

Bring to a boil. Let boil for 2-3 minutes.

Remove from heat and add 1 tsp vanilla (if you wanted to use peanut butter you would add 1/2 cup with the vanilla.) Then stir in 3-1/2 cups quick cooking oats (reduce to 3-1/4 cups if using peanut butter).

Drop by tablespoonfuls onto wax paper. As you can see I just put the wax paper directly onto my counter. You can also use it to line cookie sheets if you would prefer.

Wait about 1/2 hour until they set up. Or just eat a few after they cool off enough so they won't burn your mouth. The other important step is to cool off the spoon you were using. That was my spoon in the bottom of this picture...

Once it cools off enough, lick the spoon clean. Very important step, do not leave this step out. If you are not a spoon licker, then hopefully someone in your family is. It will make their day!

Enjoy!

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