Salted Vanilla Chunk Oatmeal Cookies

So, vanilla. Totally bland? Heck no!

I love vanilla. As a kid, I hated it. I wanted to just cry when there was nothing but vanilla ice cream left in the fridge (where’s the chocolate sauce so we can fix this?). But now, totally my favorite.

I love putting vanilla paste into everything I make; seeing those flecks of real vanilla “caviar” in everything, and tasting the burst of exotic flavor. Yum. You really can’t beat it.

So, when I received Pure Vanilla to review, I was really excited! The author, Shauna Sever, goes through the different vanillas from around the world and the wonderful nuances of each variety. In my cupboard, I have at least four types of vanilla. So this cookbook was totally made for me.

She has wonderfully simple recipes, like Vanilla Rice Pudding, Malted White Hot Chocolate, Vanilla Butter Mints…and these cookies. The cookies that have totally blown my mind for the last few nights!

I made these cookies, only changing up the original recipe a bit (hey, nobody said I was good at sticking to directions), and they’re truly magical. They taste of slightly sweet, toasted oats, yummy Pure Vanilla  and an after burst of saltiness. Amazing. Use a white chocolate bar, chopped up, to get the pools and chunks of white chocolate (but, if you only have chips, use those).

I even made mine gluten-free with my King Arthur Flour allpurpose gluten-free flour blend and they turned out amazing!!

3 cups old fashioned oats

1 ½ cups all purpose flour (I used King Arthur Flour Gluten Free Flour)

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. coarse salt (Kosher)

½ cup unsalted butter, room temperature (1 stick)

¼ cup plain nonfat Greek yogurt (I used Chobani)

1 Tbs. vanilla extract or vanilla paste

2/3 cup brown sugar

½ cup granulated sugar (I used coconut sugar)

1 large egg + 1 large egg white

8 ounces white chocolate, roughly chopped

sea salt, for sprinkling (optional)

~Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line your baking sheets with parchment paper or silpats.

~In a large bowl, combine the oats, flour, baking soda, and salt. Stir until well combined.

~In the bowl of your mixer, combine the butter, yogurt, and vanilla. Mix on medium speed for blended. Then, add the sugars and continue to mix for another 2 minutes until light. Add the egg and then the egg white, mixing well in between each addition.

~When the wet ingredients are homogeneous, turn the mixing speed to low and slowly add the dry ingredients. When the dough pulls together, add the white chocolate and mix until it is distributed throughout the dough.

~Scoop the dough with a cookie scoop (mine is 1.5 Tbs) onto the prepared baking mats, spacing them well and only placing 12 cookies per sheet. Sprinkle the tops of the cookies with the sea salt (optional), then place them in the oven to bake. Bake 12-5 min or until slightly golden. (If they are too domed shaped for you, as you pull the sheets out of the oven, use a spatula to quickly pat down each cookie.) Let the cookies cool for 2 min on the baking sheets before carefully transferring them to a wire cooling rack.

~Continue to bake the dough until all of the cookies are made. Enjoy!

*Recipe adapted from Pure Vanilla by Shauna Sever