I love the chewy satisfying flavor of oatmeal cookies, and wanted to make something festive for spring and Easter. While shopping at my local target I came across a delicious looking spring trail mix with nuts, dried fruit, chocolate & butterscotch chips and adorable pastel candy coated chocolate pieces. I was inspired and knew it would make delicious ‘trail mix’ oatmeal cookies and the fun pastel colors would be perfect for spring and Easter.
Hoping to keep these on the healthier side I also opted to omit traditional wheat flour in these and use all oats. You can purchase oat flour from the store, but it’s also super easy to make at home. All you need is regular rolled oats and a food processor. Simply put your oats in the food processor and grind them until they become a fine flour. If you are using homemade oat flour, make sure it’s very finely ground, no large pieces of oats should remain. For this recipe it’s also important to chill the dough before portioning out the cookies, they may not stay together as well when baked and are hard to form.
Easy Easter Oatmeal Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 Cup oat flour i.e. finely ground oats
- 1 ½ Cups rolled oats
- 1 Teaspoon baking powder
- ½ Cup oil
- ½ Cup sugar - or granulated sweetener of choice
- 1 Egg
- 1 Tablespoon ground flaxseed meal
- 1 ½ Teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2 Tablespoons real maple syrup
- 1 Cup easter trail mix or candy of choice
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and lightly grease or line a baking sheet with parchment paper or silpat and set aside.
- In a medium bowl combine the dry ingredients except the candy and set aside
- In a large bowl combine the wet ingredients and whisk until well combined
- Add the dry mixture to the wet mixture and mix thoroughly until no flour patches remain. Fold in candy
- Cover the bowl and chill in the freezer for about 20 minutes until the dough becomes firm. If necessary let thaw at room temperature until it’s soft enough to scoop, but still firm and chilled. If not chilled the dough can be crumbly and fall apart.
- Using a medium cookie scoop, scoop and drop cookie dough balls onto the prepared cookie sheet, evenly spaced about one to two inches apart. Cookies won’t spread that much.
- Bake for 12-16 minutes until just slightly golden around the edges and allow them to cool on the cookie sheet for about 10 minutes. This will allow them to firm up a bit.
- After 10 minutes remove cookies from the cookie and transfer directly onto a cooling rack to cool completely before storing
- Once cooled enjoy!
