Becky’s Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies

You saw the title right: “Becky’s” Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies.  For those of you who don’t know me well, I have two amazing and incredibly talented sisters.  Now, I didn’t say that to make you think they are perfect or to get them to comment and say all sorts of wonderful things about me.  As a matter of fact, I would be scared if they got on here and started talking about me.  I’m sure they are scared of what I am writing at this moment about them.   

However, despite all of our differences of opinion, we have a bond.  It’s okay for us to talk about one another, but if you let someone start talking about our sisters, and we don’t care how true it is, we will still rise to their defense.  It doesn’t mean that we agree with each other 100%, nor does it mean that we don’t squabble and have our arguments, but it does mean we will always be there for each other regardless of the situation.  We love each other! 

Becky is my oldest sister.  We are five years apart.  She was the better sister when it came to listening to mom’s advice about cooking and baking.  We have a lot of fond memories of growing up as kids.  I will give you one and move on to this amazing recipe. 

When we were younger, my parents had a wood-burning stove in the living room.  During the summer, my mom would put some type of fabric over the top and decorate it with some of her pretties.  One of those pretties was these two lovebirds kissing.  One day, for who knows what reason, Becky and I were arguing.  We hit the door of the wood stove, and the birds fell and broke.  We immediately stopped what we were doing and just stared.  We knew that our mother was going to kill us when she got home (it’s just a metaphor, people).   

We went searching.  We were doing our best to find some type of glue.  We were no longer thinking about fighting and arguing.   

Our common goal at that moment was survival from our mother.   

We eventually found superglue and carefully glued the pieces together.  I think we did a pretty amazing job!  We gently set it back up on the wood stove and made a pack to NEVER tell mom.  Our mom came home, and she never noticed.  

Whew!  That was a close one! 

It wasn’t until we were gone and married that we were reminiscing about the time when we finally told our mother about the birds.  I think we both felt it was safe to talk about it, knowing that we were both married and no longer living at home. She never knew.  We had a great laugh at that and decided it might be time to tell her about the other set of birds my little sister, Crystal, and I broke because we cranked the music up too loud on our dad’s stereo system. 

The joys of sisterhood! 

I am giving you this recipe because it is super simple and requires little effort.  Best of all, you don’t have to wait for them to cool.  You can eat them hot.  Instead of putting them on the wax paper to cool, simply grab a bowl and put some in it.  Eat it right away.  Either way, they are amazing.  Especially if you like peanut butter and chocolate. 

I have not tried this as a low-sugar recipe, but I would think, and I may try it soon, that you could simply substitute the sugar for Swerve Confectioner’s. As far as the peanut butter goes, you can use a lower-sugar peanut butter. 

Becky’s tips.

1. Make sure you mix the sugar, milk, and butter first.  Let them come to a boil and boil for one minute before adding any of the other ingredients.  This process helps dissolve the sugar. 
2. Next, remove it from the heat and add in the cocoa, vanilla, and peanut butter until smooth. 
3. Finally, add the oats. 
4. Simply spoon them out onto wax paper and allow them to cool, or put some while hot into a bowl. 

We hope that you enjoy this recipe as much as we do at every holiday gathering.  But don’t wait until a holiday to try it.  Throw it together and put it in a cookie jar to enjoy throughout the week when that sweet tooth rares its ugly head. 

ENJOY!