White Chocolate Almond Chunk Cookies

recipe from Dana Treat

Adapted from With Love and Butter
Makes about 4 dozen cookies

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, at room temperature (I used SALTED!)
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 1/2 cups quick (1-minute) oats
• 2 cups flour
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 2 cups white chocolate chips (I used chunks)
• 1 1/2 cup whole, natural almonds (I used slivered)

Preheat the oven to 375°F with the rack in the top position.

Cream the butter and sugars together.  Add the eggs and vanilla and mix until smooth.

Fit a food processor with the steel knife blade and process the oats.  Add to the batter along with the flour, baking powder, soda, and salt.  Mix until combined.  Stir in the white chocolate chips.

Reassemble the food processor without washing.  Add the almonds and pulse until roughly chopped.  Mix the almonds into the dough.

Drop mounded tablespoons of dough on the a cookie sheet spacing them 1 inch apart.  Flatten each cookie slightly with the palm of your hand.  Bake the cookies 4 minutes, rotate the pan, and continue baking  3-5 minutes, until they show the barest amount of brown around the edges.  The centers should be soft but not gooey.  Cool completely, then store in an airtight container.

**As Dana notes, it’s good to use a medium sized ice cream scooper to scoop out the dough! I used slivered almonds because that’s all I had.  I skipped the food processing step for the almonds and left the slivers whole. They were good, but not as effective in the crunch department as real, whole almonds. So use whole almonds.

I should also note that I baked the cookies for 5 minutes and rotated. After rotating, they baked for another 5. I learned that it worked well this way in my oven after the first round of cookies came out. You’ll find your rhythm too!***