Of all the things that I love love love about our own home, having family come to visit is at the top. My dad rode his motorcycle across the country for the solar eclipse and then stayed with us for the week so I’ve been playing tour guide! Seeing our little town with fresh eyes always reminds me how much I love Colorado. He’ll ride back to the east coast in the morning, but at least I can pack his saddlebags full of cookies for the road.
Truthfully, I don’t want raisins in my cookies. Raisins in cookies should always be chocolate chips in cookies, because why wouldn’t you want chocolate? Duh. But I married a man whose favorite cookies are oatmeal raisin, because everyone has to have at least one flaw I guess, and if I’m going to be making oatmeal raisin cookies every now and then for the rest of my life I need a damn good recipe.
(And yes… these are the best with chocolate chips too.)
The first batch of these oatmeal cookies was actually declared too heavy on the bourbon, which might be the first time those words have been said in our house. Soaking the raisins overnight makes them plump and juicy and full of bourbony goodness.
I’m always so impatient that I try to skip chilling the dough 4 out of 5 times, but trust me that you’ve gotta wait this time. The dough is extra wet thanks to all that delicious raisin-infused bourbon, meaning my first batch melted into one big flat sugar pancake. So please: chill dough for cookies. (Or I guess don’t if you’re into big flat sugar pancakes, because they’re still delicious.)
Two of these goodies, warm from the oven, with a big scoop of vanilla ice cream smashed between them? This is the ice cream sandwich we deserve for the end of summer.
