Making cookies is a great procrastination tool…

It’s so hot and muggy outside today! I spent some time sitting outside this morning visiting with my neighbors, and after that, I headed inside to cool off and do a bit of work on my current painting.

I have the air conditioner blasting and it’s very nice and cool here. I have my insulated cup of sugar free lemon iced tea with lots of ice cubes and slices of fresh lemon. I sit down and prepare to paint…but nope…not inspired. No matter what I do, the picture is not transmitting from my brain, fingers or paint brush onto the canvas.

I need a diversion! Something to get my mind off the painting for a while, so that when I go back at it later….I will succeed!

What better diversion is there than baking cookies? Baking is kitchen therapy as far as I am concerned! Baking got me through many sleepless nights when I was going through chemotherapy a few years ago and whenever I need a distraction, I bake!

I love to bake from scratch and I either fine tune some of my older recipes or I create new recipes when inspiration hits….but today, I have no inspiration (or so I thought). I decide to go with some cake mix cookies. You see, I bought a few different flavors of Betty Crocker cake mix when they were on sale a while ago for a buck each.

Cake mix cookies are really easy. You just add eggs and oil to the mix and drop the batter on the cookie sheet. This is exactly what I need to do. Nothing fancy, just some easy cookies.

So, I have a Betty Crocker Super Moist Carrot Cake mix. Yum, that would make incredible cookies don’t you think? I get my eggs and oil out and BAM…inspiration just whacks me in the side of the head. Grated carrots! Yep…grated carrots need to be in my cookies. And wait…that jar of rolled oats just sitting there on my counter, would that work in carrot cake cookies? Hmmm…I do believe it would. Well, if I am adding the rolled oats that I was saving for oatmeal raisin cookies, heck…I might as well throw in the raisins too.

It’s time to begin this cookie experiment! I assemble all my ingredients on the counter then I take out my large mixing bowl and add the cake mix. Next, I put 1/2 a cup of the rolled oats and mixed them through with my favorite cookie making wooden spoon. It doesn’t really seem like enough oats, you can barely see them within the mix. Might as well add another 1/2 cup. Nope, that doesn’t feel right either, so in goes another 1/2 cup. Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about. That looks perfect!

Now it’s time for the carrots. When I was assembling the ingredients, I thought I was only going to use about 1/3 cup of grated carrots, but that doesn’t seem like enough now that I a looking at it. I grab my mini box grater and shred up another carrot. I end up using a whole cup of the finely grated carrot before it looks right to me.

To pull it together and turn this into a cookie batter, I add a couple of slightly beaten eggs and half a cup of veggie oil. My trusty wooden cookie making spoon is called upon once again to mix the wet ingredients through the dry. And now…the raisins. I dump them in and give a few more mixes to work them through. Well, it certainly looks like a good cookie dough now. It’s time to scoop and bake.

I recently lost my favorite cookie dough scooping spoon. It was really just a 1 tbsp round measuring spoon, but it was great for making round, evenly sized cookies. I really think I threw it out with some used paper towel that was sitting in my dirty mixing bowl last time I baked cookies. So sad….

I grab a round soup spoon out of my drawer and figure that might work. And it does! This dough is perfect for scooping with that spoon.

It’s kind of sticky, so as I transfer it from the spoon to the parchment lined cookie sheet, I have to ease it off the spoon with my thumb and forefinger of the opposite hand. Once I get six good sized lumps of dough on the sheet, I use my fingers to round them out, making them sort of dome shaped.

Into the preheated oven they go. I usually check cookies of this size and consistency around the 9 minute mark. When the timer goes off at 9 minutes, they still look like they could use about two more minutes, so back in they go.

Buzz….time to take them out. They look good enough to eat!

The color didn’t change much, but I can tell they are done because they have lost that wet, glistening look and have firmed up. I set the cookie sheet on a cooling rack for five minutes and then after that, transfer the slightly cooled cookies to another cooling rack. In the meantime, I put another tray into the oven to bake. The dough ended up making exactly two dozen cookies. I let them all sit for a while to cool completely.

I figure they are probably good “as is”, but you know, carrot cake usually has a cream cheese frosting. I would make a cream cheese glaze, but darn it….no cream cheese. Hmmm…I do have a can of Betty Crocker Whipped Cream Cheese Frosting. I have used that before in a pinch. It’s not as good as the “real thing”, but today it will have to do.

Since the cookies are all completely cooled now, I scoop out about half the can of the frosting into a microwavable glass dish and heat it up in ten second increments. I stir it after each ten seconds and by thirty seconds it’s just perfect for drizzling. I pour the glaze into a piping bag prepared with a tip I usually use for cake writing. This is just the perfect size to drizzle the glaze over the cookies.

I put half the cookies on a rack over a cookie sheet (the sheet will catch any stray drips) and I drizzle the glaze over them. I transfer them to a plate and repeat the motion with the other half the cookies.

Now all that is left is the taste test. Yum! They are good. I really like them. I think next time I might try chopping up some walnut pieces and adding them.

Maybe the cooking adventure has sparked my painting creativity. I guess I will try again after I clean up the baking dishes. Wish me luck!

Carrot Cake Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

Ingredients:

• 1 box Carrot Cake Mix (Betty Crocker 15.25 Oz / 432 Gram Box)
• ½ cup vegetable or canola oil
• 2 large Eggs, mix with whisk or fork before adding
• 1 cup finely peeled and shredded carrot *see note below
• 1 ½ cups small rolled oats
• ½ cup raisins and/or walnut pieces chopped small (optional)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F.
2. In a medium-sized bowl, stir together the carrot cake mix, rolled oats, oil, eggs, and shredded carrot until it is mixed well. Fold in the raisins (and/or walnut pieces).
3. Drop the batter by heaping soup spoon-sized scoops onto parchment lined baking sheets, spacing them at least an inch apart. The batter will be sticky, so use your fingers to slide it off the spoon. Then gently form into rounded, dome shaped mounds.
4. Bake for 9 – 11 minutes.
5. Remove cookie sheet from the oven and place on wire rack for 5 minutes to set. After 5 minutes, remove cookies from sheet with spatula and place them on wire rack until completely cooled.
6. Add Cream Cheese Glaze drizzle.