Laura Bush
These cookies aren’t mentioned in A Different Kind of Fire, but they should have been. I can certainly imagine my heroine, Ruby, making something like this for her children. After all, what could be more Texan than a recipe from a former First Lady of Texas and First Lady of the United States?
Laura Bush’s Texas Governor’s Mansion Cowboy Cookies
If you need a BUNCH of cookies to feed an army—or a teenage son and his buddies—this is the recipe for you. Excellent for bake sales, too.
Yield: enough cookies to feed most of the Lone Star State (I get nine dozen cookies about 3-1/4 inches in diameter).
Be sure to use the biggest bowl you own as this recipe fills my KitchenAid mixer’s five-quart mixing bowl to the brim. Also, use the flat beater, not the whip, as the dough is extremely thick.
Ingredients
3 cups flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tbsp baking soda
1 tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
3 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla
3 cups semisweet chocolate chips
3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
2 cups sweetened coconut flakes
2 cups chopped pecans
Directions
Preheat oven to 350ºF.
In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Set aside.
In a second bowl, beat the butter on medium speed until smooth. Add the sugar and brown sugar and beat for another 2 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Mix in the vanilla.
Stir in the flour mixture, blending until just combined. Add the chips, oats, coconut, and pecans and stir until fully incorporated.
Drop by rounded tablespoons onto an ungreased baking sheet, making sure to allow plenty of room between cookies. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until the edges are set and golden brown. Allow the cookies to cool on the pan for 1-2 minutes before placing on a cooling rack.
I found this recipe on-line in Family Circle, but made with 1/4 cup size cookies which would be enormous.
These cowboy cookies are cowboy-approved, at least by my family.
