Apple Chai Oatmeal Cookies

I love fall; it’s my favorite season! While the Internet has been inundated by pumpkin recipes, I’m just not ready to go there quite yet. But there are loads of apple, pear, cinnamon, and oat recipes that I am so excited to make. These flavors of fall are great at any time, but seem most fitting this time of the year. These cookies, with applesauce, oats and spices, are great for fall.

These cookies get part of their spice flavor from chai tea concentrate, but it just adds subtle spice. You soak the raisins in the chai and so they carry the chai flavor. These cookies contain everything: raisins, chocolate chips, oats, and nuts. When I first came across this recipe, I thought it would contain apples, but the apple in in the form of applesauce. You typically use applesauce in recipes to cut down on the fat, but these cookies still contain plenty of butter.

These cookies contain an entire cup of applesauce, which is a lot. It gives the cookies an unusual texture. They are cakey and kind of too wet at first. But what I noticed is that after a day the cookies matured and were just wonderful. They stayed soft for quite a while, well over a week. I loved the flavors in these and loved that they contained both raisins and chocolate chips. 

Apple Chai Oatmeal Cookies

1 cup raisins

1/4 cup chai tea concentrate

1 3/4 cup oats

1 1/2 cup flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1 cup brown sugar, packed

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 egg

1 cup applesauce

1 cup chocolate chips

1 cup chopped nuts

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with silicone baking mats.

In a small bowl, combine the raisins and the chai tea concentrate, set aside. In a medium bowl, combine the oats, flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg and set aside. 

In a large mixer bowl, combine sugars and butter and beat until creamy. Add egg and applesauce and blend until smooth. Add flour-oat mix and blend on low. Stir in the chocolate chips, chai-soaked raisins and nuts. 

Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto prepared cookie sheets. Bake for 10-12 minutes, until lightly browned around the edges.

Recipe from Oregon Chai