I'm Back Again! (with cookies): S'moresNana Oat-Chewies
Hi hi, it's been over a year, but I'm back. Better late than never, righttt?
A few things have happened since I last posted. Mainly, I moved to Boston, and I finished my first year of dental/med school!!! Dental/med because for the first year we are basically med students. We take all the med school classes, interview and perform full physical exams on patients in the hospital – I even have a hospital ID that says medical student to prove it. :P
I've got to say, I've enjoyed this past year a lot more than expected. The human body is AMAZING, and I got to appreciate that a little bit more. (As well as how much about ourselves we still don't know.) Dental/med school is wayyy better than college in my opinion. It's basically all the topics I'm interested, taught with encouragement and support, and a lot less theoretical science torture taught with the intention to weed out pre-meds.
The parts of college I do miss though, are all the things I did outside of class! Extracurriculars are pretty much no longer a thing. (Unless you count all the medical/dental specialty interest groups we have - wooo so much variety. :P) You kind of have to go out of your way to keep your hobbies, and there's just less students, so it's rarer to find others that have the same hobby. I really miss the dance community at Penn, esp Pan-Asian and Penn Dance. If you're still there, make sure you take advantage of being around so many awesome people who dance and go attend as many free dance workshops as you can!!! After college, it's probably gonna be 20 min+ Uber ride to get to a studio, and it's gonna cost you mad $$. (Cringe because you might also be taking out loans and you'll have to pay all this back in double later. D:<)
Another thing I miss is having a private kitchen and bathroom. (Which I shared with the lovely Sandhya. <3) I'm living in the med/dental student dorm and will be an RA this coming year. Although I love being able to walk to class in 2 minutes and always being close to a bunch of awesome people, the shared kitchens and bathrooms are a bit of a drawback. Having to carry a bunch of stuff to the kitchen every time I need to cook is a pain, but sharing the kitchen is alright because I get to chill with cool people while I cook. (This is more of a disclaimer because making food look good without a legit kitchen is extra hard, and my only camera now is my phone so don't judge my photos too hard okayy??) Sharing the bathroom is...well, sometimes you just want to do your business in peace if you know what I mean. :P
Anywayyy, the cookies!!! I assume that's what you're here for right? :) This was an improv-recipe that I came up with to use up some overripe bananas. It tastes kind of like the love-child of banana bread, s'mores, and oatmeal cookies. (Don't ask me how that works). They're soft, chewy and not too sweet - definitely a treat, but not too ridiculous to eat for breakfast and/or snack. The marshmallows melt and caramelize in the oven, contrasting in flavor and texture with the slightly-bitter, rich chocolate chips and earthy chewy oats.
Just a few tips for baking: make sure you lightly spoon your flour into the measuring cup and then level it. Don't pack it down or you'll end up with really dense hockey-puck cookies! If your bananas aren't super duper ripe, wait until they are :P, or increase the sugars to ½ cup each. Using room-temperature butter and eggs is essential, so plan ahead! Finally, as I mentioned before, the marshmallows will melt, spread, and caramelize on the baking pan in the oven. You can kind of fold the melted sugar goodness onto the cookie when you transfer it off the baking sheet. Happy munching!! ^_^
S’mores-‘Nana Oat Chewies
Makes about 4 dozen cookies
Ingredients
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 ½ tsps baking soda
½ tsp sea salt
1 ¼ tsps ground cinnamon
¾ cup unsalted butter, room temperature
⅓ cup granulated sugar
⅓ cup dark brown sugar
3 large ripe bananas, mashed, about 1 ¾ cups
2 large eggs, room temperature
1 ½ tsps vanilla extract
3 cups rolled oats
1 ½ cups mini marshmallows
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
Preparation
Whisk together until well combined: flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon. Set aside.
Using a hand-mixer or stand-mixer, cream the butter and sugars. Mix in mashed bananas. It will be a bit lumpy, do not panic. Mix in the eggs, 1 at a time. Add vanilla extract and mix again.
Add in flour mixture and mix on low speed until just combined. Fold in oats, marshmallows and chocolate chips with a spatula.
Chill dough in refrigerator for at least 1 hour, and up to a day.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Line 2 standard-sized cookie sheets with parchment paper.
Shape dough into 2-tbsp-sized balls. Place on cookie sheets spaced 2 inches apart.
Bake in preheated oven for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from oven and keep on cookie sheet ~1 minute. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Allow the cookie sheet to cool completely between batches.
Eat warm or at room temperature. Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 3 months.
