↓
 

Lady Behind the Curtain

Bringing the simplicity of entertaining into your life

Oatmeal Trash Cookies

Lady Behind the Curtain Posted on by
Jump to Recipe

Oatmeal Trash Cookies or Kitchen Sink Cookies: You may wonder what that means.  Well……it means you can add any leftover treats you have in the pantry.  These Oatmeal Trash Cookies have a little bit of everything in them and are super flavorful.  Like, pretzels, dried cranberries, white chocolate chips, dark chocolate chips, toffee bits and nuts!  A great recipe and the perfect cookies for a bake sale, take along to a potluck or barbecue!  Don’t forget about game day!

Oatmeal Trash Cookies
Imagine a warm, gooey chocolate chip cookie fresh out of the oven. The aroma fills the room, and your mouth starts to water at the thought of taking that first satisfying bite. Now, what if I told you that these garbage cookies were made with a not-so-typical ingredient – oatmeal trash? Yes, you read that right. These chewy cookies are not only delicious but will quickly become your favorite snack.

How to Make Oatmeal Trash Cookies-My Favorite Cookies!

Oatmeal Trash Cookies
I named these cookies, oatmeal trash cookies because I used up all my leftover baking chips, nuts, toffee bits and dried cranberries.  Don’t know what to do with that last 1/2 cup?  Now you do! These oatmeal chocolate chip cookies are moist and full of flavor.  I love sweet and salty together and that’s what these Oatmeal Cookies deliver.  Don’t have the same leftovers?  Use what you have….just keep the measurement down to 1/2 cup per ingredient.  If you don’t have pretzels, another great way to add a salty touch is with coarsely smashed potato chips. Any dried fruit will add a touch of chewy sweetness. Nuts will add another layer of crunch along with sweet toffee bits. For the ultimate sweet and salty treat!

OATMEAL TRASH COOKIES SIMPLE INGREDIENTS FROM THE PANTRY (full recipe below in the recipe card)

  • 1-1/4 cups unsalted butter, softened
  • 3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
  • 1/2 cup granulated sugar
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 3 cups old-fashioned oats or quick oats
  • 1 cup pretzel sticks, crushed
  • 1/2 cup white chocolate chips
  • 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips
  • 1/2 cup toffee bits
  • 1/2 cup dried cranberries
  • 1/2 cup walnuts, chopped

OATMEAL TRASH COOKIES SIMPLE INSTRUCTIONS

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
  2. To a large bowl, add the butter, brown sugar, sugar, egg and vanilla.
  3. Mix on medium-high speed until fluffy.
  4. In separate bowl, combine the flour baking soda and salt.
  5. Add to the butter mixture, mix until well combined.
  6. Add oats, pretzels, white chocolate chips, dark chocolate chips, toffee bits, dried cranberries and walnuts.
  7. Mix until well combined.
  8. For best results, use an ice cream scoop for the cookies, place 6 cookies per cookie sheet and bake cookies 15 minutes or until crispy edges with a soft center.
  9. Cool on wire rack. MAKES 26 LARGE COOKIES

How to Store Homemade Oatmeal Trash Cookies

Oatmeal Trash Cookies

FREEZER: Baked cowboy cookies freeze up to 3 months. Unbaked cookie dough balls freeze well for up to 3 months. Bake frozen cookie dough balls for an extra minute, no need to thaw.

KITCHEN COUNTER: Cookies stay fresh in an airtight container at room temperature up to a week. You can make the cookie dough and chill it in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. Allow to come to room temperature then continue with step #8.

Oatmeal Trash Cookies-Recipe Variations

These cookies are very forgiving with the mix-ins and super fun, just make sure to keep the ratios as listed in the recipe when making substitutions.

  • SWITCH UP THE CHOCOLATE: Don’t like dark chocolate? That’s okay, use milk chocolate instead.
  • ADD A FLAVORED MORSELS: Toss in some flavored chips like butterscotch chips or peanut butter chips.
  • SUBSTITUTE CHIPS FOR THE PRETZELS: There’s a variety of chips that would be delicious in this cookie recipe. Potato chips, corn chips or tortilla chips.
  • SHREDDED COCONUT: Add some sweetened coconut flakes.
  • SPRINKLES OR M&M’s: Transform these cookies into celebration cookies with themed colored sprinkles and M&M’s or any candy-coated chocolate.
  • COCOA POWDER: Change up the vanilla base of this cookie recipe to be chocolate! Add 1/3 cup of unsweetened cocoa to the cookie dough flour mixture, whisk until combined.
CAN QUICK COOKING OATS BE USED INSTEAD OF OLD FASHIONED OATS?

Yes, the only difference between quick cooking oats and old fashioned are the size. The quick oats have been cut into smaller pieces.

CAN A NUT BUTTER BE ADDED TO THE RECIPE?

Yes, Add 1 cup of a nut butter and 2 LARGE EGGS INSTEAD OF ONE.

Oatmeal Trash Cookies

Oatmeal Trash Cookies

Yield: Makes 26 large cookies
Prep Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 45 minutes

The perfect opportunity to use up all the little bits in your pantry.

Ingredients

  • 1-1/4 cups unsalted butter, softened
  • 3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
  • 1/2 cup granulated sugar
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 3 cups old fashioned oats
  • 1 cup pretzel sticks, crushed
  • 1/2 cup white chocolate chips
  • 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips
  • 1/2 cup toffee bits
  • 1/2 cup dried cranberries
  • 1/2 cup walnuts, chopped

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
  2. In a mixer combine the butter, brown sugar, sugar, egg and vanilla.
  3. Mix until fluffy.
  4. In another bowl combine the flour baking soda and salt.
  5. Add to the butter mixer, mix until well combined.
  6. Add oats, pretzels, white chocolate chips, dark chocolate chips, toffee bits, dried cranberries and walnuts.
  7. Mix until well combined.
  8. Using a ice cream scoop place 6 cookies per cookie sheet and bake 15 minutes.
  9. Cool on wire rack.

Did you make this recipe?

Please leave a comment and rate the recipe card so others can enjoy the recipe too!♥

© Sheryl

SIGN UP FOR THE LADY BEHIND THE CURTAIN NEWSLETTER


NEWSLETTER: Receive (twice a month) seasonally themed newsletters full of recipes, tips and tricks. Sometimes even FREE gifts! Click here for the Newsletter→CURTAIN CALL NEWSLETTER

THANKS FOR VISITING♥

Oatmeal Trash Cookies

Comments

Oatmeal Trash Cookies — 34 Comments

  1. I’ve made cookies along these lines before…called Compost Cookies. Gotta love clearing out those little dribbles of odds and ends from bags. Love that you were able to throw in the kitchen sink in these 🙂

    Reply ↓

  3. I made these tonight! My four year old insisted we didn’t NEED to put pretzels in it (translation: SHE didn’t want PRETZELS in HER cookies) so we used macadamia nuts instead. I can’t WAIT for the oven to finish baking them! They look fantastic!

    Reply ↓

  5. yummy!!! I’ve seen versions of these with names that shall not be mentioned on your family friendly blog :o) Thanks for linking up to Tasteful Tuesdays! you are a faithful linker! love it! Really appreciate you stopping by my blog! I’m trying to keep in better touch with my linkers/readers… If you already follow me, please let me know I will find your blog on Bloglovin (I’m transferring my follows there)if you don’t follow in any way, would you consider following via GFC or other method?
    http://www.nap-timecreations.com

    Reply ↓

  11. I just made these first pan is in oven but before I started to bake them I realized the dough was to crumbley , so rechecked the recipe and sure enoug I only used 1 and 1/2 cube of butter sooo melted the cube I forgot and poured in the dough mixed it in by hand and got a better cookie dough . It tasted great so Im sure it will be just tasty . Lol sometimes missing an ingredient happens lol, I used my medium ice cream scoop as my large is jumbo size , What can I say we love cream and cookies I used trail mix that had all the ingredients you called for and them few more also used quick cooking oats and used 2 1/4 . I do this all the time as the quick cooking are bit more powdery, Thank you for the great recipe

    Reply ↓

  15. These are amazing! Used all of the left over odds and ends after making my dipped holiday pretzels (heath bits, crushed butterfingers, peanuts, m&ms, crushed Oreos) and they were delicious! Thanks for sharing this great recipe!!

    Reply ↓

  18. Made these for a club meeting and they were a huge hit. Thanks for your great recipe. I will definitely make them again!🍪🍪💖💖

    Reply ↓

  19. Do you use quick cooking or old fashion oats in your Oatmeal Trash Cookies?
    I made them with quick oats and they seemed dry.

    Thank you!

    Reply ↓

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

HTML tags allowed in your comment: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

↑ Skip to Recipe