Oatmeal not-raisin cookies

I was walking through the greenmarket on Saturday with a friend who raved about the chocolate chip oatmeal cookies from one of the stalls. They were sturdier than I like my chocolate chip cookies — I fall on the barely-holding-together-globs-of-dough end of the spectrum — but also ... nice. There was something almost wholesome about them, and they got me thinking about sturdy, wholesome cookies, something that would fall between a cookie and a homemade energy bar, kind of decadent but in a good-for-you kind of way. I started with Mark Bittman's oatmeal cookie recipe and added all sorts of stuff, with the notable exception of raisins. I hate those little bastards. People are always adding them to stuff and ruining everything. They're sticky and gross and taste like the bottomless pit of despair that comes of being the kid at school with the lamest snack at snacktime.

The cookies, however, worked out pretty well and have been called into service as both breakfast and the kind of snack any little anklebiter would trade their Twinkies for. Oddly, as I've been eating my way through the batch I keep wanting them to have sesame seeds and coconut too. Next time...

Oatmeal not-raisin cookies
adapted from How to Cook Everything

1 stick butter, softened
½ c. white sugar
½ c. brown sugar
2 eggs
1 c. all-purpose flour
½ c. whole wheat flour
2 c. rolled oats
½ c. oat bran
3 T. ground flax seeds
½ t. cinnamon
pinch salt
2 t. baking powder
½ c. milk
½. t. almond extract
½ t. vanilla
½ c. dried cherries
½ c. ground walnuts
½ c. dried apricots, chopped

Preheat the oven to 375F. Cream the butter and sugars; add the eggs one at a time and mix until well blended.

Combine the dry ingredients except nuts and fruit in a separate bowl. Add the vanilla and almond extract to the milk. Alternate adding the dry ingredients and the milk, stirring by hand after each addition. Add the nuts and fruit.

Drop by teaspoons or tablespoons onto ungreased baking sheets and bake until lightly browned, about 10 min. Cool for about 2 minutes on the sheets before transferring to a rack to finish cooling. Store in an airtight container.