Oatmeal Cream Pies

Now, I'm no Little Debbie, but when I saw this recipe on Pinterest, I knew that I had to give them a whirl. I would now like to be referred to as Little Jenny, lol, and it think I rightfully earned it with as much effort as it took to make these little beauties. It took a good hour to make the cookie dough and the cream filling. And since I left all my big cookie sheets at my sisters, it took awhile to bake all the batches of cookies seeing that I had to use one small tray that only fit 9 cookies on it lol. While this recipe doesn't taste exactly like the ones you can buy from the store, they are damn tasty.

You have to have a mixer in order to make this recipe. If you have a stand mixer, even better...I did not and was cursing the fact that I didn't by the third step of mixing. (Boyfriend, sister, or parents, this is a major hint for Christmas, wink face!) There is some major creaming going on in order to get the desired results. Cream the sugar and butter for the dough, add some stuff and mix again. Add some more stuff, and mix again. Then more sugar and butter get creamed together for what seems like forever. Add a milk and flour mixture (which also took about 5 minutes of straight whisking) to the creamed sugar and butter and cream, cream, cream. To say the least, my forearms got a workout today, which is good, because these aren't exactly health food. I promise you though, if you have the time and give it what it takes, you will be rewarded in the end.

OK, enough talking, you will need to save your energy to complete the recipe. Depending on how big you make the cookies (I did a heaping teaspoon) and how much filling you use for each (this is the best part in my opinion, so a heaping tablespoon), these will make just about 2 dozen sandwiches.

From Stella B's Kitchen

Oatmeal Cream Pies

Cookies

• 2 cups brown sugar
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1/4 cup Crisco
• 2 whole eggs
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon, heaping
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 3 Tbsp boiling water
• 1 tsp soda
• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 2 cups quick cooking oats

Filling

• 5 Tbsp flour
• 1 cup milk (skim is fine)
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup granulated sugar (not powdered)
• 3/4 cup marshmallow creme

Preparing cookie dough:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Cream brown sugar, butter and shortening.  
3. Add eggs and mix.  
4. Add salt, cinnamon and baking powder and mix.  
5. Mix boiling water with soda, then add to the bowl and mix.  
6. Add flour and oats and mix well.
7. Scoop teaspoon sized portions as evenly as possible onto a greased baking sheet.  
8. Bake 10 minutes, being careful not to over-bake. 
9. Cool slightly on baking sheet, then transfer to a cooling rack. Cool completely before filling.

Preparing filling:

1. In a medium saucepan, whisk flour and milk over medium heat, stirring constantly until mixture is very thick.
2. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature. Stir in vanilla.  
3. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. About 4 minutes. 
4. Add the cooled flour/milk mixture to the fluffy butter and sugar. Beat until it combines and resembles whipped cream. About 3 minutes.
5. Beat in 3/4 cup marshmallow creme until smooth.

Assembly

1. Scoop about a tablespoon of frosting on a cookie and sandwich with a similar sized cookie.
2. Try not to stack on on another when storing so the cream doesn't squish out or the cookies not stick together.

Tips and Tricks

• I know that the times stated for creaming the ingredients seems excessive, but the results will show your hard work. If you don't cream the sugar, butter, and shorten enough, your cookies will be flat and dense. If you don't cream the sugar and butter for the filling or the milk/flour mixture with creamed sugar/butter, your filling will not set up right and will be a runny mess.
• Don't over cook the cookies or you will lose the chewy texture and the bottoms will be too crunchy.
• You can use more or less filling in each cookie depending on your tastes. Just know if you use a ton, you might not have enough for all the cookies.
• A heaping teaspoon makes the perfect size for the cookies and keeps the baking time at exactly 10 minutes.