Homemade Oatmeal Cream Pies

I had to save the best for last this week. Oatmeal Cream Pies were my all time favorite. There’s just something about that soft chewy oatmeal cookies with the cream filling smooshed between.

I have a confession to make about the store bought version of this cookie. When I was in High School, I was the yearbook editor senior year with a good friend of mine K. He and I had a class period each day to do yearbook work as an independent study class. We had the yearbook room to ourselves for one hour a day. It was a lot of fun. We kept Oatmeal Cream Pies in the yearbook drawer and would house these things on a regular basis. We’d go through a disgusting amount of these cookies in one hour. Thank goodness for my high-school metabolism (which has since vanished), as well as my stomach of steel. Oh man, parts of high school were a good time.

Back to reality. In the past 10+ years since then, my stomach has become more sensative to dairy and other foods, and I have to work to not gain weight. I’ve learned a lot about how to eat healthy and gained quite the love of cooking and baking. I’ve also learned that most store bought foods can be made a hundred times better at home.

These cookies are no exception. The brown sugar in the cookies keeps them perfectly soft and the filling is so much better than what’s in the store bought version. It’s like a homemade marshmallow fluff, and it’s amazing. I packaged them in celophane bags so they were easy to throw into lunches for me and Hubby this week.

One Year Ago: Best Dang Thing Ever Bars

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Homemade Oatmeal Cream Pies

Yield: 24

Ingredients:

For the Cookies
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 cups packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 cups quick-cooking rolled oats
2 tsp baking soda
3 Tbsp boiling water

For the Filling
1 Tbsp plus 1 tsp unflavored gelatin (about 1 1/2 packets)
1/3 cup plus 1/4 cup water (divided)
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup light corn syrup
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup powdered sugar
8 ounces vegetable shortening

Directions:

Make the cookies
Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Lightly grease a baking sheet and set aside (or use parchment).

Cream the butter, sugar, and eggs in a large bowl.

In a separate bowl, sift together the salt, flour, and baking powder. Add to the creamed mixture. Add the cinnamon and oats. Mix well.

In a small dish, add the baking soda to the boiling water, and then stir the mixture into the rest of the batter. Mix well.

Drop by the tablespoon onto the baking sheets about 2 inches apart and bake until the cookies are firm and just starting to turn golden around the edges, 10 to 15 minutes. Cool the cookies on a wire rack or a plate.

Make the filling
In a small measuring cup, sprinkle the gelatin over 1/3 cup cold water. Let stand, stirring once or twice until the gelatin softens, about 5 minutes.

In a heavy 2-quart saucepan over medium-high heat, stir together the granulated sugar, corn syrup, and 1/4 cup hot water until well blended. Continuing to stir, raise the heat to high and bring to a full boil. Continue boiling for 30 seconds. Immediately remove from the heat. Stir in the gelatin mixture until it dissolves completely.

Transfer the mixture to a large bowl. Add the vanilla.

With a mixer on medium speed, beat for 20 seconds. Gradually raise the speed to high and beat until the mixture is stiffened, white, very fluffy, and cooled to barely warm, about 5 minutes.

Reduce the mixer speed to low and gradually add the powdered sugar.

Add the shortening and beat until completely smooth.

The filling will set up as it sits, so wait until it is thick enough to spread or pipe before filling the cookies.

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11 Responses to “Pumpkin White Chocolate Chip Bars”

  1. #
    1
    stephchows — October 27, 2009 at 2:26 pm

    mmm they look so super moist!

  2. #
    2
    Cupcake Activist — October 27, 2009 at 4:11 pm

    Yum! Those look really good! I’ve never tried white chocolate with pumpkin.

  3. #
    3
    nutmegnanny — October 28, 2009 at 1:41 am

    Wow white chocolate and pumpkin! What a delicious combination…yum!

  4. #
    4
    Erin — October 28, 2009 at 2:02 am

    I made those last year, and MAN OH MAN aren’t they good!

  5. #
    5
    Sweet and Savory — October 28, 2009 at 4:01 am

    I have in the oven, a chocolate-pumpkin streusel brownie. Now, I want to make this too.

    You have great recipes. Thanks.

  6. #
    6
    The Novice Chef — October 28, 2009 at 4:03 am

    These look delicious! And I totally do not blame you for having a couple before taking them to give away!

  7. #
    7
    bridget {bake at 350} — October 31, 2009 at 12:44 pm

    I love that you ate 2 while you were cutting them! 🙂 That sounds familiar!

    They look wonderful!

  8. #
    8
    Tessa — October 31, 2009 at 5:33 pm

    These are the same bars I made, but I added cinnamon chips per recommendation from Maria at Two Peas in their Pod. They were great! Glad to see they turned out well for you too!

  9. #
    9
    Ingrid — November 2, 2009 at 7:05 pm

    I totally agree I’m not crazy about chocolate and pumpking together. Another great flavor with pumpkin (in my opinion) is gingerbread.

    I’m definitely adding this to my list of pumpkin recipes that will be baked from here until the kiddos say no more! 🙂
    ~ingrid

  10. #
    10
    Jade — November 3, 2009 at 10:13 pm

    I love making bars. These look amazing. I will definety try these soon!

  11. #
    11
    Jessica — October 29, 2010 at 1:21 pm

    I made these last night to take tailgating at a college football game tonight and they are SO yummy! I used semisweet chips instead of white chocolate, but I bet they’d be good either way! I’m Really glad you warned that the mixture might look like it curdled after adding in the pumpkin, because I think it would have freaked me out and I would have thought I did something wrong!

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