Rooibos Phoenix Oatmeal Cookies

“Will you love me more if I make you cookies?”

This is the question I asked my boyfriend as I was debating what to bake over the weekend. Since the calendar says it is fall, even though the weather says summer (which, by the way, is totally fine by me) it basically means its baking season. It’s actually more like pre-season, since we all know baking is a winter sport. But all I want to do when I’m not rowing an absorbent amount of meters on the rowing machine is bake things. And eat a lot of bread. You know, so different from my normal routine.

We have previously established that every single male anywhere loves cookies. And they really love oatmeal raisin cookies. In fact, this blog alone has a few oatmeal raisin cookie recipes, and I’m not really even the biggest fan. This just proves that I’m not the heartless wench I believe I am. Don’t tell anyone. Or I will probably kill you. Or just withhold cookies. Which is absolutely just as bad.

I’m a huge fan of infusing desserts with booze. And this recipe is a little bit of a shift from that. Friends, please meet my favorite tea. Ever. Alice’s Tea Cup absolutely takes full credit for this infusion. Rooiboos Bourbon is a red tea with notes of honey, vanilla, and caramel. But if you aren’t a fan of overly-sweet tea, don’t worry, this is more musky than sweet. OK, that makes no sense, but trust me. This tea is ahhhhhh-mazing. One whiff of this tea and you immediately want to wrap yourself in a blanket and curl up on the couch. It’s perfect sweater-weather tea. And how perfect. These cookies are the definition of fall. Basically. The 40 or so cookies that I made were gone in 2 days. Not a crumb left. Want to hold someone hostage on your couch so gives you cuddles and massages? This is the way to do it.

Rooibos Phoenix Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

*adapted from Alice’s Tea Cup

Ingredients

• 4 teaspoons Rooibos Phoenix tea leaves (or other red, spiced tea)
• 2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 eggs
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 2½-3  cups dried oats
• 1-2 cups of raisins

Directions

• Steep the tea for 7 minutes in ¼ cup of boiling water, strain tea and refrigerate tea to cool.
• Preheat oven to 375 degrees F
• Cream butter and sugar together. Add cooled tea and eggs, beat until smooth. Add flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon.
• With a spatula, mix oats and raisins until well incorporated.
• Drop onto baking sheet, about 2-inches apart (they will expand quite a bit). I could fit 12 on my cookie sheet
• Bake for 13-15 minutes, until tops are browned. Let cool and devour. Or give to a friend so they will fall in love with you too!