ina garten's raisin pecan oatmeal cookies

i have made lots of  cookies over the years...mostly around the holidays.  my cookie mentor was not tilly though, it was my mother in law lillian.  she was born in norway and immigrated to this country in her late 20's/ early 30's.  she brought  to america, her pastry skills and a sense of duty to make the required cookies for christmas....regardless of time or money or the difficulty finding the perfect ingredients.... not to mention the fact that all of her recipes from home were metric.   lillian made all of the different kinds every year with potato flour, ground almonds ..things i had never seen before....and the finished products had to look perfect or she would throw them in the trash.....watching this process as a young bride was a shocker for me, since i had never actually seen anyone bake scratch cookies outside of home-ec class ......the thought of throwing out perfectly good cookies because the edge was a tiny bit brown, defied imagination.  ( i grabbed them before they hit the trash)  .....i am beginning to think the artistic perfection streak might have been passed on to my daughter kelsey, who will literally spend 6 hours creating gorgeous sugar cookies, that happen to taste good.  me, on the other hand....i am a different kind of cookie baker....i like cookies that don't require much decorating but taste really good!  so i do have a couple of lillian's recipe's that i will share around the holidays....but mostly i stick to the basics that taste good.  this recipe for oatmeal cookies is from ina garten's back to basics cookbook and it makes some seriously yummy cookies.

these are best enjoyed light brown and crunchy

recipe after the jump

1 1/2 cups pecans
2 sticks of unsalted butter at room temperature
1 cup dark brown sugar lightly packed
1 cup granulated sugar
2 extra large eggs at room temperature
2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 cups old fashioned oatmeal
1 1/2 cups raisins

preheat oven to 350 degrees put the pecans on a cookie sheet and toast in the oven for 5 minutes.
set aside until cool then chop coarsely.
in a bowl of an electric mixer with the paddle attachment beat the butter, brown sugar and sugar together on medium to high speed until light and fluffy.  with the mixer on low add the eggs, one at a time and then the vanilla.
sift the flour, salt, baking powder and cinnamon in a medium bowl.    add the oats, raisins and pecans and mix until just combined.
i put my batter in the fridge for a half hour to firm up.  use a small ice cream scoop to drop two inch mounds of batter onto cookie sheets covered with parchment paper. before putting in the oven flatten each mound with damp fingers.  bake for 12-15 minutes until lightly browned.  then transfer to cooling rack.  (cool on the cookie sheet for chewier cookies. )

ready to come out of the oven