Cranberry Orange Iced Oatmeal Cookies

Fresh orange and dried cranberries add a zesty flavor to these chewy, whole wheat cookies.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup plus 6 T unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
•  1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 t vanilla
• 1 orange (for zest and juice)
• 1 3/4 c whole wheat flour
• 1 t baking soda
• 1 t ground cinnamon
• 1/2 t salt
• 3 cups old fashioned oats
• 1 cup dried cranberries*
• 2 cups powdered sugar (for the icing)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cream together butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, and mix well. Add vanilla and zest from 3/4 of the orange. In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Add to butter/sugar/egg mixture, and mix until well combined. Stir in oats and dried cranberries.

Scoop dough onto prepared baking sheet (I like to use silicone baking mats or parchment paper), about 1-2 tablespoons of dough for each cookie. Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until golden. Allow cookies to cool on the pan for a few minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

While cookies cool, prepare the icing. Mix together powdered sugar, remaining orange zest, and juice from half the orange until smooth. Drizzle a generous amount of icing over cooled cookies, and allow to set.

*Commercially dried cranberries often have a good amount of added sugar. In this recipe I used home-dried cranberries with minimal sweetener added.

This article was written by Marta Nielsen, blog editor for Live Well Utah, marta.nielsen@usu.edu