Hi Elise - this is such a lovely post - it's wonderful to have your grandmother's recipe, she must have been a great cook too. The picture is really beautiful as well.

I love cookies but I was wonderin' if you could use butter or margarine in place of shortneng?

this is a great recipe...I made a variation including:

1/2 teaspoon of Almond Extract
2 tablespoons dark corn syrup
1 cup dried cherries (instead of raisins)

A different idea I tried because my daughter doesn't care for raisins.

Had a terrible urge for Oatmeal cookies, hadn't made them in five years partly because the recipe I have has never really "thrilled" me. Copied yours down and made a big batch of them this evening. They are, hands down, the best, beST, BEST, Oatmeal cookie I've ever made or eaten. Thank you so much for sharing this wonderful recipe. I will always think of you and your grandmother everytime I make them. And who knows, maybe I'll live to 92 because of them!!!

Your cookies sound wonderful! And I wouldn't change a thing, especially the Cinnamon! I'm going to bake some for my grandson.

We have squirrels in our back yard and one of them, whom my grandson named "Stinky" drinks from our bird bath and feasts on anything he happens to see growing in our yard including most of our pecans, some berries, grapes and apples. I wish he would take a bite out of one of our peppers and I could see his reaction!

Although we would never kill Stinky or his friends, my husband does go squirrel hunting occasionally, but I don't care for the meat. He speaks fondly of the squirrel stew his dad used to cook. (yuk!)

I really like the recipe in your grandmother's own handwriting. What a treasure! I have recipes I saved from my mother, mother-in-law, and her mother. The little spots of flavoring and notes written in the margins make them all the more meaningful to me. I hope when I am gone, my daughters will feel the way you do about the memories we made together when they were little girls, baking cookies in my kitchen.

Keep up the good work! I love you site!

This is the perfect oatmeal cookie. Grandma's recipes are usually the best. I also love oatmeal cookies with dried cranberries and white chocolate chips. My family had the cookies eaten before they had a chance to cool!!

Looking forward to making these . They sure sound like my grandmas recipe . Theres also a carmel recipe my grandma had , she made it for my mom and i'd like to surprise her with it , Thanks Connie

Oh my, I just made these oatmeal cookies for my family. Thought I'd put some into a tin and send them off with my college boy. They are the absolute best! I have looked for many years for an oatmeal cookie that was as good as my grandma's. I found it! Next time I will try them with some dried cherries. You and your grandma are the best! Thanks so much!

I made these cookies last night for my cookie snob husband and they were a big hit!!! You can get shortning made of vegetable oil and it's no less healthy than butter or margerine. In fact, shortning makes cookies more fluffy and less flat and crispy than butter -- much much better! Anyway...these cookies are fantastic! Crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside. They were prefect! I am wondering though, if anyone knows how to figure out the nutritional information of an old recipe like this?

Thanks so much for this recipe, I'm going to be using it for years to come.

You add up the fat and protien etc. of each ingredient then divide the total into 24 (24 cookies approximately).
I am omitting the raisins and walnuts because I have none. I also use whole wheat flour in everything :) but If you still want a rough idea of nutritional information:
Per cookie assuming that as stated in a reply above the recipe makes 24 cookies:

201 calories
4 grams fat
ABOUT 76 mg sodium
roughly 2 grams fiber
17 grams sugar
2.6 grams protien (about 2 and a half grams)

Please do correct me If I am wrong. I admit my math is rusty. Using white or bleached flour makes less fiber and protien per cookie. :)
so anyway hope that at least gives you an idea.

I tried the recipe last night and it made around 50 cookies when dropped by tablespoon, so about half of the above figure would be correct per cookie.
100 calories
2 grams fat
1 gram fiber
8.5 grams sugar
1.3 grams protien :)

They were absolutely lovely. :)I tend to prefer old fashioned and "hand-me-down" recipes. They always turn out perfectly. Both in taste and form. :)

I was hunting for an oatmeal cookie recipe tonight and ran across this posting. I whipped up a batch and was pleasantly surprised to find these were the best oatmeal cookies I had ever tasted. My husband agreed. These cookies will make your taste buds DANCE IN YOUR MOUTH!!! You can't get any closer to heaven than that!

Home today due to a blizzard in Central NY, I decided to make oatmeal cookies to send to my college son. Unable to find my favorite recipee, I googled and came up with your site. I immediately felt a connection---the handwriting looks just like my grandmother's; then to read that your grandmother also was born in 1899; also died at the age of 97; and loved her desserts!!
THANK YOU for making my day!!

Thank you for your recipe. I was searching for oatmeal recipes and some of those I saw had water or milk in them, which I don't recall ever using before. You see, I forgot to bring my own recipe book with me when i left my country. This recipe of yours sounded just like the ones I've been making. One question though, could I replace the baking soda with baking powder? It's just that baking powder is what I have in my cupboard. =) Thanks!

I'd been hungry for oatmeal cookies but couldn't find my recipe. Most of the recipies I could find called for quick oats and I don't use quick oats -- only "old fashioned." Went to the Quaker Oats web page and pulled up a recipe that sounded okay and used old fashioned oats, but I still wanted to look for more. All I did was type in "Oatmeal Cookies" on my Google page and your web page was one of those displayed. Anything that refers to "Grandma" catches my eye so your web page was where I went. To make a long story a whole lot shorter, I made your grandma's oatmeal cookies this afternoon. I cut the cinnamon to 1/2 tablespoon because my husband thinks he doesn't like cinnamon all that much, and the cookies are fabulous! This recipe will definitely go into my recipe file and I will NOT lose it. Thanks so much!

I made these cookies today but accidentally overlooked the white sugar. Surprisingly, they came out great with just the brown sugar! Not too sweet, just the way I like them. Thanks for the wonderful recipe! These are the best cookies I've ever made.

Hi Elise,

I just made the cookies. They come out great!! Thanks a lot. All my flatmates like them.

In fact I didn't expect that the inside has a soft texture. Is it supposed to be like that? I thought they would be a little bit crispy inside. Or perhaps I made them too big?

These cookies are a favourite with my family and my friends. Everyone loves them- great recipe!
Thanks!

Hi Elise
Thanks for the great tasty oatmeal cookie recipe. My husband said it is the best homemade cookie he has ever eaten and he said not to lose your recipe.He also said it was a keeper so I will indeed will be baking your grandmother's cookies forever.. Thanks again for sharing with us your delicious recipes

Elaine

First time I made oatmeal cookies I tried this recipe: I used half the sugar and added a bit more
raisins, some coconut, and some chocolate chips.
Really good and all the guests really liked them.
I halved the recipe the second time because I thought I would eat them all in one go, which I pretty much did.

I was looking for an oatmeal cookie recipe tonight and found this. Oh, wow!! These are so good!! I used butter instead of shortening and was low on white sugar, so I used 1 1/4 cup brown and 3/4 cup white. I had a bag of Toffee Bits and used those instead of the raisins and nuts. These are soooo good!! Very chewy!! I'm excited to find your blog. Very Nicely done! Thank you!

Thank you so much for sharing this recipe! Your grandma's recipe is wonderful! All too often, oatmeal cookies are fussy and difficult to make, but these were so easy! I love the cinnamon taste, consistent turn out, and the chewy texture. Because I didn't use nuts, I decreased the sugar to 3/4 cup of each and increased the amount of raisins to 1 1/2 cups. This recipe is a keeper!

What a lovely way in which to honor your grandmother by sharing her treasure with the world. The cookies are the best oatmeal cookies I have ever had. I am enjoying them with my family. Thank you. Happy cooking!

This is so amazing! Your recipe is the exact same one that my grandmother uses, except with shortening instead of butter. I've been trying to remember it for forever. Thank you so so much for putting this up here! I always loved these cookies.

I made these for my coworkers and

THEY

LOVED

IT

Thanks for posting this recipe. It was seriously one of the most compliments I'd ever gotten on anything I'd ever made for work.

My husband is an oatmeal cookie fanatic. He also loves pumpkin pie, so I ran across your recipe, and decided to put some pumpkin pie spice in place of some of the cinnamon. It was wonderful. I was wondering though, why are my cookies coming out so flat? They are still chewey in the middle, and crisp on the outside, but I would like them to be more formed and not as pancake-like! (I am still learning :) otherwise than my newfound talent - thank you for the chance to find a recipe that my husband absolutely loves for his favorite cookie!

These are excellent cookies! I added 1/2 c. flour and did not add raisins or nuts and they were great! I also substituted butter for shortening. I really like them. Well done!

Thank you, Elise, for your kindness and generosity in sharing your grandmother's recipe for Oatmeal Cookies. I made them this afternoon, and they are superb. I didn't change any of the ingredients and find that I don't need to. They truly are a perfect cookie for my family.

I was looking for some cookies to make for my mother who is 75 years old, but her best are oatmeal. I did these and she asks every weekend, are you going to make me those cookies today? Love them. Thank you very much for sharing them with the world. Grandma is still around. Thank you again. Jan.

God bless your beautiful sweet Grandmother and you, Elise!

I just now tried her recipe and honey, let me tell you, those are the BEST oatmeal cookies I have EVER made.

I feel lots of love and gratitude to her and to you.

Lauren

Hi there, I finally found the perfect oatmeal cookie recipe thanks to you and your grandmother! God bless her soul. Thank you for sharing with the world. Its a cold winter day here in Canada and your cookies have warmed our house and our hearts. My 5 yr old daughter loves them!

Oatmeal raisin cookies are my all time favorite but a good recipe is hard to come by. Thank goodness for you Elise, these cookies are the best! I make them all the time and everyone loves them. They really are awesome and they turn out exactly the same every time, the true test of a great recipe.

It took me about an hour to find, print, and bake these cookies. They turned out with an absolutely indescribable consistency, not to mention they were fast and easy! I split the dough in half and added butterscotch chips, which turned out wonderfully as well. Thank you so very much for this recipe :) !!

My daughter printed this recipe to try as I usually use the recipe on the back of the Oatmeal box, NEVER AGAIN! Your recipe is now in my recipe box to pass down to my daughters when they marry. I also have a recipe for Zuchinni bread that my Granny wrote down for me. It's my treasure! Thank you for sharing!!

1.5 cups flour + 3 cups oats divided by rounded tablespoons /= 2 dozen cookies ... it simply does not compute. As I type, 4+ dozen have come out of the oven and almost 1/2 of the batter is left ... good news for me, but you might want to adjust the expected product estimate - YIKES! LOL

Ooooh ... 2 dozen are left to pack up after the family has at them! Ah, the wisdom of Grandma. These are "very yummy" cookies! And chewy! Thanks again!

Well if you remember that cookies of 50-150 years ago were often 3-4" in diam. In that case you could get about 2 dozen. For me I get about 2.5 dozen

I am a cookie fanatic and these are the best Oatmeal Cookies ever! The only thing I differently was to use butter flavor shortening instead of regular. Best, best, best!

Thanks so much for sharing this recipe. What a treasure for you have have your grandmother's handwriting.
It is such a good recipe. The only changes I made were to use 1/2 cups shortening and 1/2 cup butter and I also added 1 cup of chocolate chips. They were so very good. Crisp and chewy at the same time.

Thank you for sharing your Grandmother's recipe. They are THE BEST! I have collected recipes for years and the best ones are always from cooks that jot down the basics. This one will go in my Favorites file.

Hi Elise, tried this recipe over the weekend, my my my, these are so precious! It's the best cookies I have ever tasted.. Thank you so much for your grandma's recipe.

Thank you so much Elise. I made these cookies this past weekend for a family event and at the end of the event...they were ALL GONE! I usually make chocolate-chip & pecan cookies from scratch using a recipe I found long ago and my family always wants me to make them, but after tasting these oatmeal cookies, they now want me to make these in addition to those. I now want to find a great sugar cookie recipe. My nephew only likes this particular kind of cookie. Any suggestions?