Notes from My Kitchen...

I have been looking for a copycat recipe of Famous Amos crunchy cookies for a long time. Then, I came across Biskut Raya: Famous Amos about half a year ago. The guy said that the recipe was from Famous Amos in Bangsar, Malaysia. At first, I was quite sceptical about the recipe but anyway, I gave it a go today. There is also another website citing the original recipe and there are comments from some people. They said that the cookies are not like Famous Amos and too much oats etc. But hey, I guess they might not know if they were not told that the cookies were not bought from the Famous Amos shop.   I suppose the cookies have the closest taste and texture to the Famous Amos version.

I converted the quantity to grams, adjusted the quantity of some ingredients, grouped the ingredients, adjusted some of the baking steps and quartered the original quantity. Geez... the ingredients in the original recipe are just all over the place. The reduced quantity still makes a lot of cookies. Just take a look at the total quantity of the quartered recipe, it's about 1 kg dough. Btw, my mother in law said she saw a similar cookie recipe with oatmeals but she cannot remember where it was from.

Anyway, the cookies turned out very light, airy and crunchy as I always want... yihuiiii . Whether the recipe was really from Famous Amos or not, I am still very happy with the result. The texture of the cookies was just right. The light crunchy texture is contributed by the oatmeal and baking powder and soda.

The only thing that I have to improve is the fineness of the oatmeals. Mine was still quite coarse. Here is the adjusted recipe. If you want to use the original, please check the original source.

 

Ingredients

 

115 g butter, You’ll Love Coles, reduced salt, cold and cut into cubes

100 g caster sugar

90 g brown sugar

 

1 egg (70 g with shell but don't include the shell in your mixture )

½ tsp vanilla extract, Queens

 

100 g Oats, Uncle Toby Traditional, grind to a fine powder, sieved

125 g plain flour

^1/­₈ tsp salt (because I used reduced salt butter, you may want to use 1/4 tsp salt if using unsalted butter)

½ tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

 

150 g almond, chopped coarsely

150 g milk chocolate chips, Cadbury 

90 g milk chocolate bar, Lindt, grated finely with microplane (when the chocolate pieces were getting too difficult to grate, my husband just ate those bits. The whole block was 100 g.)

 

 

Cooking Methods

 

1. Cream butter and sugars until light and fluffy
2. Add egg and vanilla, beat till well combine
3. Add oats mixture and mix till combine
4. Add chocolate and nut mixture then mix till just combined.
5. Leave the dough in the fridge for about 20 minutes
6. Preheat oven to 160-180^oC
7. Lay a baking paper on the cookie sheet
8. Take about ½ tsp of the mixture and put on the cookie sheet
9. Bake for about 10 minutes
10. Return the remaining dough to the fridge while waiting for the batch to come out from the oven.
11. Cool on the cooling tray
12. Store in an airtight container

 

 

Note:

-        The nuts can be changed to macadamia, walnut, pecan, cashew nuts, peanuts or even just no nuts.

-     The cookies are also nice with some of the dried fruits such as raisins and cranberries.

-        If you want the cookie to have darker colour, you can use dark brown sugar and/or add cocoa powder. Reduce the plain flour accordingly when add cocoa powder.

-        Baking time should be adjusted according to the size of the dough balls

-     Leave the dough ball stay high (don't press it). I find the cookies that still stay high are cruchier and lighter (not dense).

-        I put the dough in the fridge for about 20 minutes before baking the first batch to prevent excessive spreading. Then, I returned the remaining dough to the fridge while waiting for a batch baked in the oven.

As for the photos... just imagine the cookies from the Famous Amos display shelf.  At the moment, I still feel not quite right from eating too much cookies....

 

Note:

- Do not mix the dough for too long as it will cause the cookies turn hard.

- I tried to modify the recipe by reducing the flour and add arrowroot starch and wholemeal flour. Also, I shape the cookie into a log and cut it. The cookie became hard and chewy