Cherry Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies with Coconut

Gluten Free - Cherry Chocolate
Oatmeal Cookies

I'm continually on a quest for great gluten free cookies. Real Simple has a great peanut butter cookie recipe (they are even better if you add chopped Skor bar). I made Carmelitas a couple weeks ago with GF-flour and those were good too.

This weekend, I was craving a chewy oatmeal cookie so I made up a recipe that turned out to be pretty damn good. In fact, I took them to a Super Bowl party and didn't tell anyone that they were gluten free. I think it's a good sign when the cookies disappear.

1 cup melted butter
1 1/2 cups light brown sugar
1 tablespoon black tea (coffee would work too)
2 eggs

1 1/2 cups gluten-free flour mix
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2  teaspoon salt (next time I'm going to use kosher)
1/2  teaspoon cinnamon

Cherry Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies -
Amazing when they are warm!

1 1/2 cup oats (I used gluten free, but you could use regular. I would stick to something like Coach's Oats where it's a little more finely ground.)
1 cup coconut
1 cup dried cherries
1 cup chocolate chips

Mix the butter, brown sugar and tea. Add the eggs and mix it for a minute or two. Add the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. Mix well. Add the oats, coconut, cherries and chocolate chips. Mix. I used a regular table spoon to "drop" them on the cookie sheet. I was in a rush and made the last tray a little big. With the big tray, I still got 48 cookies out of it so I'm sure I could have gotten 60 out of the batch normally.

Bake 12 minutes at 350.

A note about the coconut: I think it really helped the consistency of the cookie. It made them nice and chewy. But, I didn't get a lot of coconut flavor, which I was hoping for. Next time, I might use additional coconut and  roll the dough in it before baking. Hubby also suggested trying coconut oil instead of butter; I think a 1/2 cup of butter and 1/2 cup of coconut oil would be ok. So, if you're looking for a big coconut flavor try that.