Look at those lovely flecks of orange Hershey’s Pumpkin Spice goodness. I first saw these specialty Hershey’s Kisses at Target in a pre-flight snack rush.

I grabbed them on impulse. Who knows when you’re going to find a novelty like that again?

Plus, every time I find something amazing at Target, if I don’t buy it, I can never find it again. Anyone else have that problem?

Of course, I had one or ten of these immediately, straight out of the bag en route to San Antonio. They are really good.

But really sweet.

I couldn’t eat too many without feeling a bit sickly. But I just knew they had potential.

While hanging out at my sister’s down in San Antonio, lots of different yummies got made (there was a 1st birthday to celebrate, after all), and the yummies included sugar cookies by the kids’ paternal grandmother.

Cookies! I thought.

And away we go…

The first thing I should tell you is that this recipe was adapted from Pam Anderson’s “Saucer Sized Oatmeal Cookies”, which appears in her cookbook, Perfect Recipes for Having People Over. I can’t say enough about this book, or the author. I love them both!

First, throw your Pumpkin Spice Hershey’s Kisses (really, you can use any Kiss you want) into the freezer for a couple of hours.

Then start by assembling your ingredients, and preheating your oven to 350F.

The Players :: All Purpose Flour, Baking Powder, Baking Soda, Old Fashioned Oatmeal, Eggs, Salt, Butter, Sugar, Dark Brown Sugar, Dried Cranberries, Pumpkin Spice Hershey’s Kisses, Vegetable Oil and Vanilla Extract (last two are not pictured because I’m a ninny that forgot to shove them into the shot).

I measured out about 1 cup of Kisses into a dry measuring cup. Then, peel all the wrappers of those little lovelies, and throw them into your food processor (or have fun chopping by hand!).

Pulse them a couple of times until you get some smallish chunks.

You’ll need three medium sized mixing bowls. If you have a standing mixer, the bowl that comes with that should be one of them.

Start by combining the dry ingredients in one of the bowls.

• 1 1/4 cups of all purpose flour.
• 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder.
• 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda.
• 3 cups of old fashioned oatmeal.

Mix them all together in a happy little dry-ingredients party.

In your second bowl, combine the wet ingredients and salt.

• 2 large Eggs
• teaspoon of Vanilla Extract
• 3/4 a teaspoon of Salt

Throw the salt in, and then beat all the ingredients together until well mixed.

• 1 3/4 sticks of butter (14 tablespoons), melted
• 2 tablespoons vegetable or canola oil

Pour the butter into your 3rd mixing bowl, or the standing mixing bowl, if that’s what you’ve got.
Pam’s recipe calls for 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil. However, because of my lack of stick butter, I had to use some of the tub butter that already has canola oil in it to make it spreadable. So, I only used 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil.

• 1 cup packed Dark Brown Sugar
• 1 cup regular Granulated Sugar.

Start up that mixer and let it go to town. When it’s well-combined, slowly add in the egg mixture and let it go until smooth.

Now add in your flour/oats mixture a little at a time, folding in with a spoon rather than using the mixer.

When well combined, it’s time for the star ingredients! One cup of dried cranberries, and the pumpkin spice kiss chunks.

Fold together until well mixed. You’re ready for the oven, baby!

Use a cookie scoop, or a large spoon, to create dough balls that are on the larger side. Pam doesn’t call them ‘saucer-sized cookies’ for nothing.

James came up with a little trick to help the parchment paper stay on our baking trays.

He shot a little cooking spray onto each tray before laying the paper down. It stayed in place the entire time we baked. Clever, my man is!

You’ll want to bake these at 350F for 16 to 18 minutes, or until golden brown.

Remove to a cooling rack, and let cool for as long as you can resist biting into one of these babies.