Lea's Favourite Unbaked Goodies- Everyone's A Kid At Heart!

So yesterday I started thinking about my mother's recipe box and what treasure I might find in there.  I can't tell you what I was hoping to find as so many recipes of hers and my aunt have fallen by the wayside with the passing of my aunt and my mother's dementia.  To my great surprise, I did find a recipe that I've searched Pinterest for and have yet to find: Unbaked Goodies (as my aunt called them, also known as Haystacks)!!  She never added peanut butter and I've yet to find a recipe that had that wonderful taste that I recall.

RECIPE BELOW

Here is my mother's recipe card:

It would seem that she got this from the Red Roses cookbook...  Will have to drag that out one of these days and look it up.

As great as it was to see my mother's chicken scratch again...  I was really pleased that she wrote "Lea's Favourite" up at the top.  These truly were my favourite growing up.  Every Christmas, my mother and I would have dinner with my Aunty Bev and her family.  Every Christmas before dinner, while we were left in the frontroom alone, out of sight, my cousin Ronny and I would sneak a treat.  Her unbaked cookies and her dark chocolate fudge are my favourites!  My mother didn't think much of my aunt's baking but I was a real fan!  :) 



I'm pretty sure she measured with a teaspoon but now that we have gadgets... let's use them!  :)



Anyone else revisiting their childhood here? I thought for sure I'd be safe with this recipe as my husband dislikes coconut so I was almost guaranteed that they'd be all mine!  MINE!!!  ;)  He saw the recipe, asked if they were the Haystacks, and then proceeded to tell me how much he loved those because his grandma made them. *sigh  I guess we're all kids at heart!



Happily, these yummies are back in my life again and I might even take some to my mother in the care home...  see if I can convince her to eat one.  YUM!

Unbaked Goodies aka. Haystacks

Recipe:

• 2 cups white or brown sugar (I used 1 cup each)
• 1/2 cup butter (1 stick)
• 1/2 cup milk (I had skim)
• 1/2 cup cocoa

Place in a large pot and cook for 5 minutes to a rolling boil.  Remove from heat and add:

• 3 cups oatmeal (she used instant, I used 3 minute as that's what I had)
• 1 14/16 oz bag of sweetened coconut (I had 3 separate bags of various types of coconut and measured out almost 400g. I added some chopped walnuts in order to get it up to 400 and it added something to the cookies.)
• 1/2 tsp vanilla

Mix well.  Drop by teaspoon onto a waxed sheet (thus the haystack look) or use your gadget and measure out equal amounts and squish well between the palms of your hands so that they stick together to form your cookies.

I had enough for 40 cookies and then the mixture was far to crumbly for my patience so I put the leftovers into a ziplock and am thinking of a way to either make a crumble out of it or possibly use it as a crunchy filler between two layers of cakes.  Either way, I obtained the exact flavour I was looking for with this recipe.

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