Cookie Monster: Banana Oatmeal Cookies with Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chips

The first time I had an Elvis sandwich (for the uninitiated that'd be a fried banana, peanut butter, and bacon sandwich) I thought woah, this is intense, then eh, one bite'll do me. It's similar to trying on an Elvis Halloween costume. The first few minutes you're blinded by rhinestones and the light bouncing off your white pleather-clad thighs. Woah, this is intense. Then you realize your butt feels like ham in a resealable deli pack and you think eh, these two minutes'll do me. Where are the Ronald Reagan face masks?

There is genius in that sandwich, though, and it's the combination of peanut butter and banana. I wanted to incorporate both into a cookie but my first attempts, which used a peanut butter cookie as the base, didn't work out. I changed direction and made an oatmeal banana cookie that's mild but tasty on its own; almost like breakfast in a cookie.

Instead of swirling in peanut butter, I turned to a pack of peanut butter chips that I had in my freezer. They were sitting next to a bag of bittersweet chocolate chips—which obviously couldn't be left behind—and the rest is cookie history.

The dough for these drop cookies needs to be refrigerated for thirty minutes so that when they bake they don't spread thin but instead stay a little thick and chewy. Worried about the banana flavor? Well, I'll say this: if you don't like banana, don't make these. But you don't have to be a banana obsessive—the banana flavor is present but it's all about how it plays with the pops of bittersweet chocolate and salty-sweet peanut butter chips. The oats add body but flavor too, harmonizing with the banana just like they do in your morning bowl of oatmeal.