Nana Spotlight: Baking Oatmeal Chocolate Chip cookies with Olga

There are few things more precious than baking

chocolate chip cookies with your Grammy. Lily got the delicious treat of baking with her Grammy (a Nana-extraordinaire!) today. On the menu: delicious Oatmeal Chocolate Chip cookies and memories for a lifetime.

Grammy (or Olga, my mother-in-law) is a wonderful cook. While my Nana, mother and father all influenced my culinary loves, Olga really taught me how to cook. I learned by watching and asking and helping. She has taught me to love food--appreciate the flavors and textures. She has also taught me how to make something out of nothing. All you have is a lime and some steak--well, how about fajitas? Some stale bread--make some french toast that puts room service to shame. Olga exposed me to all the best gear for cooking--from herb snips to the perfect cork screw--the things that inspire me to add more herbs and drink more wine.

I could write a book about Olga--an official Nana (to 5 fabulous kids) and a master home cook!

The recipe below is wonderful! The cookies are light and crispy and chocolately. Lily and Grammy mixed the batch in a beautiful heirloom bowl--the same bowl that Olga's mother, Grandma Rudko, used to mix bread and cookies. There is history in that bowl--and when we eat something mixed in that bowl--we share in the history of the Rudko family.

Bake these cookies with your favorite Nana (or Nana-in-training!)

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 cup shortening

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

3/4 cup white sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. Baking soda

1 tsp. salt

2 cups rolled oats

9 oz chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350.

2. In a large bowl, cream shortening, brown sugar and white sugar. Add eggs and mix thoroughly.

3. Combine the baking soda, salt and flour and stir into creamed mixture.

4. Add oatmeal and chocolate chips and stir until well blended

5. Drop by teaspoons onto greased cookie sheet. Bake for 15-20 minutes.