The ingredients are dimly remembered from the back of a bag of sweetened flaked coconut. This is what I do with that dim memory! Please note that these only resemble cookies in that they are baked. These are really candy masquerading as cookies.
- 14 oz. bag of sweetened coconut flakes
- 14 oz. can of sweetened condensed milk
- 1 tbsp. vanilla extract
- 1-1.5 c. mini chocolate chips (opt.)
Preheat the oven to 325°F. Line your cookie sheet with parchment paper.
Mix all the ingredients together in a big bowl.
Use a teaspoon and your fingers to make little haystack shapes about 1.5 inches apart on the baking parchment.
Lick your fingers.
Bake the tray of haystacks until they turn deep golden brown on the little sticky-out bits of coconut and the rest starts to brown a bit. This is about 20 minutes, but there is a fairly large range of acceptable brown-ness. Darker tastes toastier!
Let the macaroons cool on the pan, and then pull them off the parchment. These are best eaten within a few days. Store in an airtight container.
This recipe makes a variable amount depending upon how tightly you pack the coconut in the haystacks, and how big they end up. I've made anywhere from 16-25 in a batch! If you like smaller, loosely packed ones, try using a #100 ice cream scoop which holds 1tsp. It will make around 58 cookies, more or less.
An testimonial (upon receiving all the funny looking ones): wertperch says re Coconut macaroons: So simple! And tasty. WOW.