Attack of the Eugene Monster Cookie

This past weekend I traded the Portland urban "hip" for the Eugene country fair "hippie". Down in the land of stardust, rainbows, people on stilts with strange french accents, and infants dangling from painted breasts, I stumbled across an old stand-by. Originally, I had hoped to find a magical cookie baked by hand. But when cookie time rolled around, I saw a sign that read "Cookie Monster". Yes, my favorite character of all time lured me over. It turned out to the be the Eugene "Monster Cookie" in six classic varieties: chocolate chip, oatmeal chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, snickerdoodle, M&M, and peanut butter chocolate chip.

These Monster Cookies were a staple that got me through grad school. Best described as a meal, the monster cookie is about the size of a big grapefruit and it is one dense gorilla of a cookie. I consider it the type of thing you choose when you need a real cookie fix and nothing else will do. You've eaten a couple oreos and still aren't satisfied or you just broke up with your lover. It would also be pretty good if you had just returned to civilization after being stranded on a desert island for weeks and were starving. It is that type o cookie.

While capable of pulling you out of a ditch, the "Monster Cookie" sits like a lead weight on the tummy. As a result, after eating it you feel as though you have gained 50 pounds. If you ate the whole thing, you will still feel like this after 3 hours. My guess for this is because they are made with margarine or the like rather than real butter. But let's talk about the positive features. These cookies have a pretty groovy texture- chewy, slightly raw in feel. I also like them, because they seem to have a bit of salt. This is an especially good thing about the oatmeal raisin version. It gives the oatmeal grains a potato chip quality that blends nicely with the sweetness of the raisins.

On this particular day I went with the peanut butter chocolate chip. I was feeling stressed out by the crowd of people surrounding me, so this was a good release. While I like the texture, consistency, and feel of this cookie, the flavor fell a little short. More peanut butter and choco chips would have been great. Overall, it may have mollified whatever Eugene nostalgia I was feeling, but the gut bomb it placed in my belly made it difficult to properly enjoy the Country Fair.

Moral of the Story: always hold out for good cookies. Never fall prey to cookie monster motifs or fond memories, alone. And if you find youself at the Country Fair, look for the place that sells the cookies fresh from the oven.