Its ingredients also typically include flour, sugar, eggs, salt, and spices.

[1] When the cookies were becoming prominent in the United States in the early 1900s, they came to be known as a health food[2] because of the fiber and vitamins from the oatmeal and raisins.

The first recorded oatmeal cookie recipe was published in the United States by Fannie Merritt Farmer in her 1896 cookbook, The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book.

While Farmer's original recipe did not contain raisins,[5] their inclusion grew more common over time, due in part to the oatmeal raisin cookie recipes featured on every Quaker Oats container beginning in the early 1900s.

[6] In addition to plain oatmeal cookies, chocolate chips may be added instead of raisins.