A little snack cake company made its Oatmeal Creme Pie famous, and a high profile college football coach is reported to consume them regularly. And because I love Little Debbie and Alabama head coach Nick Saban, I had to make the Oatmeal Cream Pie recipe in Everyday Food magazine’s September 2010 issue.

I wondered whether it would even come close to Little Debbie’s version, which is pretty darn good. Recreating the oatmeal cream pie seemed like a daunting task–just think of putting your cooking skills up against a nearly iconic treat that America has loved for 50 years. But I can happily report that it can be done–and quite easily at that.

The most time-consuming step by far is preparing the (very soft) oatmeal cookies, and those alone are delicious. So delicious that instead of the 13 cream pie yield as indicated by the magazine, my batch was, let’s just say, a little less.

Another reason why my attempt yielded fewer oatmeal pies was that I got a little impatient and/or rushed (it was late), so I made the cookies a little larger than they should have been. Maybe I need more cookie sheets or a bigger oven (the answers are “yes” and “yes”) to have gotten the size just right.

Otherwise I followed the magazine’s recipe to the letter, only omitting one ingredient–golden raisins. I didn’t have any on hand (not a huge fan), and I just couldn’t imagine an oatmeal cream pie with it. Still neither I nor my taste testers had any complaints.

One taster suggested that my results were better than the “real” thing. While I appreciate the flattery and maybe even the outside chance that my batch met or exceeded a very high bar, I still worried that the more cream cheese-than-confectioners’ sugar filling wasn’t sweet enough.

More, ahem, research may be needed. Perhaps even a side-by-side comparison of the two. But I’d certainly recommend Everyday Food magazine’s recipe for the Oatmeal Cream Pie, especially if you want a fresher, less sugary version of the Little Debbie.