How old is your soda? My money is on the soda. Butter consistency shouldn't make them fall apart as you describe, as much as make them spread or burn. I date my soda when I open the box.

This sounds like a lot of sugar (sugar + maple syrup) and butter with the oats, and not much flour as glue to hold them together. I suspect the falling apart is intrinsic to the recipe, though you can probably minimize it my cooling on the cookie sheet for as long as possible.

Also, did you really use sticks of actual butter or a tub of margarine? Tub margarine will totally mess you up.

I suspect that your butter was too warm. Softened butter should not be squishy or at the last possible solid state before melting. It needs to be a bit soft but also have something for your mixer to chew up.

Definitely sounds like a recipe where you let the cookies rest on the baking sheet for a bit before you take them off. One way to do it is too put parchment on the cookie sheet and then slide the parchment with the cookies onto a cooling rack.

Thanks, all, I think it might have been too little flour in the flour/butter ratio. I refrigerated the second batch of raw dough for about 20 minutes while the first batch was cooking and cooling, and that seemed to help.

I can't remember the recipe completely, but it was something like:

1 cup flour leveled
1 cup packed light brown sugar leveled
1/2 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1.5 sticks unsalted butter (and I used salted, so maybe that had something to do with it?)
1 egg (can't remember size, but I had large or extra large)
3 cups oats
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/4 water
1 teaspoon vanilla

I mixed all the dry ingredients first. I creamed the butter and sugar for 3 minutes as stated. It did "not" seem as fluffy as it's supposed to get. Not sure what I did wrong there.

New recipe!

Recipe could be bad. Not all recipes actually work. Find one from something like Cooks Illustrated which tests all its recipes and gives detailed instructions. Make sure you use the right type of flour, correct size eggs etc.

Forgot the egg?

You need a binder.

I say just make them into pancakes. Put them on the griddle. Flip em on a plate pour syrup on em. Fixed.

Do you have a link to the recipe?

Possibilities -

Wet to dry ratio is off -- are you using the correct size egg?

Dry ingredients did not properly absorb the moisture -- combine your wet and dry ingredients and then let the dough sit for 10 minutes before finishing the mixing process.

Too much salt - are you using salted butter? Table salt instead of kosher salt?

Oven is running hot -- your oven may be hitter than you think.

You have angered the baking gods -- purchase an Entenmann cake and sacrifice it to restore the baking auroa.

Go to this website. It will help you troubleshoot.

http://theperfectchocolatechipcookie.com/instruct.php

Is this after cooking? If so, let the cookies sit for 5 minutes after you take the trays out of the oven.

Butter and flour base. I measure precisely. I read butter temperature makes a difference. So I was as precise as I could be, but half still fell apart. Any ideas or tips?