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Whole Wheat Cherry Pecan Cookies

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , on April 12, 2012| 7 Comments »

In case you haven’t realized yet, I go through phases where I’m obsessed with something, can’t live without it, then am over it a week later.

Past obsessions:

– Fun.- We are Young. I listened to this over and over again until I was sick of it. Then I went out and bought the CD. It’s not too bad!

–  Strawberry margaritas. Seriously, I couldn’t make another batch of strawberry simple syrup or I would be certifiably a lush!

– avocados. I’m. Still. Obsessed! I may even have another avocado recipe for you in a week or so if I ever stop shoveling my new favorite meal in my mouth and take a picture of it!

Current obsessions:

– This song. I don’t know why-I don’t even really like Pop music. It just gets stuck in my head and I need to listen to it. My roommate actually caught me listening to it really, really loudly and dancing around the kitchen while making peanut butter cookie dough cups. He’s a music major…I’m pretty sure he was judging my music choice.

– Cranberry Blood Orange tea by Republic of Tea. I gave up coffee for lent and pretty much had two cups of this tea every. single. day to help me get through. Now, I can’t say I miss coffee too much (as I sit drinking a cup…)

– I know I’ve mentioned this before but- Pineapple Chipotle Salsa from Stonewall Kitchen. Get yourself a jar…or barrel, and LOTS of chips. There’s nothing worse then running out of chips and having this jar of salsa taunting you in the fridge… which is my current life. 

– Dried cherries infused with apple juice. Best. Dried Fruit. Ever. I love how chewy and a little sour they are. Dare I say, they are like the healthier, adult  version of sour patch kids? I bought them on a whim at Whole Foods and…it led to this recipe:

Whole Wheat Cherry Pecan Cookies
adapted from Toll House Chocolate Chip cookies

Ingredients

  • 2 1/4 cups whole wheat flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup (2 sticks) earth balance, softened
  • 3/4 cup granulated sugar
  • 3/4 cup sucanat (or brown sugar)*
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 flax seed “eggs” (2 TBSP ground flax seed, 6 TBSP water)
  • 1/2 cup dried cherries
  • 1/2 cup chopped pecans
  • 1/2 cup vegan chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Mix up your flaxseed eggs and set aside for 10 minutes.

Mix your flour, baking soda, and salt together in a small bowl. Set aside.

Cream the Earth balance, white sugar and sucanat together. Add the flaxseed eggs and mix until well combined. Gradually add the flour mixture and mix until well combined. Fold in the cherries, pecans, and chocolate chips. Drop by TBSP onto the prepared baking sheet (no need to roll them into balls). Bake for 9-11 minutes.** Let cool on the pan for about 5 minutes then move them to a cooling rack.

* I subbed out the brown sugar for sucanat because that’s what I had in my cabinet and was pleasantly surprised with the results. Because sucanat has bigger granuales then white sugar and definitely bigger then traditional brown sugar which you usually pack into measuring cups, my cookie was less sweet. It worked well with the whole flour, nuts and dried fruit them. It made for a healthier tasting cookie.

** I like my cookies undercooked so I pulled these out after 9 minutes and then let the sit on the baking sheet for another 9 or 10 minutes. They continue to cook a bit and firm up but the center still stays soft. I love them like that! If you want yours a little more cooked, just keep them in for a little longer.

I was pleasantly surprised by these cookies! I’m not usually big into dried fruits in my baked goods but I love those dried cherries so much that I couldn’t resist trying them in a cookie! Like I said above, the combination of the whole flour, nuts, fruits and sucanat resulted in a less sweet, a little bit heartier feeling cookie. Plus, you can use whatever is in your cabinet for this recipe- almonds instead of pecans, raisins or craisins instead of cherries, etc. I should have just called this “the whatever is in my cabinet” cookie. =)

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go put on Call Me, Maybe…again…and pretend I’m Selena Gomez. Dont judge…

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Fruit and Chocolate Dessert Pizza

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , , , , on April 10, 2012| 6 Comments »

This is my answer to the chocolate overdose I was suffering from last week. After making those cookie dough peanut butter cups (which I’m dying to make again with different flavors!) AND a vegan version of Reeses Peanut Butter eggs (which were ok,  but not great, which is why I didn’t post them here), I was so over chocolate. That’s apparently what happens when you make excuses to have peanut butter eggs for breakfast (I’ll just have a peanut butter egg instead of peanut butter on my toast. Same thing!). Infact, the thought of making something heavy for Easter dessert made me want to cry. But backing out of making a dessert wasn’t optional. If I didn’t bring anything then I wouldn’t have a vegan dessert and a holiday isn’t a holiday without a dessert…or five!

So I decided a light, fruity dessert would be perfect. It would be a nice change from heavy cakes, cheesecakes and chocolate that usually show up for our holiday parties. The one I made had a thin, chewy snickerdoodle cookie crust, a layer of creamy chocolate pudding (pudding technically isn’t a chocolate. It’s way too light for that!), and a layer of fresh fruit. Yes, please!

 

Snickerdoodle Cookie Crust
from Wicked Vegan

  • 1/2 cup vegan butter, at room temperature ( used Earth Balance)
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 Ener-G “egg”
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
  • 2 tablespoons milk replacer (I used unsweetened soy milk)

Preheat oven to 375.

Cream vegan butter and sugar with an electric mixer until smooth. Add “egg” and vanilla, mixing well until combine, about 2 minutes. Stir in flour, baking powder, salt, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon. Mix until dough comes together. Dough will most likely be crumbly at this point. Add in milk 1 TBS at a time until the dough comes together. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

After 30 minutes, spread dough onto a round pizza pan. The dough will be thin. Cook between 10-15 minutes. Mine took about 12 1/2 minutes.

Let cookie cool 100%. Melt about 2 TBSP of vegan chocolate with  1/2 tsp of vegan shortening in the microwave. Spread a very thin layer of the chocolate onto the cooled cookie and let dry. This will prevent the pudding from making the cookie soggy.

Vegan Chocolate Pudding
 from epicdialogue.com

  • 1box (1.4oz) jell-o instant chocolate pudding mix*
  • 1 package (12.3oz) silken tofu, chilled
  • 1/2-3/4cup almond milk (I used 3/4 cup)

In a food processor, puree the tofu with the almond milk until smooth. Add the pudding mix and blend to a creamy texture. Put in fridge to set for about an hour. Spread on the cookie. I had about half the mixture left over.

*jell-o instant pudding is dairy-free but it has a few chemicals and weird ingredients that I wasn’t thrilled with but I couldn’t find an organic, more healthful instant pudding. I found the cook and serve kind but not instant. I wasn’t sure how the cook and serve would work so I opted for jell-o. If anyone finds a better instant pudding product or tries the cook and serve in this recipe, let me know how it turns out!

Toppings

  • strawberries
  • kiwi
  • banana
  • blueberries
  • raspberries

Slice up your fruit and layer as desired. Really, you could use any fruit you wanted, including mandarin oranges, apples or pineapple. Or you could use shredded coconut, slivered or sliced almonds or other nuts. I haven’t tried those but I bet they’d be great!

mmm…I want some of this right now. After all, if I can justify a knock-off Reeses egg for breakfast,  I should have no problem doing that with a fruit covered cookie!

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Deep Dish Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , on February 28, 2012| 9 Comments »

I don’t know what has come over me lately. All I want to do is snack. On chocolate. Or Sugar. The other night for dinner, I definitely had 3 scoops of White chocolate Peanut Butter (how did that even get into my grocery cart???) and a handful of almonds. That’s it. What is wrong with me??

So when I sat down last weekend to figure out what I was having for food this week, I definitely made sure to factor in some healthy snack. I knew that I couldn’t make it through another week on handfuls of chocolate chips and late night microwavable mug cakes (one of the blogs I follow calculated how many calories are in one of those and it was like 900. Kill me…)

Let’s begin with the sweet stuff, shall we? Let me introduce to you one of my favorite, new desserts. I was skeptical at first, then when I made it I was undecided on the taste. But after snarfing on it for three nights straight, I have to accept that I really like it. My friends, I introduce to you the Deep Dish Chocolate Cookie Pie aka, my answer to the perfectly undercooked monster cookies that call to me from the caf each day at work.

The cafetaria cookies are in no way, shape or form vegan. But when it’s two o’clock, and I forgot a little something sweet for after lunch, those cookies are relentless in calling to me. BUT, knowing that I have a slice of this cookie pie waiting for me at home, makes it a trazillion times easier to resisit.

Deep Dish Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie
from Chocolate Covered Katie

  • 2 cans white beans or garbanzos (drained and rinsed) (I know…I seriously have a cookie recipe with chickpeas!!)
  • 1 cup quick oats (or certified-gf quick oats)
  • 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
  • 3 T canola oil
  • 2 tsp pure vanilla extract
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 and 1/2 cups brown sugar
  • 1 cup chocolate chips

Blend everything (except the chocolate chips) very well in a good food processor (not a blender)*. Mix in chips, and pour into an oiled pan (I used a 10-inch springform pan) Cook at 350F for around 35-40 minutes. Let stand at least 10 minutes before removing from the pan.

*A high speed food processer is best and here’s why: I blended the crap out of these ingredients and they  still were n’t perfectly smooth. There was definitely a little bit of oatmeal and possibly a bit of chickpeas that remained a bit intact. Nothing severe but it added texture. That texture really threw me off at first and I wasn’t sure how I felt about the pie. But I got over it…cause it tasted great and it was super moist! My friend, Rachel, compared it to having bits of coconut flakes in the pie and she is right. I’m possibly overreacting. But, if you are a texture person, I would suggest either using a high speed food processor or blending the oatmeal seperately first, until it’s the texture of flour, and  then adding in the other ingredients. I haven’t tried that but I bet it would be a huge help in the texture department.

Seriously, could that recipe be any easier?? It’s easier than the 900 calorie mug cake I devoured, that’s for sure! AND this makes 8 serving slices, the mug cake just made one large mug…and made me feel really guilty. Chocolate Covered Katie put the nutritional count of this at about 200 a slice. Not great but hello? Better then 900!! You could also bake this in a square or rectangle pan and cut them into bars if you wanted to get more servings out of it. Just adjust the cooking time accordingly

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go munch on an apple with a bit of dark chocolate peanut butter and granola and ignore that monster cookie in the caf. I have better waiting for me at home, thankyouverymuch!

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Snickerdoodle Cookies

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , on October 24, 2011| 7 Comments »

Lets be honest with one another here- sugar cookies are hands down the most boring cookie ever. Yeah, ok…they get trooped out a few times a year when we need to decorate cookies but no one really loves sugar cookies. I don’t know anyone whose ever like, man…I could use a good sugar cookie right now. Because they are boring. They have no pizzazz!

Since cookies were homemade when I was growing up, more often than not, they were chocolate chip or oatmeal raisins (I’d pick the raisins out, obviously). During the holidays, the really good ones came out- mint chocolate chip, chocolate rolos, white chocolate dream cookies,  cookies with Andes mints in the middle, etc. So, why would we ever make sugar cookies when we had these amazing cookies to choose from?!?

The fact is, we didn’t. I called my mom for a sugar cookie recipe last year and she didn’t even have one! When I tried a few online, I felt like Goldilocks with porridge- these are too crunch, these are too cakelike- and I could never find the right one.  I quickly got bored and gave up. Sugar cookies are so not worth the effort.

So it goes without saying that I never made a snickerdoodle cookie. They’re just sugar cookies with cinnamon sugar, right? Well, having exhausted my apple and pumpkin taste buds over the last few weeks (and mildly concerned one of my my co-worker would kill me if I brought one more pumpkin thing into work), I was desperate for a different fall flavor for my Monday treats for work. Since I’ve been shoving my face with this cinnamon honey bread like my life depended on it, obviously my first thought was cinnamon. Hence, me turning to the snickerdoodle cookie. And I must admit, these cookies may be worthy enough to go toe-to-toe with our mint chocolate chip cookies…well, maybe…

Snickerdoodles

veganized version from How Sweet Eats

makes 16-20 cookies

1/2 cup vegan butter, at room temperature ( used Earth Balance)

1 cup sugar

1 Ener-G “egg”

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon

2 tablespoons milk replacer (I used unsweetened soy milk)

1/4 cup sugar + 1 tablespoon cinnamon for dipping

Preheat oven to 375.

Cream vegan butter and sugar with an electric mixer until smooth. Add “egg” and vanilla, mixing well until combine, about 2 minutes. Stir in flour, baking powder, salt, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon. Mix until dough comes together. Dough will most likely be crumbly at this point. Add in milk 1 TBS at a time until the dough comes together. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

In a bowl combine remaining sugar and cinnamon. Remove dough from fridge and roll into big 1 1/2 inch balls. Dip in cinnamon sugar mixture and place on baking sheet. Lightly press down on dough to flatten it. Bake at 375 for 10-12 minutes.

These cookies were the perfect texture. A little crunchy around the edges, soft and chewy in the middle. I’m sort of in love with them. And, I may have just had one for breakfast…

Side note: I know I’ve been giving you guys a lot of How Sweet Eats recipes lately. This week I’m going to be getting seriously vegan on your butts though and trying out some recipes from Alicia Silverstone’s Kind Diet, as well as my second favorite blog Healthfulpursuit.com. Stay tuned!

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