Cookies Gone Healthy

Most people know it already but I’ll tell you if you don’t: I love sweets. I could eat cookies, brownies, and cakes all day long. Because I am a trainer does not mean that I am immune to baked goods. I was feeling a little “loose” after weeks of every Friday being “chocolate chip cookie baking night” in my apartment. That’s why I was on a quest to find a healthy cookie recipe, one that wasn’t too bad but also gave me the satisfaction of sweets.

I happened to come across my now favorite chocolate-chip cookie recipe while perusing pinterest one evening. Shazaam! It was perfect; ingredients were very few, all good stuff in there, decently cheap as well.

These cookies are amazing, I’ll just tell you that right now. Make them with caution because although they are healthy, it is still unhealthy to eat the whole batch in a very short time period. Which is why I had to take a break from cookies because I actually got sick of them. But don’t worry; I’m back and eating them sporadically as a treat, just like any other normal person.

Here is the fabulous recipe that is sugar-free, egg-free, possibly gluten-free, and will change you and your family’s cookie eating:

Peanut Butter & Banana Chocolate Chunk Cookies

(If you want these gluten-free, ensure you use gluten-free oats)

Ingredients:

-3 large, very ripe bananas -1/2 cup peanut butter, preferably all-natural or almond butter

-1/4 cup olive oil -1 tsp. vanilla extract -2 cups old-fashioned oats -1 tsp. baking powder -1 tsp. cinnamon -1/4 tsp. salt -1/2-1 cup chopped dark chocolate chips

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350˚F.

In a large bowl mash the bananas, then mix in the peanut butter, oil and vanilla.

In another bowl stir together the oats, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients along with the chocolate and stir until combined.

Drop spoonfuls of dough onto a parchment or Silpat lined baking sheet, or one that is sprayed with nonstick spray, and bake for 12-14 minutes, until just set.

Makes about 2 dozen cookies.

You can add whatever you’d like into the concoction as well; I added dried cranberries before and they were oh-so-good.

Simply wonderful. Enjoy these yummy treats!

By: Jessica Stewart

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