Chocolate Chip Cookies

This is the latest healthy and tasty chocolate chip cookie recipe I use that can be made dairy and gluten free as well.

Ingredients

1 cup - Organic Unrefined Sugar (instead of brown sugar)

1 tbsp - Organic Molasses (instead of brown sugar)

1 cup - Olive Oil (instead of butter, my current favorite is California Olive Ranch Extra Virgin)

2 tbsp -Water (instead of butter)

(Alternatively use 1 cup of softened organic butter instead of olive oil and water)

2 tsp - Vanilla Extract (either natural or artificial)

2 - Large Organic Eggs

2 cups - Organic Rolled Oats (may use gluten free ones)

1 1/2 cups - Organic Whole Wheat Flour (or gluten free flour)

1 tsp - Baking Powder, Double-acting (optional)

1 tsp - Ground Cinnamon

1/2 tsp - Salt

12 ounces (0.75 lbs) - Organic Chocolate Chips, Semi-Sweet

Optional: Also add some pecans or walnuts, up to 1 cup.

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F.

A stand or other electric mixer is easiest. Otherwise this is very rigorous exercise for your arm. In a large bowl mix sugar and molasses until well blended (this turns it into brown sugar, it takes quite a lot of mixing to evenly distribute the molasses).

Add oil and water (or softened butter) and mix.

Add vanilla, eggs and mix.

Add flour, oats, baking powder, cinnamon, salt. Baking powder is actually optional, you will get chewier cookie without it. Mix until well blended.

Add chocolate chips (and optionally pecans) and mix until evenly distributed.

Drop tablespoons of cookie dough 1.5 inches apart onto baking sheets (greasing with a light coat of olive oil is optional). Bake for 10-12 minutes or until golden brown.

Let stand on baking sheets for ~5-10 minutes before scraping cookies off baking sheet with spatula. Cool on baking sheet (fewer crumbs) or racks. Move to suitable storage containers.

Makes about 48 cookies.

Notes

The sugar, flour, oats, chocolate chips, pecans, salt, and cinnamon can be purchased from Whole Foods and possibly other supermarkets in bulk (bring your own container if possible to eliminate disposable packaging -- alternatively flour and sugar are typically sold in recyclable paper). Whole Foods and some other supermarkets also sell molasses in glass containers and 3 liter California Olive Ranch Extra Virgin Olive Oil (or other olive oils) in metal containers. Even if you don't use organic ingredients for some or all of the above, it still is very healthy and minimizes trash. Double check to make sure the olive oil you are buying is really olive oil as many commercial brands have mixed in cheaper oils.

Copyright 2017 Tim Oey. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 543 Howard Street, 5th Floor, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.