almond flour chocolate coconut cookies

I recently bought almond flour. I had resisted for so long because it is expensive, and I didn’t really see the benefit in it over other gluten free flours on the market. Well, Sister and I recently decided to rethink all of our white gluten free baking ingredients (cough*bisquick*cough). I will never fully give it up for when I want to bake something special, but I definitely don’t need to be using it as much as I have been!

I’ve tried oat flour, coconut flour, sorghum flour and bisquick in the past to make some delicious recipes, but bisquick was by far the best for baking cookies that were almost identical to their gluten-filled counterparts. I found this recipe for Paleo-inspired chocolate chip cookies using almond flour, but wanted to make it more deluxe. Girl Scout Samoa cookies may have had something to do with the flavor combination… ;).

• 2 cups almond flour
• 1/4c cocoa powder
• 1/4c ground flax
• 1/2t salt
• 1/2t baking soda
• 1/2c grapeseed oil
• 1/4c agave
• 1T vanilla extract
• 1/2c chocolate chips
• 1/4-1/2c shredded coconut
• 2T coconut flour (if your dough ends up being too moist)

1. In a large bowl, combine all of the ingredients. I did this somewhat in stages, but it doesn’t matter a whole lot.

2. Roll into balls, flatten slightly, and then press some additional coconut on the outside of the dough (optional).

3. Bake in a 350* oven for 8-10 minutes, being careful to not overbake them or burn the coconut.

4. Allow to cool slightly on the baking pan as they are fragile right out of the oven, but they set up really well!

Coconut + chocolate, a winning combination. If you’re really wanting all the flavors from Girl Scout Samoa cookies, I bet this Salty Medjool Caramal sauce would be an excellent topping.

These not only taste amazing, but are gluten free, grain free, refined sugar free (depending on the chocolate chips/chunked chocolate you use), egg free and dairy free. Not too shabby.

valentine’s m+m’s

At least this February-inspired recipe had more success than my baking fail!

As a “holiday” I really have no patience for Valentine’s Day. I really could care less when February 14th rolls around. The only redeeming quality V-Day has for me are the pretty colors of Valentine’s m+m colors. Red, pink and white are a great combination… it’s just unfortunate they have to come out around this “holiday” ;).

I decided to pick up a pack of these spontaneously at Target when I was getting a heating pad and ICEE hot for sister’s back. I told myself awhile ago that I wasn’t allowed to buy m+m’s… mostly because they disappear way too quickly! At one internship I had last year, the front desk had two m+m characters with unlimited amounts of m+m’s… it was way too easy to grab a few when walking by ;).

Because of how fast they usually disappear, I figured it would be good to space them out a bit with some cookie dough. Yes, cookies disappear quite fast as well, but they can be given away much more easily to family + friends than a handful of m+m’s, haha. At first, I thought of making the World’s Best Chocolate Chip cookies with m+m’s instead of chocolate chips… but then I had another idea. How about Peanut Blossoms adapted with m+m’s? Oh, and adding in an extra ingredient that makes them a little nutritious to top it all off? Well, nutritious may be a bit of an over-statement…  but at least better than they were originally!

Peanut Butter Cookie Dough Balls with Valentine’s M+M’s

• 1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup natural peanut butter (I used Skippy)
• scant 1/4c brown sugar
• scant 1/4c organic white sugar
• 1/4c ground flax
• 2t vanilla
• 4T unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 3 to 3 1/2c gluten free bisquick
• 2t xanthan gum
• 2t baking soda
• 1t salt
• valentine’s m+m’s
• sugar, for rolling (optional)

1. Cream together the butter, peanut butter and sugars until all creamy.

2. Add in the flax, vanilla and milk. Mix to combine.

3. Put in the xanthan gum, baking soda and salt, and then gradually add in the bisquick until the dough is no longer sticky and will roll into balls. Doing your dry ingredients this way helps keep this to a one-bowl recipe!

4. Add in the Valentine’s m+m’s (as many as you desire) and stir to combine. Place in fridge.

5. Once chilled (to hold shape better and help the m+m’s not melt as much), scoop the dough into balls (I used a small cookie scoop and then rolled into round balls). Roll into additional sugar to coat the outside of the dough.

6. Place on to a lined baking sheet, and bake in a 375? preheated oven for 10 minutes.

7. Remove from the oven and move to a cooling rack.

Oh boy were these tasty. I was at first expecting them to turn out more like a regular cookie, but these reached semi-doughball cookie status. I was pleasantly surprised with the outcome :). The added flax is barely noticeable, only a few speckles here and there but you almost get the sense that it’s specks of chocolate. And one awesome bonus of using the flax? It makes this an egg-free recipe so you can eat as much dough as you want, ha!

world’s best chocolate chip cookies

Now don’t get me wrong, I would eat pretty much any type of cookie I could get my hands on. Especially if there’s chocolate. Or frosting. And sprinkles. Anyways, I know cookie recipes really have been taking over my blog lately, what with my 12 days of cookies before Christmas, but these are not Christmas cookies. These are every day and any day cookies.

The best cookie, in my honest opinion, are cakey chocolate chip cookies. Ever since childhood these have been by far my favorite, but I was never successful in making them. They would always turn out too flat, too buttery tasting, I could never get it right.

Little did I know that I would finally find a way to make my favorite kind of chocolate chip cookie while being gluten free. You mean gluten free cookies don’t have to be dry, hard rocks? No, no they do not. I’m not sure if regular bisquick would result in the same type of cookie, but there is just something about the gluten free bisquick that I am just a little obsessed with. Betty Crocker, please feel free to send me unlimited supplies of gluten free bisquick. I will send you some cookies in return. Thank you.

• 2 1/4 cups gluten free bisquick
• 1t xanthan gum
• 1/2t baking soda
• 2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
• scant 1/4c brown sugar
• scant 1/4c organic sugar
• 1t salt
• 2t vanilla extract
• 2 eggs (I used egg whites this time because we were out of real eggs!)
• 1c+ chocolate chips (Guittard semi sweet)

1. Cream the butter and sugar together.

2. Add in the salt, vanilla and eggs.

3. Once that is mixed together, add in the baking soda and bisquick until everything is combined.

4. Add in the chocolate chips.

5. Scoop into larger scoops and place onto a parchment covered baking sheet.

6. Bake in  350* oven for 12-14 minutes, flipping halfway through.

*Adapted from Martha Stewart’s Cakey Chocolate Chip Cookies.

I am still shocked with how delicious these cookies are. I will never go back.

out and about in middleton: bloom bakeshop

Right after Sister and I signed up for the Haunted Hustle race in Middleton, WI, we started researching places we would be able to eat that catered to our gluten free lifestyle.  We immediately stumbled upon Bloom Bakeshop and were incredibly excited to go there.  I even considered a quick almost 2 hour drive over there because I couldn’t wait! 😉

I, of course, wanted to go there multiple times over our day being there, but we settled on just once and loading up on all of their gluten free options!  We decided to go there after the race as a recovery treat so it tasted all the more delicious.

Bloom Bakeshop is in downtown Middleton, such a cute area and the shop is adorable.  The downtown trees looked especially gorgeous with their fall foliage.

We walked in and only two of their bakery items were marked as gluten free (+ vegan), but there were five in total that day.  We obviously had to get one of each because we couldn’t decide and they all looked extremely delicious.  The mummy cupcake was the most delicious chocolate cake I’ve had (with chunks of real chocolate – yum!) topped with vanilla buttercream.  The other two cupcakes were seasonal flavors, sweet potato with chai spiced buttercream and pumpkin with eggnog – so good!  The bottom row is a blondie-type bar with chocolate chips and a chocolate chip cookie sandwich.

I loved how they decorated these!

And I must admit that this one was my favorite.  The cookie was moist and the buttercream was so creamy sandwiched in between.

We ate this on our scenic drive home and are already trying to find an excuse to go to Middleton again!

turtle cookies

I confess, I have absolutely no idea what to call these cookies besides delicious.  At first I was going for caramel-chocolate chip, but that’s a bit wordy and does not do justice to how incredible these are.  Then I thought monster cookies, since that’s somewhat where the inspiration came from but they did not have any other ingredients in them to make them actual monster cookies (m&ms, whole oats, raisins, etc.).  And then I thought, well I think it came from either my mom or sister when they were eating them that they were almost turtle flavored.  caramel, chocolate + nuts.  Although no nuts.  But close enough for me and maybe next time they will have nuts.

So if you can think of a better name for these delightful cookies, please share.

 

Turtle Cookies

• 1 stick unsalted butter or margarine at room temperature
• 1/4 c grapeseed oil (or any other light oil)
• 1/2 cup organic sugar
• 2t vanilla
• 1t salt
• 2 eggs
• 2 1/4c oat flour (oats ground into flour is what I used)
• 1/2c sorghum flour
• 1/2t baking soda
• 1 cup chocolate chips
• 1 cup caramel bits

1. In a small bowl, combine the oats, sorghum flour and baking soda.  Set aside.

2. In a large bowl, beat up the butter or margarine until it is nice and fluffy.

3. Mix in the oil to the butter or margarine until it is somewhat mixed well, and then add in the sugar and continue mixing.

4. Once the sugar and butter/oil mixture are combined, add in the salt and eggs.

5. Dump the dry ingredients into the wet and stir until fully mixed together.  If this ends up being too sticky, you can add some more oat or sorghum flour.

6. Once the batter is a good consistency, add the chocolate chips and caramel bits.

7. Try not to eat the entire batter as-is… and then take small scoopfuls of what is left and place on a parchment-lined cookie sheet.

8. Bake in a 350′ oven for 10-12 minutes, rotating sheets halfway through if necessary.

I used the smallest scoop I had and these cookies were still a very good size, and it made 4 dozen cookies.  If you add in extra cookies for the amount of dough that was consumed.

Holy yum.

The caramel bits were such a random splurge at the store…

But definitely, 100% worth it.

They could also be called “I took way too many photos of these cookies” cookies, but that’s an even greater mouthful than caramel-chocolate chip…

Mouthful being the key word.