Pumpkin Oatmeal-Raisin Cookies

I rarely have to make recipes over for my blog, but I made these cookies four times to get the right texture.  All I wanted was a crispy cookie on the outside with a moist-chewy center.  The problem with pumpkin cookies is that they contain a lot of moisture because the pumpkin has a high water content and you end up with a cake-like texture instead of a cookie texture.  I also didn't want to use regular or brown sugar in the recipe, even though it would help crisp them up.  My sweetener of choice is maple syrup, especially if the flavor pairs well, and pumpkin and maple are a great combination.  However, I knew that by using the maple syrup that I would be adding even more moisture to the batter and I would have to make further adjustments to the recipe.   Anyway, I was about to give up (I had wanted to post this recipe in October), but I'm glad that I hung in there because I really like the texture and the flavor.  But it's time to move on--I'm so over pumpkin cookies!

Ingredients:

(Yield:  4-1/2 doz if using a small ice cream scooper)

1 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp kosher salt

2-1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1/8 tsp ground cloves

2 sticks Earth Balance Vegan Buttery Sticks, softened to room temperature

1-1/2 cups pure maple syrup

3 tsp Ener-g Egg Replacer, plus 2 tbsp filtered water

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup canned organic pumpkin

3 cups old fashioned rolled oats, not quick or instant

1 cup dark raisins

1/2 cup golden raisins

Method:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line two sheet trays with either a silpat or parchment paper and set aside.
• In a small bowl, whisk together egg replacer and filtered water and set aside.
• In a medium sized bowl whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and spices and set aside.
• In the bowl of a food processor (or large bowl) add softened butter and maple syrup and mix well to combine.  Then add egg replacer, vanilla and organic pumpkin and mix well again.  If you used a food processor to mix the wet ingredients, then scrape out the batter into a large bowl.  Note:  The batter may look like it's curdling because of the acid content of the maple syrup reacting with the butter, but it will all come together when it bakes.  Just make sure that your pumpkin is evenly disbursed and this is where it's helpful if you have a mixer or food processor. 
• Add flour/spices to wet ingredients and mix lightly just so that the flour is disbursed, but not all the way combined.  
• Add in rolled oats and raisins and stir until ingredients are evenly combined, but do not over mix.
• Using a small ice cream scooper, or what ever size you have on hand space batter evenly on a cookie sheet (12 per sheet) about 2" apart and flatten cookies slightly with your fingertips.  
• Bake for 16-20 minutes depending on your oven temp, rotating the baking sheets from top-to-bottom, and from left-to-right, half way through the baking process.
• Cookies will be lightly golden brown around the edges/bottom and firm to touch when finished. 
• When finished baking, remove cookies from the sheet pans and place on cooling racks.  As the cookies cool (about 15 minutes) they will crisp up even further.

 

Dried Fruit & Nut Energy Bars

A friend and I go on a two hour hike every week and I'm always rushing out of the house at 8:30 AM to meet her.  I'm really not interested in whipping up a green drink before I leave, but I feel that I should eat something small before or during our hike.  I started purchasing some vegan energy bars but some are really high in fat and sugar and so I thought that I would make my own.  Now, I haven't calculated the sugar, carb or fat grams for these mini bars (wouldn't know where to begin), but they can't be all that bad.  Most importantly they are homemade, delicious and provide me with enough of carbs and protein to fuel our morning hike.  Kids will love them too--it's a great replacement for cookies!  So Val, if you read this before we meet tomorrow morning--don't eat anything for breakfast because I'll be bringing along some of these healthy high-energy bars!

If you have a dehydrator then you can easily serve these raw.  I don't and so I slowly baked them at the lowest "warm" oven temperature which ranges about 135-145 degrees depending on the location in my oven.  It took about 13-15 hours at this temp to get them to be the right consistency.  Of course if you don't care about eating raw energy bars, then I would turn up the oven to 250 degrees and cook them in half the time.   Since I don't have a dehydrator, I'm not certain how long they would take, but it would be fun experimenting though if I had one!

Ingredients:

1/2 cup raw almonds, soaked
1/2 cup raw sunflower seeds, soaked
1 cup Medjool dates, pitted and soaked
1 cup Turkish apricots, soaked
1/3 cup goji berries, soaked
1/4 cup raisins, soaked
1 cup gluten-free, rolled oats, soaked
1/2 cup unsweetened desiccated coconut flakes
1/4 cup ground flaxseed
1/4 cup agave syrup
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp sea salt

Method:

• Pre-heat oven.
• In a medium size bowl, soak almonds, sunflower seeds, dates, apricots, goji berries and raisins for about 1 hour.  Soak the rolled oats in separate bowl for the same time period.
• Drain nuts and fruit really well and grind in a food processor until you get a thick paste, scraping down the sides.
• Add ground flaxseed, agave syrup, cinnamon and sea salt and blend until combined.  Remove paste from food processor and place in a medium size bowl.
• Drain rolled oats really well and add to paste along with dried coconut and stir well to combine.
• Line an 8x8" square baking pan with aluminum foil or parchment paper and with a spatula add mixture to the pan smoothing the surface to make sure that it is even and flat.
• Depending upon what temperature you use will determine when you flip the bar and cook on the other side.  Again, I cooked the bar at my lowest oven temp for 6 hours.  I then removed the pan from the oven, lifted out the bar, flipped it over onto a lined baking sheet and baked it for another 6 hours.  I then cut the bar into individual 1"x2" squares and returned them to the oven for another 1-2 hours.  
• When finished, let the bars cool to room temperature and then place them in a sealed container, separating layers with sheets of parchment paper.

 

Trio of Hummus

We vegans, we eat a lot of hummus and so I'm always experimenting with different types of beans and seasonings to come up with new flavors.  Some combinations work really well and others don't.  These flavors that I made the other day are good, but not great and so back to the kitchen for some additional tweaking to the recipes.  

The main ingredient in hummus, other than the beans is tahini sauce or paste, and believe it or not the type of tahini you use can make a big difference in flavor and texture.  I have tried all types of tahini from Middle Eastern markets, but for making hummus, I prefer Trader Joe's Tahini Sauce.  It has a really creamy texture and is full of citrus flavor.  However, if I'm adding tahini sauce to a dessert, or for a salad dressing then I prefer Middle Eastern brands, such as Mid East.

I wanted to use three different types of beans and so I used Fava, Garbanzo and Cannellini Beans for different textures and colors.  Of course, all of these are made with fresh garlic, lemon juice, cumin, tahini, olive oil and salt and pepper.  But here's what I would do differently...

Fava Bean Hummus:  

Fava beans have a high starch content and so when they are pureed they turn into a paste and become gummy.  The texture would be fine for spreading on bruschetta and topping with other ingredients, but used as a dip for vegetables I don't like the texture.  Fava's also have a bitter taste and so the next time I make this recipe, I will reduce the fava beans by half and incorporate a broccoli puree.  I would also add some fresh Meyer lemon juice if it's in season.

Roasted Red Bell Pepper Hummus with Aleppo Pepper:

For this hummus, I used garbanzo beans and Aleppo pepper.  Aleppo pepper is named after a city in Syria where the peppers are from.  It is very fruity, and earthy with citrus undertones, and is coarse in texture.  Also the heat is very mild and so next time I will substitute some cayenne pepper and paprika for the Aleppo and also grind it into a finer powder.  The texture was a bit grainy for me.

White Bean Hummus with Roasted Lemon and Zatar:

Trader Joe's has the best white bean hummus around but it's so much cheaper and healthier to make your own.  I really love zatar seasoning (which is a mixture of toasted sesame seeds, dried thyme, oregano and sumac), with cannellini beans, but the roasted lemons were a bit over powering.  So next time I will either add less lemons, or leave them out all together.  I may also consider using preserved lemons, but that takes some planning because the process of preserving takes about month.

I normally don't spend a lot of time in the kitchen perfecting recipes.  Most of the time I make something once and I really like it and never have to change the recipe.  And other times, if it doesn't work out, I may never make it again.  But with hummus, it's so easy, inexpensive and fun to play with different flavor profiles, that I will definitely be making these recipes again. 





 

 

Peanut Butter-Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies

I love baking but I really don't like eating sugar, or I try not to consume it on a regular basis.  So I'm always looking at ways to eliminate sugar and replace it with healthier alternatives such as pure maple syrup or fruit purees when I bake.  I read an article recently published by the Science Daily that says, "34 new beneficial compounds have been recently discovered in pure maple syrup and that several of these compounds possess anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, which have been shown to fight cancer, diabetes and bacterial illnesses." 

Sounds good to me...so I decided to make a batch of Peanut Butter-Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies.  Of course, even though pure maple syrup is considered to be a healthy alternative to sugar and high fructose corn syrup, I will still eat these in moderation.  But it's going to be hard because they are yummy!  They have a light crispy exterior with a soft chewy middle!

Dry Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups whole grain spelt flour
1 tbsp ground flaxseed
1/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
1/4 cup coarsely chopped vegan semi-sweet chocolate chips

Wet Ingredients:

1/2 cup pure maple syrup
1/2 cup mashed ripe banana puree
1/2 cup non-hydrogenated, natural crunchy peanut-butter.  (I like using Trader Joe's Crunchy Valencia Peanut Butter with Roasted Flaxseeds)  
2 tbsp canola oil
2 tsp pure vanilla extract

Method:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Measure out dry ingredients in a bowl and whisk to combine, including chocolate chips.
• Measure out wet ingredients in a bowl and combine with a spatula until smooth and creamy.
• Add dry ingredients to wet and stir until flour is incorporated into batter.
• Let batter rest in the refrigerator for 15 minutes until slightly firm.
• Line a baking sheet with a silicone mat or parchment paper.
• Using a small ice cream scooper, scoop out 10 cookies spaced evenly apart.  Press slightly to flatten and bake for 10-12 minutes, turning baking sheet once during cooking.
• Remove cookies from the oven and let cool on a baking rack for five minutes before removing.
• Repeat process again.  Makes 20 cookies.

Note:  I made these cookies using whole grain spelt flour.  You could substitute whole wheat pastry flour instead.  I like using spelt because it has a slightly nuttier flavor than whole wheat.  It is also higher in protein and easier to digest.  However, it does contain gluten so it is not suitable for a gluten free diet.