Jessica shares a delicious cookie recipe to go with our Nourishing Back to School recipes today. They are grain- and flour-free, lightly sweetened, and a perfect after school snack. – Kimi
These chocolate peanut butter cookies make a perfect after school treat, or a special treat in the lunchbox of kids (big or little!). They are even better with a glass of cold milk. These cookies are rich in flavor, with a perfect balance of chocolate and peanut butter. They are only mildly sweet, plus they’re packed full of protein and fiber so they are quite filling. They are gluten- and grain-free and only made with natural sweeteners. There is nothing better (in my opinion) than a chocolate peanut butter cookie. The recipe was inspired by a recipe I found on Health-Bent.com for their Paleo Double Chocolate Chunk Cookies.
Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies
If you need the recipe to be strictly gluten and dairy-free, make sure you use gluten-free vanilla and gluten and dairy-free chocolate chips.
Ingredients:
2 cups organic peanut butter
4 pastured eggs
1/4 cup fresh ground flax meal
1/2 cup high-quality, organic cocoa powder
1/2 cup high-quality, organic dark chocolate chips
1 teaspoons vanilla
1/8 cup coconut sugar
12 drops stevia (SweetLeaf brand is what I used)
coconut oil for pans
Instructions:
1. Cream the peanut butter and eggs together until smooth.
2. Add in the rest of the ingredients and mix until combined.
3. The dough is going to be crumbly so you will need to shape each cookie by hand. Refrigerating the dough for a few minutes helps (and definitely keep it in the fridge between batches).
4. Shape and flatten the cookies to your desired size – this is not the kind of dough that spreads, so the size you make the cookie will be the size of the finished cookie.
5. Place cookies on a cookie sheet that has been greased with coconut oil.
6. Bake cookies at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes. Because the cookie dough is so dark, it’s important not to overcook them, as you won’t be able to tell if they are browned. Don’t cook for longer than 15 minutes or they will be too dry and crumbly. They will be done when the edges of the cookies start to show little cracks. They may seem undercooked when you take them out, but they do harden as they cool.
7. Makes approximately 18 cookies. Store in an airtight container in the fridge, though they taste best at room temperature.
Jessica Espinoza is the founder and publisher of Delicious Obsessions, a real food blog focused on cooking, baking, nutrition, and natural living. Jessica is passionate about food and she was drawn to the kitchen at an early age. She began helping her mother cook and bake around the age of three. She has been in the kitchen ever since, even working as the lead chef in a restaurant in her hometown. Jessica’s main goal is to provide real food recipes that are simple, yet delicious, as well as show that eating healthy doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive. She has a strong desire to show people how making even small changes in their diet and food selections can make a huge difference in their lives. She is a founding member and contributor of the Nourished Living Network. You can find Jessica on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Pinterest.
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Wow! Those look amazing 🙂 you really know how to capture the taste of this cookie …mmmm.
Thank you!! 🙂
Those sound delicious. I’m curious if you’ve tried making these with honey?
I have not made them with honey, but I personally think it would be a fine substitute.
Hi Jessica,
This recipe looks really great. Do you think I could just use a little more sugar, like 1/4 cup, and not use stevia? I don’t have any stevia, and I don’t want to buy any because I’m not sure how much I’ll use it.
Thanks!
Nancy
I think that would be fine to do. I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t work. The 12 drops of stevia doesn’t add much liquid to the recipe, so I think it would be fine to omit. 🙂
Oh yum!! I might try these with almond butter!
I have been wanting to do that! I think this recipe would taste amazing with any nut butter! 🙂
Thank you! I was wondering the same thing.
This looks great except For the flax seed. From my understanding you should
Never heat it.
I’ve never heard that it was bad to heat flax. I do know that flax meal goes rancid very fast, so you should always grind it fresh and store your flax seeds in the fridge. I will have to do some research about the heat issue.
I think the heat issue only has to do with flaxseed oil – it is fine to heat and cook flax seeds (whole or ground).
Looking at the recipe, I’d venture to guess that the flaxseed is subbing for an egg or two? I will probably try that, as we can eat eggs and always have them and I doubt I have any flaxseed.
Oops, my bad. Plenty of eggs there. So…what is the flax instead of? Flour? Will almond meal work? Flax has a lot of omega 6 for the amount of omega 3 you get from it, so we generally leave it alone. But Trader Joe’s often has almond meal, so I keep it around.
Yes, the flax was in place of a flour. I think that the almond meal would probably work fine. The cookies might be a little crumblier, but I understand why you would want to omit the flax! An almond butter/almond meal combo sounds delish! 🙂
Can you substitute the coconut sugar and stevia with honey or raw agave?
I don’t see why not! The cookies might be a little more moist with the added liquid, but that’s not a bad thing! 🙂
While flaxseed oil should not be heated because it can easily oxidize, it seems that heat doesn’t have the same effect on whole flaxseeds. Flaxseed oil features a high concentration of alpha-linolenic acid (ALA), and flaxseeds not only contain this omega-3 fatty acid but other important nutrients as well, including vitamins, minerals, fiber, and lignan phytonutrients such as secoisolariciresinol diglucoside (SDG).
Thanks for that info Priscilla! 🙂
Would ground chia seeds work in place of the flax? I don’t know if it’s bad to heat those.
You know, I’ve never used ground chia seeds before, so I am not sure. But, my gut feeling is that it would work just fine. It might change the texture slightly, but I don’t think it would be bad! 🙂
Hi
Hi
Thanks for the great recipe!
I just made these (half recipe) and used ground chia instead of flax, and about 1/4 cup raw honey and added cinnamon and coconut oil b/c my peanut butter was really dry.
VERY tasty and very easy and wonderful for my lil’ preschooler –
We had no choc. chips so just used 1/4 cup raw carob powder and 1/4 cup cocoa powder and they are delicious 🙂
Can’t beat grain free!