Health Nut

I know that I'm WAAAAY too into baking and eating baked goods, but there are some foods that are good for you that I adore as well. Mostly green stuff. Spinach, broccoli, zucchini and asparagus (the green kind, not the white stuff which is all I ever see around here and which I have no idea what to do with). I recently started using whole grain pastas. I always try to get whole grain bread. I eat lots of yogurt (Oh, you poor Americans who live in the land where "yogurt" is sugar with a little yogurt mixed in, and some corn starch or something that makes it far too jelly-y! I think I know why greek-style yogurt is all the rage!) And fresh fruits that don't make my mouth itch so much that I think I'll go crazy. There seem to be fewer and fewer of those. And I'm big into nuts and dried fruits.

But mostly, I'm into baked stuff. I bake a few times a week and we eat that stuff for dessert every night. Then, during the day, I forget about the delicious polish yogurt, the dried fruit and nuts, and the possibly non-itch inducing fruit, and head straight for the cookie jar. Well, not really, because you can't keep brownies in a cookie jar, and also, my cookie jar currently resides at my mother's house in Utah. But what I mean is that I reach for cookies or brownies or whatever it is I have most recently baked. This means that possibly 1/2 the calories I take in in a day come from junk food. No, probably not half. Please don't let it be half.

Greg recently asked me if I couldn't try making some treats that are a little more healthy now and again. It sounded like a dumb idea to me, but I love him SO much that I decided to try. One week, besides the usual chocolatey, rich treats, I made a carrot cake (with cream cheese frosting. See?! Cheese and carrots! That's what you'd give your kids for a healthy snack, and we were eating it for dessert!) Last week I came up with an even healthier treat to bake. I had made it before, long ago, and remembered it and decided to make it again. I will share the recipe with you, in case you are a health nut like me. It has oatmeal, banana, hardly any fat, and I even substituted half the chocolate chips for dried cranberries, which elevated it from a low-fat cookie to pure health food. You can go to the original recipe (it's by Nic at Baking Bites) but I'll copy it here, too.

They're not the best cookies in the world, but for what they are, they taste very good. We all liked them, and David loved them, but wished I'd used only cranberries (no chocolate). What a wierdo. This recipe is perfect if you just have one black banana and not the 25 required to make banana bread. If you let the cookies get very brown they will be cakey or dry, but take them out as soon as they start to change from white to golden and they'll be lovely. I didn't take any pictures of mine because they aren't actually physically lovely. I was referring to the texture.

Banana Oatmeal Cookies

1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 tbsp butter, very soft
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup mashed banana (1 small/medium)
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups oats
1 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking sodaand salt.
In a large bowl, cream together the butter and the sugars. Beat in egg and banana, followed by the vanilla extract. Gradually, on low speed or by hand, add in the flour mixture. Stir in the oats (either whole rolled oats or “quick cooking”) and chocolate chips.
Drop dough by tablespoonfuls onto prepared baking sheet.
Bake for 11-14 minutes at 350F, until set and lightly browned.
Let cookies cool for about 5 minutes on the pan before transfering them to a wire rack to cool completely.
Makes 2 dozen cookies.