King Arthur Cookie Mix

I've been gluten free for 6 months and we finally broke down and got a toaster (oven), since the toaster had to be quarantined. I love it! I can roast polenta for dinner, or make garlic toast, or 6 cookies!

I had sworn off baking mixes for years, for a billion reasons. They were often not vegan when you delved into those scary sounding ingredients, although the scary ingredients were enough to keep me away even if I didn't know what l-cystine is. It turns out the gluten-free mixes are less frightening. The ingredients list is recognizable and usually things I have in my pantry. Many use xanthan gum, which is not in my pantry, and I kind of hate it, but it's been in my condiments for years, so I don't get rabid about it.

King Arthur's gluten-free cookie mix uses normal ingredients and no xanthan gum. I used coconut oil for butter, and ground white chia seeds for the egg (1 tablespoon ground seeds with 3 tablespoons warm water in a little bowl to gel up), with a cup of Enjoy Life mini chocolate chips. They're chewy and delicious.

My only complaint about baking cookies these days is that I have
To form each cookie by hand for them to bake up properly.

I put hand pressed cookies on a sheet in the freezer, and when they froze solid, I put them in a container with baking instructions for a quick hot cookie dessert some painful evening with warmed chocolate hemp milk. <3

Magic Peanut Butter Kisses

So... I have celiac disease. My life has been blissfully more comfortable since giving up the gluten (and the withdrawals were awful!) and I've had to relearn everything about baking. I'm still learning. But these cookies were a pretty good success for a night at home on New Year's Eve, reminiscent of the very non vegan peanut butter kiss cookies with the Hershey candy. This recipe closely follows Elana's Pantry's peanut butter cookie recipe.

Ingredients:

2 cups almond flour*
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 cup creamy peanut butter
Pinch salt, if unsalted PB
1/4 cup agave
1/4 cup maple syrup
1 tsp molasses
4 tbsp coconut oil
1 tbsp vanilla (I used Cook's cookie vanilla)

About 1/4 cup sugar for coating uncooked cookies (I used half turbinado and half vanilla sugar).
About 24 bite sized pieces of chocolate.

*I used Bob's Red Mill blanched almond flour. In the past I had some random almond meal (from Trader Joe's?), and it was ground almonds with the skins on them, which made for kind of a gritty, bitter final product in everything I made. Blanched almonds have their skins removed, so the resulting flour is softer, sweeter, and a little more flexible in baked goods, I'm finding. I'm really impressed. I just wish it was cheaper.

Directions:

Mix ingredients well (I used a stand mixer for about 2 minutes), adding a little more almond flour if too sticky to handle. Scoop tablespoonfuls into sugar and roll to coat. Flatten slightly on parchment covered cookie sheets, and bake at 350f for 8-10 minutes, until browned. Press chocolate chunk into each cookie and allow to cool on baking sheet for 5-10 minutes before transferring to cooling racks.