Almond Joy Cookies
Oct. 19th, 2006 03:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eruthrosThis is one of my favorite cookie recipes; it's easy, fast, and the cookies come out moist and thick. The original idea was from allrecipes.com, but ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
m_shell and I make them way more... well, way more everything. These are moist, thick, studded with chocolate chips and almonds, and mildly coconuty.
I'm making them right now for a potluck we may or may not have tomorrow.
Ingredients:
1 stick unsalted butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup unrefined white sugar
2 eggs
1+ tablespoon vanilla extract
2.25 cup whole wheat pastry flour (or 1.25 cup whole wheat pastry flour and 1 cup of soy protein powder; then they're proteinaceous cookies)
1 teaspoon baking soda
pinch salt
2 cups dried coconut
2 cups dark chocolate chips
1 cup chopped almonds
***
Preheat oven to 375*.
1. In a large bowl, soften the butter and cream with the sugar. Beat in the eggs until smooth. Stir in the vanilla.
2. This recipe is very generous to shortcuts, so if you, like me, hate doing dishes, you can do the dry ingredients in the same bowl without premixing. (Horrors!) If you're more cautious about baking than I am (Me: "I'm making Recipe X, but I don't have the nuts, the banana, the wheat berries, or the baking powder, and while I'm making substitutions I thought I'd like to try it with soy flour instead, and soy milk, and maybe add some chocolate chips." Friends: "..."), combine the flour, baking soda, and salt in a second bowl, mixing thoroughly. Then add that mixture to the wet ingredients and stir until well blended.
3. Add the chocolate chips, coconut, and almonds in several small increments, stirring after each. The ideal consistency here is something so close to a solid it can't be stirred any more; the coconut is going to add body to the cookies, just like oatmeal does in oatmeal cookies, but it doesn't dry things out as much, so you can use more of it. The batter will begin to hold its shape and pull away from the walls of the bowl; keep going until your spoon really won't turn over the batter. With the eggs I use, I usually get all two cups of coconut in, and something like 2.5 cups of chocolate chips.
4. Spoon the batter out onto baking parchment on a cookie sheet, or onto a buttered cookie sheet. They don't need to be flattened.
5. Bake for 8 minutes at 375*. (Unless you have the most unpredictable oven ever, take them out by nine minutes, maximum, even if the center still looks liquidish; they'll finish cooking on the cookie sheet, and will be infinitely better for not being dry or burnt on the bottom.)
Makes 36 + a little batter left over for tasting :)
***
Substitutions that I've tested: yes, you can use canola oil in place of the butter. You can leave out the almonds altogether. Pecans work, but have to be chopped finely. You can use almond extract or amaretto instead of vanilla, if you don't have almonds but want them almond-ish, but it won't be a strong flavor. I've done them with half-soy flour, as indicated. You can use the same recipe with oatmeal instead of coconut, but they'll be drier. The sugar ratio is not set; if you don't have brown sugar, you can do about a cup of white sugar and about a quarter cup of molasses. If you don't have white sugar, you can do just 1.5 cups brown sugar.
m_shell and I make them way more... well, way more everything. These are moist, thick, studded with chocolate chips and almonds, and mildly coconuty. I'm making them right now for a potluck we may or may not have tomorrow.
Ingredients:
1 stick unsalted butter
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup unrefined white sugar
2 eggs
1+ tablespoon vanilla extract
2.25 cup whole wheat pastry flour (or 1.25 cup whole wheat pastry flour and 1 cup of soy protein powder; then they're proteinaceous cookies)
1 teaspoon baking soda
pinch salt
2 cups dried coconut
2 cups dark chocolate chips
1 cup chopped almonds
***
Preheat oven to 375*.
1. In a large bowl, soften the butter and cream with the sugar. Beat in the eggs until smooth. Stir in the vanilla.
2. This recipe is very generous to shortcuts, so if you, like me, hate doing dishes, you can do the dry ingredients in the same bowl without premixing. (Horrors!) If you're more cautious about baking than I am (Me: "I'm making Recipe X, but I don't have the nuts, the banana, the wheat berries, or the baking powder, and while I'm making substitutions I thought I'd like to try it with soy flour instead, and soy milk, and maybe add some chocolate chips." Friends: "..."), combine the flour, baking soda, and salt in a second bowl, mixing thoroughly. Then add that mixture to the wet ingredients and stir until well blended.
3. Add the chocolate chips, coconut, and almonds in several small increments, stirring after each. The ideal consistency here is something so close to a solid it can't be stirred any more; the coconut is going to add body to the cookies, just like oatmeal does in oatmeal cookies, but it doesn't dry things out as much, so you can use more of it. The batter will begin to hold its shape and pull away from the walls of the bowl; keep going until your spoon really won't turn over the batter. With the eggs I use, I usually get all two cups of coconut in, and something like 2.5 cups of chocolate chips.
4. Spoon the batter out onto baking parchment on a cookie sheet, or onto a buttered cookie sheet. They don't need to be flattened.
5. Bake for 8 minutes at 375*. (Unless you have the most unpredictable oven ever, take them out by nine minutes, maximum, even if the center still looks liquidish; they'll finish cooking on the cookie sheet, and will be infinitely better for not being dry or burnt on the bottom.)
Makes 36 + a little batter left over for tasting :)
***
Substitutions that I've tested: yes, you can use canola oil in place of the butter. You can leave out the almonds altogether. Pecans work, but have to be chopped finely. You can use almond extract or amaretto instead of vanilla, if you don't have almonds but want them almond-ish, but it won't be a strong flavor. I've done them with half-soy flour, as indicated. You can use the same recipe with oatmeal instead of coconut, but they'll be drier. The sugar ratio is not set; if you don't have brown sugar, you can do about a cup of white sugar and about a quarter cup of molasses. If you don't have white sugar, you can do just 1.5 cups brown sugar.
no subject
Date: 2006-10-19 07:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-10-20 01:05 pm (UTC)Enjoy!
no subject
Date: 2006-10-19 08:01 pm (UTC)I'll pass 'em off on my work colleagues. Yeah.
no subject
Date: 2006-10-20 01:04 pm (UTC)Of course, there are the chocolate chips, but... that's another story.
Anyway, I hope you can enjoy a cookie or two and not feel guilty about it.