ChocoAlmondoodles

So this is our first published attempt at vegan baking. We did initially start with a plan/recipe in mind...but we should've probably checked the pantry BEFORE we began. Regardless, we loved them and are most definitely making them again soon!!

Here's how it ended up:

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1tsp baking soda
1tsp cinnamon
3/4 cup honey almond butter (Justin's)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup Cream of Wheat ***
1/2 cup chocolate (any kind, broken up bar, chips, chunks, etc) or whatever other type of cookie gems you care to add (nuts, berries, etc).

***The original recipe called for flax meal to act as a binding agent in place of eggs. We didn't have any so upon exploration through my limited college pantry, we saw cream of wheat and figured it would do the job well enough (the dough was VERY dry before we added any). I did a couple tablespoons of (instant) cream of wheat and added 1/2 cup of boiled water and let it stand for about a minute. Then mix it.

Yield: 12 cookies

Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. We mistakenly added all the ingredients, up to the sugar, progressively to one bowl. (It seemed to work out fine. Next time we might cream the almond butter and sugar together separately as that is what the original recipe called for.)
3. At this point the dough resembled clumpy sand. Experiment to see how much of the cream of wheat you need to add, as the consistency of both your dough and the cream of wheat may vary.
4. Add chocolate chunks (or other fillings) as you round that dough into balls (we did approx. 1.5" balls).

Before:

5. Bake 10-13min on paper-lined cookie sheet (could do it w/o paper too). (this produced a cookie on the chewier side)

After:

Nutrition Estimates (per serving):
Calories: 175, Fat: 8.5g, Carbs: 19g, Protein: 3.5g

Overall:
These cookies were DEFINITELY not what we expected, but in a good way! First of all, they very closely resembled snickerdoodles but with a nutty kick. Secondly, the almond butter, unlike peanut butter, has a milder taste and therefore its flavor didn't come through as much as you might expect it to. If you really want that nutty flavor, you might look into either trying this same recipe with peanut butter or adding almond extract. That being said, these cookies were INCREDIBLE, and I'm not talking just "vegan good." Our friends told us they were amazing by both vegan and non-vegan standards!