Cooking with Mary: May 2014

Let me start off by saying that I know I've been absent from this blog. Between traveling, getting stuck in an airport, coming back and having to move out of our house & my husband starting 4 masters classes in a summer session. It's been a bit hectic, and to say that I've cooked anything other than quesadillas and easy foods would be a lie.

That being said, I'm showing you a new cookie recipe, because to be honest we've found out that I have more dietary restrictions than I originally thought. So, I've been having these really bad pains and spasms in my right side for about a year. & I really thought nothing about it because I didn't want to seem over dramatic about something that could be entirely just gas. But, my mom recently found out that my auto immune disease and Olive Oil had negative affects on a gall bladder. And to be honest, I use olive oil in just about everything. Salads, baking, and cooking on the stove. It is my go to, and why not? It's SO good for your heart, but I guess Hashimoto's disease doesn't like it, and because of that, my gall bladder has been hurting for a good year with me trying to ignore it. Also looking at both sides of my family, theres a history of gall bladders having to be removed. So with that in mind, my husband and I have decided to for the most part make the switch to either coconut oil or avocado oil. Today I bought a jar of coconut oil and I cant help but be pleasantly surprised.

When my husband and I were looking at the oil isle, he voiced concerns about it being too sweet or fragrant for foods. Right on the label it says that there is virtually no taste or smell to this oil, and if you really don't like it, its great for your hair and skin so that was my back up plan. Coconut oil hair masks anyone?!

So today, I wanted to make cookies. & yes I know I've made cookies on this blog before. But these cookies by definition would be (almost--I added eggs) vegan, dairy free and gluten free cookies. So why not share. I used the same exact recipe as previously used on this blog. Only where there was butter, I substituted for coconut oil. The cool thing about coconut oil is that its a 1:1 ratio, so for 1 stick of butter (1/2 C) is 1/2 cup of coconut oil. My recipe involves 1 cup of butter-2 sticks= 1 cup coconut oil.

So, I took a 1/2 C, a knife & a jar of pure coconut oil, and filled it to the top.

Then repeated. You want to make sure you have about a cup of oil.

Then add your 3/4 C brown sugar, 3/4 C white sugar, 2 eggs & beat

You want to beat until the coconut oil is warmer, and obviously spread in with the sugars

I then added about 3-3 1/4 C of Pamela's GF flour & beat that all together with 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda, an amount of vanilla that is to your preferance. This dough will seem a little crumbly because the oil works better when there is heat added to it.

Add your chocolate chips, I added Ghirardelli's dark chocolate, chocolate chips.

& this is where you want to skip the fancy kitchen utensils and just use your hands to make into round relatively small balls of dough. I spaced them out by 3 on the top, 2 in the center, and 3 on the bottom on the cookie tray. You want to use your hands because like stated above the coconut oil needs heat to make it do anything, so the warmth from your hands will take that crumbly dough and turn it into the regular cookie dough you're used to.