Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Ooey Gooey Chocolate Chunk Walnut Cookies


My baby sis, who is not a vegan *yet*, loooooves my chocolate chip walnut cookies. It's one of her favourite desserts ever and if she had her way, I'd be making it every week! A few weeks ago, she went out with our dad to shop for nuts at this speciality store called Manak Mewa which stocks a huge variety of high quality dry fruits and nuts and sells them at reasonable prices. Ever since my parents attended the Reversing Diabetes seminar by Dr. Nandita Shah last November and turned vegan, my dad started to munch on a few nuts and raisins with salad for his mid morning snack instead of the crappy processed biscuits and stuff that he used to eat before. It's turning out to be healthier and cheaper but it calls for a regular visit to Chickpet to shop at Manak Mewa.

But I digress. I was telling you about my sis at the store. She called me with great excitement in her voice and said in one breath, "Akka, you said your stock of walnuts was over no? There's plenty here. I'll bring some, you make me choco chip cookies." She wanted a whole batch to herself this time, as opposed to the one batch I make and share with her, so she asked me to make two batches, "one for you, one for me". I agreed to spoil the brat this time.

Ooey Gooey Chocolate Chunk Walnut Cookies

The vegan chocolate chips I'd brought back from the US was long over so I told her to pick up some vegan chocolate bars on her way here. Since chocolate bars are a tad overly sweet in my opinion, I halved the quantity of sugar and the cookies were perfect!

I also wanted to make the cookies slightly healthier so I tweaked the recipe around a bit. So these turned out quite different and much much more scrumptious than the already delicious basic chocolate chip cookies I have been making all these years. These have a softer crumb and a texture that's in between a chewy cookie and a cake. It's just amazing what flax seed powder and Bajra can do to baked goods!!

Ooey Gooey Chocolate Chunk Walnut Cookies

Dry ingredients:
2 C All Purpose Flour (Maida)
2 C Pearl Millet Flour (Bajra)
1 1/2 T Baking Powder
2 T Cocoa Powder
Pinch of Salt

Wet ingredients:
1 C Sugar
1/2 C Olive Oil
2 tsp Pure Vanilla Extract
3 T Flax Seed Powder
2 1/4 C Water

Additions:
1 C Broken Walnuts
4 Bars Dark Chocolate Cut into Chunks

Preheat oven to 180C/350F.
Line a baking sheet with aluminium foil.
Sieve together dry ingredients.
Whisk together wet ingredients for a few minutes.
Mix the wet and dry ingredients together.
Stir in the walnuts and chocolate chunks.
Drop onto cookie sheets by spoonfuls.
Bake for 20-25 minutes.
Let cool on the cookie sheet for a few minutes.
Transfer to wire rack and cool some more.
Serve warm.
Bite into the soft, gooeyness and be transformed into a state of bliss.

Ooey Gooey Chocolate Chunk Walnut Cookies

While the cookies were baking, a strange phenomenon occurred. I had negligently left one unbroken walnut half lying around on my kitchen counter (apparently on white paper to get the perfect lighting :oP). I heard a soft shuffling sound and when I looked, I beheld three little zombie veganosaurus monsters walking towards the walnut half with a greedy gleam in their eyes. "Brains, brains, brains", they said. But suddenly...




14 comments:

  1. did you say cookies:) i love those walnut muching monsters.. i could play that video on loop all day!

    well if she keeps eating all the vegan stuff u make for her.. she will soon be close to all vegan:)

    I made my dad's bday cake last yr and he now wants cakes only like that and mom would always make them with lots of eggs. She is experimenting a whole lot these days, whcih is very admirable for both her and dad!:) they made young coconut milk and made tea with it yesterday since mom wasnt keen on making almond milk. i asked her to expriment with other grain milks to find a tea they like:) lets see.

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    1. Thats great about your parents, Richa. That feeling of being responsible for our parents making healthy choices is unbeatable, no? :)

      I do that with the monster videos too. Can't watch them just one time. lol

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  2. Lucky your sister! What greater lover is there for a sibling then sharing a batch of freshly-made cookies (and a zombie video, for that matter!)

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    1. Thanks Joey. I'm lucky to have her too. She's the kind of sis who is worth spoiling! :)

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  3. Yum! Gooey chocolate chunk walnut cookie looks really very tasty.

    I was so excited to taste the vegan Dark chocolate in India. I really liked it very much ...

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  4. how did you make that video....apart from the cookies the video is also a cute one.

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    1. dassana, I made it using stop motion software. It basically puts a bunch of photos together into an animation. So I moved the monsters a little at a time and took photos and strung them together into a video. There were about 45 pics clicked to make this 5 second video. It is a lot of fun! And so addictive! :)

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  5. you know how much I dig your monster videos!! but did you know how much I love those cookies? Do you have room for another sister? I'll bring some brains...uhm walnuts.

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    1. Yessss. I'd love to have you as another sis, Gi. Imagine if we had been, how much would we have tortured our parents with our pranks. hehehe

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  6. Hi! I am just starting my journey towards becoming vegan... it has been a month now and I feel sooooo good.. have been following your recipes religiously! thanks for all the info.. i wouldnt have been able to get started without them.
    I am going to make this soon... just drooling over the pic... i got some morde dark compound chocolate which doesnt contain any milk solids in it.. so i guess that makes it all in all vegan..it is easily available at major grocery stores in India.

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    1. Shreya, good to hear you've decided to go vegan. Thanks for reading my recipes and trying them out. :)

      Though Morde Dark Compound is vegan, I would suggest you use the Morde Dark Chocolate instead. Both are vegan but the Compound is filled with really unhealthy ingredients and it doesn't even have enough chocolate content in it. The Morde Dark Chocolate is better in terms of taste and it's a little less unhealthy.

      Let me know how the cookies turnout. :)

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