After all the cream, custard and cake in last week’s trifle, I thought I ought to go for something a little more subdued and a tad healthier. Whilst I am a firm believer in the benefits of butter, I also think it’s good to vary your diet and fat intake from time to time. So when I spotted these Healthy Chocolate Chip Cookies using avocado rather than butter, I bookmarked the recipe.
I had to adapt the recipe from American measures to make it gram friendly and did my usual bit of tinkering, so these will not be replicas of the originals by any means. However, the flour is wholemeal and the sugar content is not high, so these cookies are relatively healthy. That is, if you ignore my addition of white chocolate – just to give them a soupçon of naughtiness.
This is how I made:
Chocolate Chip Avocado Cookies
- Peeled and stoned a small avocado then mashed it in a large bowl.
- Beat in 80g golden caster sugar and 40g dark brown sugar.
- Beat in 1 duck egg (large hen’s egg will be fine), ½ tsp vanilla extract and a pinch of salt.
- Sifted in180g wholemeal flour and ½ tsp baking powder.
- Stirred until just mixed, then stirred in 50g dark chocolate chips and 25g of white ones (for dairy free use all dark chocolate).
- Transferred the mixture to a small bowl, covered it and left in the fridge overnight to firm up.
- The next morning, placed heaped teaspoonfuls well apart on a lined baking tray – I made 20.
- Flattened them roughly with a fork and baked at 180℃ for 13 minutes.
Warm cookies for breakfast – mmmm. All this sweet stuff in the morning is becoming a bit of a habit and has got to stop, especially as these biscuits were surprisingly moreish. Of the “crisp on the outside, soft and chewy on the inside” variety, they weren’t too sweet but had lots of chocolate hits per mouthful. They were a little greenish and they did taste of avocado, but we are hardy folk and didn’t mind that. In fact, we both really liked them. Normally I dislike cooked avocado, which in my experience has a gloomy texture and tastes bitter. Not in this instance however – could it be the alchemical properties of good old Theobroma cacao?
Sharing
I’m sending this off to Jac at Tinned Tomatoes for her monthly event, Bookmarked Recipes.
Although Avocado isn’t strictly a vegetable, we tend to think of it that way, so I am entering this into Eat Your Greens and hoping Shaheen of Allotment 2 Kitchen will be lenient with me.
Thanks for entering your cookies in Bookmarked Recipes. They do look good and I love the idea of adding avocado. The roundup is now live.
Thanks Jac 🙂
I have never used avocado in baking, but these sound fascinating and look very tempting! Does its use shorten the life of the biscuits at all (or did they not last long enough to find out)?
The biscuits lasted three days and were fine on day three, but I suspect they wouldn’t have been good for much longer. So probably best to freeze half the batch if they aren’t going to be eaten fairly soon.
Avocado! That’s clever…can you taste it? X
CT and I could both taste the avocado Deena, but we both knew it was there. Would have been good to try them out on someone who didn’t know.
I have never ever thought about using avocado in baking. What a fab idea.
It’s a good one Bintu – providing you have plenty of avocados – otherwise it seems a bit of a shame not to eat them just as they are.
Wow they look amazing. I would never have thought of using avocado instead of butter, but it makes perfect sense. So cool
Thanks Katie. I doubt I would have thought of using avocado either if it wasn’t for the wonders of the internet.
I didn’t know you could do this with avacacdo, would love to taste them. They look lovely
No, it was a new concept for me too Alison, but it’s a good one.
So intrigued by the taste of these. They look so lovely. Good old chocolate and it’s addictive qualities eh?
Good old chocolate indeed Dom – where would this blog be without it?
How wonderful! I used avocado one time in blondies and they were delicious, though a lot more green than your cookies!!
Avocado blondes sound like a must try Jennifer and I like the idea of the green colour.
loved the addition of avocados in cookies… interesting!
Interesting, but good too Hasna.
I am actually accepting anything that is green for #EatYourGreens. I made some biscuits a little while back with celery http://allotment2kitchen.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/soft-centred-celery-cookies.html
and they were very tasty, so I can imagine your Avocado ones to be too. Thank you so much for sharing.
Celery sounds far more interesting than avocado Shaheen – will come and check those out.
I baked avocado cookies before, but without chocolate. These cookies look scrumptious!
Ah well Angie, I should have guessed this would be nothing knew for you 😉
I love avocados in baking and these cookies look amazingly tasty as well as being healthier too! Such a super recipe and lovely photo, Karen
You are well ahead of me in this Karen, but I’m glad I’ve tried it out. If I ever get a glut of avocados, I’ll know what to do with them. Thanks for the photo comment 🙂
Would never have the confidence to bake with avocado but this looks the business. That’s if I ever have any avos left – they get eaten in two minutes in this kitchen
Normally, avocados would never make it this far with us either, but I just so happened to have bought a load of them quite cheaply and they were all ripe at the same time.
I’ve heard and tried baking with some vegetables but never avocado. Can you taste the avocado at all? I do like the healthy sound of them.
Angela – Garden Tea Cakes and Me
You can taste the avocado Angela, but I don’t mind that. If you’d be able to identify it if you weren’t told it’s there is another matter.
That sounds really unusual and interesting, love the addition of avocado!
Thanks Jenny.