I got a bit tired of baking the same old banana bread and the (although fabulous) banana cake with cream cheese frosting all the time. Since banana cakes travel well, I almost always default to them when baking something to carry as a gift. So recently I wondered if I could bake cookies with ripe banana and if I could make it healthier than my usual bakes tend to be.
The resultant banana cookies were soft with some bite from the added oatmeal and a lovely chocolatey flavour from the chips. I made them chunky and thick so that one cookie goes a long way and you can even have it as a snack during the day with a glass of milk. YUM!
Some of my other favourites:
Eggless Almond Cookies (another great hostess gift idea)
Eggless Chocolate Chunk Cookies
Double Chocolate Biscotti
Eggless Banana Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 15 minutes
Makes ~15 cookies
Recipe adapted from: Buttercream and Chantilly
INGREDIENTS:
2/3 cup of ripe banana, mashed well or pureed
1 tsp of vanilla extract or essence
1 cup of flour
1/2 cup of uncooked oats (any kind should do)
1 tsp of baking powder
1/4 tsp of salt
1/4 cup of butter, at room temperature (55 gm)
1/2 cup of brown sugar
1/2 -3/4 cup of chocolate chips
INSTRUCTIONS:
1. Pre-heat oven to 350F/180C. Line a baking tray with aluminium foil, parchment paper, or a baking sheet and set aside.
2. Puree or mash the banana and set aside.
3. Sift the flour, salt, and baking powder into a bowl.
4. Add the oats and mix well to combine. Set aside.
5. In another bowl, beat the butter and sugar together until creamy (about 3-4 mins). You can do this by hand, in a stand mixer, or using an electric beater.
6. Add the vanilla extract to this and beat for another minute.
7. Add the pureed banana and gently combine until you get a smooth mixture.
8. Add the oats flour mixture to this and fold gently until well combined and you don’t see any traces of the flour.
9. Finally, add the chocolate chips and fold in. You can reserve some to add on top of the cookies before baking. I didn’t do this since the batter was thick enough to hold the chips in place. Also, I used 1 cup chocolate chips as in the original recipe and felt it was way too much. You can adjust this to your preference.
10. Using an ice-cream scoop or a large spoon, gently scoop out 2 tbsp mounds of batter and plate on the lined baking tray with about 2 inches between cookies.
11. Bake in the pre-heated oven for about 15 mins. The edges will start to brown and you will see some brown patches on the cookies too. These cookies don’t spread much.
You should eat them when warm and it’s super delicious. Cool completely before packing it up for a friend or storing it away for later. They stay good in an air tight container for up to 2 days. Refrigerate if keeping them longer.
NOTES:
– You can vary this recipe a lot to your preference and taste. I have made about 4 batches so far. The recipe above is the first one I tried. In the second batch, I added 1 cup oats and half cup flour and replaced brown sugar with powdered jaggery. This tasted more chewy and less sweet but overall was nice. I replaced flour with atta in a batch and the cookies turned out a bit rubbery and slightly bitter so I don’t recommend that
– You can add 1/4 tsp powdered cinnamon to the dough if you like the flavour. I once tried this and omitted the vanilla. It was nice but I prefer the original version
– Replace chocolate chips with chopped dates or raisins (although, why would you remove chocolate from anything?)
These were great! I used a little more pureed banana, just a little more oats, and replaced the vanilla with maple syrup, and it was great!
Very good. 🙂
Definitely a keeper.
I ended up using frozen bananas, but this caused no issue.
thank you!
I love you! Yours is my favorite food blog ever! It’s kinda like going to mummy to ask how to make something that pops up in the head and if mummy doesn’t have the recipe, will look elsewhere. (*lost my mom when I was 20 and not into cooking at all so didn’t learn anything much from her, but it kinda feels like she talks to me through your blog….very cheesy comment but ya)
best comment ever. hugs! and thank you
Was ok… I myself prefer a buttery cookie but this was simple… I read recipe wrong and added b/ soda instead of b/ powder… still turned out alright…
You haven’t mentioned how much flour you took for the basic one. I can’t see it in ingredients.
Oats flour or rolled ones??
Some pictures show flour some ahow rolled ones. It’s confusing!!
there’s no mention of oat flour in the recipe. under ingredients i have said 1/2 cup of uncooked oats (any kind). This means you can use ANY KIND OF OATS. rolled, instant cook, etc will all work.
please check again. i have clearly mentioned 1 CUP OF FLOUR
Can I make these without brown sugar?
yes
It was nice