Gluten Free Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

This post is dedicated to my friend/coworker April, who has to eat a gluten-free diet & has all sorts of dietary restrictions because of her MS flare ups.  She works out of our Kansas City office now, but used to be here in this office; I sort of enjoyed the challenge of trying to find a tasty, gluten-free, April-friendly recipe whenever we had a potluck at the office. 

Sadly, I didn’t find this one until just recently, but April, if you’re reading this, I’d be more than happy to make them next time you’re in town, because they were AWESOME!

 

The original blogger who posted this stated that they almost can’t be considered a cookie, but I say “phooie” to that.  It’s small, delicious, and cookie shaped—ergo, a cookie.  She referred to them as “dough bites”…which, I guess I can see the reasoning, since this is essentially a vegan recipe and a lot of the things that make a “cookie” a “cookie” are missing.  No flour, no egg, no butter…

…so what IS in them, you ask?

Chickpeas.

Seriously.

Oh, quit scrunching your nose.  You eat hummus, right? (You don’t???  Okay, you need to start.  Like right now.)  But chickpeas form the creamy base for THAT delicious dish, so why WOULDN’T they work for cookies?

Okay…I understand your reservations.  If the original blogger’s cookie hadn’t looked so darn delicious, I probably would have been skeptical too.  But I’m easily wooed by a beautiful photo with melty chocolate.

Do YOU see a chickpea in there?  Because I don’t.  All I see is something that needs to get in. mah. bellayyy.

If you’ve never cooked with chickpeas (aka garbanzo beans) before, you should really try it.  I love hummus, but on top of that, these legumes are a powerhouse.  They’re mild in flavor so you can add as filler to nearly anything, and they’re low on calories & fat, while being high in protein & fiber.  You can season & roast them for a crunchy snack (think “corn nuts”) mix them in with salsa, sprinkle over a salad, add to soups & chili…

…or you can beat them to a pulp and make a cookie dough out of them.  Let’s take a whack at that last one.

 

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 cups canned chickpeas, well-rinsed and patted dry with a paper towel (It won’t take a whole can; there will be about 1/4 cup leftover. I tossed the remaining chickpeas in with some salsa & fresh cilantro for a tasty chip dip.)
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons  peanut butter 
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• a pinch of salt if your peanut butter doesn't have salt in it
• 1/2 cup chocolate chips (I used mini chips for more thorough chocolate distribution)—note, if you’re making this vegan, you’ll have to use a vegan chocolate chip, obvs.

 

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350F.

Bust out your handy dandy food processor, and pour in the chickpeas.  Then pulse until the tiny legumes start to look crumbly.  Then, add in your remaining ingredients (minus the chocolate) and process until smooth.  You’ll probably need to stop & scrape the sides periodically so you don’t miss any chunks of pea.  Once it’s smooth & well combined, remove & scrape the blade, and then mix the chocolate chips in with a spatula.

The dough will be sticky, so wet your (thoroughly washed) hands, and then roll the dough into little balls, and place on a cookie sheet.  Because of the lack of “cookie” type ingredients, these will not spread much, so if you want them to look cookie-ish, flatten them with your hand---or you could do the signature “fork cross hatching” that is characteristic of a good peanut butter cookie.

Then bake for 10-12 minutes, or until the bottoms start to brown. Devour Eat while warm.

See???  Just looks like a normal, delicious, wonderful chocolate chip cookie!  You’d never know there were chickpeas in there!  I fed several of these to unsuspecting coworkers (seriously, my coworkers are my guinea pigs.  But they don’t complain.  We’re scientists.  Test subjects are just a way of life)  and waited until they got the “OMG it’s so good!” out of their cookie-filled mouths before I mentioned that the primary ingredient was a bean.

The inside is moist & gooey and melty. Sheer heaven in a cookie shape.

The original blogger mentioned that the dough didn’t taste great before baked, and that the cookies tasted not quite right when cold.  However, I’m thinking maybe that had more to do with the all-natural peanut butter she was using, or perhaps some of the other ingredients, since she lives in Germany and they don’t always make things quite the same in other countries. (I have a friend in Brazil who can’t buy marshmallows at the store.  What kind of life is that???)

I used Wal-Mart brand chickpeas and peanut butter, and good ol’ Acadiana honey, and I thought the dough was delicious.  And the cookies were just fine cold, too.  This is seriously, in all honesty, probably the best PB & chocolate cookie I’ve ever had.

 

So again, if you’re headed to a BBQ this Fourth of July and you don’t want to bring a salad, and/or you have a friend who needs to eat gluten-free, bring this treat along instead!  See if anyone notices they have chickpeas in them…my guess is, if you don’t tell them, they’re not going to say a word, other than “these are AWESOME!” or something akin to that.

 

NutriFacts (per cookie)

Calories 80.9

Total Fat 4.2 g

Saturated Fat 1.4 g

Polyunsaturated Fat 0.8 g

Monounsaturated Fat 1.3 g

Cholesterol 1.3 mg

Sodium 84.3 mg

Potassium 59.3 mg

Total Carbohydrate 9.8 g

Dietary Fiber 0.9 g

Sugars 5.6 g

Protein 2.2 g