For some reason, this weekend I decided to do a lot of baking with oats (gluten-free of course!). It probably stemmed from it being Anzac Day and me wanting to make Anzac biscuits. So I did. And then I continued on the oats theme …
I know that I made fruit mince pies just recently, although it wasn’t Christmas, and Easter has just passed by without me making hot cross buns (it was during our big move back to Australia), but it was Anzac Day this weekend, so I did actually make Anzac biscuits at the right time … and gluten-free because I used gluten-free oats, and a gluten-free plain flour blend that we found in the local supermarket. For some reason, Australian supermarkets don’t have the individual gluten-free flours like Chile do in their supermarkets, but they have a lot of the already processed gluten-free stuff. Oh well, live and learn I guess!
And to be truly patriotic, we made the Anzac biscuits into an Anzac cheesecake – same recipe as our fantastic Cookies & Cream Cheesecake slice (recipe here), with Anzac biscuits instead of the Oreos, and a golden syrup swirl on top. REALLY yummy … just doing our bit for the Aussies!
I had a whole pile of chocolate chips (white and milk) as well as some M&Ms leftover from last weekends Monster cookies (mmm, monster cookies … recipe here … pardon me while I remember the deliciousness of both the dough and the finished product), and I wanted to use them up so I wouldn’t be tempted to make the monster cookies again in the near future. I think I had enough of the dough last weekend to last me for a very long time! Anyway, I saw this recipe at Chocolate Covered Katie, and at only 50 calories per cookie, I thought I’d give it a try. They turned out ok, but not spectacular … so it’s back to my recipe folder to find another oatmeal chocolate chip recipe to use up the leftovers …
And the recipe I found to use up the chocolate et al … was a good choice. It was originally from Alton Brown (from the Food Network, he puts the science in cooking and usually is quite interesting!). These were a winner with the whole family, even Abby who swears she doesn’t like raisins. Actually, I haven’t told her that these cookies have raisins in them yet … we’ll see how long she is happy to eat these until she realises!
I found a recipe for a no-bake peanut butter and honey oat cookie, me trying to be a bit more healthy than eating way too much of my favourite chocolate peanut butter oat slice (recipe here). Only 4 ingredients – I thought that sounded great! The problem was, I just couldn’t get them to stay together in a cookie form. Or as a bar/slice. So I gave up and crumbled it all up and called it muesli. Peanut butter, chocolate, honey and oats – my favourite 4 ingredients – so I wasn’t too upset it didn’t work as a cookie. If you try it, and you get it into cookies, let me know!!
And because I could … and because Grant had finished the last batch of granola … I made him some more. Just continuing on the oats theme!
Thanks for reading – as always, if you like what you see, please feel free to add your e-mail address to subscribe and get my latest updated recipe (or sign up your friends and family if you think they’d be interested too). Also, please feel free to add comments to the suggestions, and the individual recipes – I love hearing from you all!
Until next time – enjoy cooking at home!
Sarah