Real-Food Ingredients

If you’ve spent time perusing FULLforLife, then you know the recipes you’ll find here use real-food, minimally processed ingredients whenever possible.

We wanted to come up with a recipe that omits the heavily processed ingredients found in traditional cookies, such as white sugar, brown sugar, all-purpose flour and margarine. What we came up with was a cookie recipe that uses simple, FfL-friendly ingredients.

Because these cookies are made with real-food ingredients, they taste a tad different from a traditional cookie, but not in a bad way. The coconut palm sugar yields a soft, chewy cookie with a subtle hint of rich molasses flavor. The white whole-wheat flour gives the cookies a whole-grain, nutty taste—which we think we can all agree on tastes amazing with butter, vanilla and decadent chocolate chips.

Our family actually prefers these cookies as a tasty treat over most traditional cookies. We promise if you serve these alongside the pre-packaged cardboard cookies, these will win every. single. time. This is a cookie recipe you can feel good about serving your family.

A few tips and techniques so your cookies will turn out perfect every time:

Soften the butter. This is IMPORTANT! You’ll want your butter to be soft and creamy before you start mixing your dough together. Take your butter out of the fridge and let it sit on the counter 30 minutes prior to mixing so it’s slightly softened by the time you’re ready to prepare your cookies. If your butter gets too soft, chill the cookie batter in the fridge after mixing everything together. If your butter is too warm, it will cause your cookies to spread out and become flat and greasy.

Measure your flour correctly. Measuring flour incorrectly is one of the most common mistakes people make while baking. While weight is the BEST way to accurately measure your flour, not all of us have scales at home.

1. Start by stirring the flour in case it’s packed tightly in its container.
2. Don’t scoop out the flour from the container or bag directly with the measuring cup. Spoon the flour into the measuring cup until it mounds above the rim. Don’t pack the flour down into the cup while doing this.
3. Use the non-serrated side of a dinner knife to level off the top until you have a smooth flour surface (you’ll probably need to do this a few times before it’s completely level).

Don’t overmix your dough. Overmixing often results in tougher, flatter cookies.

Don’t grease the pan. Greasing the pan can cause your cookies to spread out too much. Instead, use a baking mat or line your pan with a sheet of parchment paper.

Use a LIGHT colored pan. Dark pans absorb more heat than light pans and tend to burn the bottoms of the cookies. Trust us, we know from experience, and there’s nothing more depressing than a delicious dessert coming out burnt!

Don’t overbake them. The trick to doughy, yet fully baked cookies is to not overbake them. You don’t want to wait until your cookies necessarily look completely done. They’ll continue to set up after they’re removed from the oven. Different ovens may bake too hot or too cold and the size of the cookies plays a role in their cook time. Watch for the edges to be light golden brown. You can also use the toothpick test to make sure they’re fully baked. You’ll want the toothpick to come out free (or almost free) of cookie particles when you pull it out.

Don’t rotate the pan while they’re baking (unless you know your oven bakes unevenly). You’ll let out all your precious heat, which messes with the bake time.

Use a cooling rack. Cooling racks allow the steam to escape from the bottom of your cookies as they cool. This prevents the bottoms from becoming a soggy mess. It also prevents them from continuing to bake after being removed from the oven and overbrowning on the bottom.

Portion Control Tip

Because I (Kalie) have such a sweet tooth and can’t be trusted with two dozen warm, just out-of-the-oven cookies, I often make just one batch and freeze half the dough. This is only necessary if you struggle with portion control like I do.