Vegan Pumpkin Oat Chocolate Chip Cookies

Seeing as I'm in the baking spirit these days, I've been doing a bunch of experimenting and learning.  My feeling is that, though I'm not a baker by nature, I can learn.  And I should!

Though I'm blessed with tons of fabulous bakeries in my hood that sell vegan treats, there's no way of really knowing what goes into all of them (white flour, white sugar, and the such).  If I learn to bake some of our family favorites myself I can kill two birds with one stone: squash cravings for sweets and make sure they're healthy ones!

With fall in the air and pumpkins on the brain I cooked up these surprisingly delicious cookies last week without any refined sugars or white flours!

Here's how I did it:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper (recycled preferably;)).

3. Mix together 2 cups of whole wheat flour, 1 1/3 cups of rolled oats, 1 teaspoon of baking soda, 3/4 teaspoon of salt, 1 1/2 teaspoons of cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg, 1/4 teaspoon of all spice, and 1/2 teaspoon of cloves.

4. In the bowl of a mixer, mix together 1 1/3 cups of brown rice syrup, 2/3 cup of extra virgin coconut oil, 2 tablespoons of barley malt, 1 cup of canned pumpkin (or better off cooked then pureed pumpkin), 1 1/2 teaspoons of dry egg replacer, and 1 teaspoon of vanilla until very well combined.

5. Add dry ingredients to wet in 3 batches, folding to combine. Fold in chocolate chips.

6. Drop by tablespoons onto cookie sheets.  Flatten the tops of the cookies with your fingers a bit.

7. Bake for 8 minutes at 350 then switch the cookies sheets in the oven (so the higher one goes on the lower rack and visa-versa then cook another 8 minutes.

8. Remove from oven and get cookies onto a wire rack to cool.