Chewy Ginger Chocolate Cookies

This week has been absolute hell. I've had 4 assessments and they've each been worth 10-15% of my school mark. Can someone please explain to me why school is so stressful? I'm 17 years old, I don't need to have a heart attack due to such stress at an early age please.

I wake up in the night panicking about what I have to study, and what I need to do the following day. Life is stressful, and I have really bad anxiety. I know.

Anxiety + the stress of year 12 = heart attack, I think so. Waah!

After this death week though, I have been looking so forward to hitting the kitchen and baking up a storm. Lol, so sad considering all my friends are going out to parties on Fridays and Saturdays. Wooo! Go me! -__-

I haven't had enough time to bake as much as I wish I could this year - for the obvious reasons of my being up to my ears in paper and books - but I'm trying!

I've been rabbiting on for this whole post. Shall we start talking about this chewy cookies because I'm feeling like this is starting to get awkward..

Nb: If you want the cookies chewy, when placing "in balls on tray" press them down and then place in oven.
I put mine in balls and instead of being chewy, they were soft and cake like. But still great!

Spice makes everything better.
Spice with chocolate buttons? Fainted.

Chewy Ginger Chocolate Cookies

makes 4 dozen cookies

adapted from Big Fat Cookies

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

1 cup brown sugar

1 large egg

1/4 cup molasses

1/2 cup chocolate chips (milk chocolate or semi sweet)

1/4 cup granulated sugar, for rolling dough balls

Position a rack in the middle of the oven.  Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or just spray lightly with cooking spray.

Sift the flour, baking soda, spices and salt into a medium bowl and set aside.  In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat the butter and brown sugar until smoothly blended, about 2 minutes.  Stop the mixer and scrape the sides of the bowl as needed during mixing.  Add the egg and molasses and mix until blended and an even light color, about 1 minute.  On low speed, add the flour mixture, mixing just to incorporate it.  Fold in the chocolate chips.

Spread the granulated sugar into a small bowl.  Roll a heaping tablespoon of dough between the palms of your hands into a ball, toss the ball in sugar to coat and place on the prepared baking sheet.  Continue making cookies, spacing them about 2 inches apart.

Bake the cookies one sheet at a time until the tops feel firm but they are still soft in the center and there are several large cracks on top, about 12-14 minutes.  Cool the cookies on the baking sheet for 5 minutes, then use a wide metal spatula to transfer the cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.

The cookies can be stored in a tightly covered container at room temperature for up to 4 days.

Low Fat Oatmeal Banana Bread

This is a low fat banana bread.
It consists of a hearty cup of oats, a few large ripe sweet soft bananas, fragrant cinnamon, silky plain flour, a teaspoon of good ol' bi-carb soda.......okay I'll stop there. But you get the jist right? This bread is low fat yet it has all the ingredients to make it taste like a full fat banana cake. Whatever that means.

I haven't actually eaten the cake, seeing as I can't have bananas, but my Dad said it was so good! Yee-haw! A low fat oatmeal banana bread thats good? You can't be serious!

I didn't really get time to take pictures while I was making it (but to be honest, it's so easy to make that there wasn't really a reason to!)

Y'know what I like about this dessert though? You can eat a lot of it and never worry about getting fat.

 Unlike my previous Vegan Chocolate Cake post. I demolished that in one night and my pants felt tighter the next day so we all know that I gained roughly about 7 kilos!

Low Fat Oatmeal Banana Bread
adapted from the Weight Watchers site
makes 1 loaf of 10 slices, 4 points per slice

- 1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 3 tsp canola or walnut oil
- 1 large egg, beaten
- 2 medium egg whites, beaten
- 3 large bananas, ripe
- 1 cup uncooked old fashioned oats
Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour a loaf pan and set aside. In a large bowl, stir together dry ingredients including the oats and cinnamon.
In a smaller bowl, mash bananas with a potato masher or fork. Add oil and whole egg and mix thoroughly.
Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix well. Batter will be fairly thick.
In a medium sized bowl, with an electric hand mixer, beat the egg whites until medium stiff peaks form. Fold the egg whites into the batter in three additions.
Pour batter into pan and bake until top of loaf is firm to touch, 45 to 50 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool in pan for 5 minutes. Flip out and cool on a wire rack for another 10 minutes. Slice loaf into 10 equally sized slices.