The Best Healthy(ish) Cookies I Ever Made

I've been having mad chocolate chip cookie cravings lately.  And apparently this child will be satisfied by nothing but chocolate chip cookies.  Not fruit.  Not just plain chocolate.  It had to be chocolate chip cookies.  When I bake, I try to do it as healthily as possible, especially now since it's not just me my food choices effect.  So I like to make lots of substitutions.  One of my favorites is swapping out applesauce for oil/butter.  It's amazing and I seriously can't even tell the difference.  My non applesauce loving husband can't either unless I tell him.

So I set about to make chocolate chip cookies yesterday morning.  Well, to be more exact, I mixed them up in the morning and baked them in the afternoon.  And here's the thing.  I hate making cookies.  Or I used to.  And I finally realized why.  It's the mixing.  Mixing sucks.  But when you just dump it in your stand mixer, amazing.  So maybe I realized I don't really hate making cookies, I'm just lazy. 

And now I'm shutting up and telling you how to make these amazing cookies.  They are approved by me, my husband, this child that is still under cover, and my adorable nephew.

Healthy-ish Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup natural applesauce (I buy the little individual cups and just dump one in)
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla (I just used a tiny bit of vanilla because I was almost out and these were still delicious)
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups old fashioned oats (these are the only kind you should ever buy in my opinion.  It's what I use for breakfast, even cooked in the microwave they're amazing and less processed!)
2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat your oven to 350 (if you're baking your cookies now, if not, leave it alone and preheat it when you're actually going to bake your cookies so you don't burn down your house leaving your oven on all day).  Cream together butter, applesauce, and sugars.  Add eggs and vanilla.  Add flour gradually (unless you're using your stand mixer, then just dump it all in and let'er rip.)  I like to mix the baking powder, soda and salt into my flour ahead of time so it combines better.  Mix in oats.  Fold in chocolate chips.  Drop by the spoonful onto greased cookie sheets.  Bake 11-13 minutes.

Makes 4-5 dozen cookies.  Now, the number of cookies it makes is not exact, obviously.  I don't use a cookie scoop.  I just scoop them out with a cereal eating spoon.  This makes a perfectly lovely size of cookie.

Now go make these cookies.  And enjoy them with a tall glass of milk (skim is my choice!).  They are baby approved!