Healthy Dessert/Snack Recipe: Boondoggle Bars - The Deceptively Healthy Cookie

Boondoggle Bars - The Deceptively Healthy Cookie
The data is in, people like boondoggle bars (even though there is nothing bad for you in them)! In fact, so many people requested this recipe at the lentil festival that we had to put it on our blog! These are a mix between a cookie and a health bar, but even kids like them! Feel free to add variety with different flours, nuts, and sources of moisture such as apple sauce, yogurt, bananas....really all you need is too have the right wet ingredients to dry ingredients ratio to make a cookie dough consistency. So if you are eating no dairy, feel free to substitute other wet ingredients for the yogurt and egg. See below for ideas. Have fun experimenting to make your own favorite variety of Boondoggle bar....share your creations on the blog!
 


Dry Ingredients:

1 cup whole wheat flour (whole wheat pastry flour preferable but any will work)

1 cup oats

2 tbsp wheat germ

1/2 cup ground flax

1/2 cup bran

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp cinnamon

Any of the other dry ingredient additions listed below..... 

Wet Ingredients:

1/3 cup peanut butter or almond butter (or mixture of the two)

1 cup yogurt (optional, see substitutions in wet additions list below)

1 cup applesauce

1 tbsp vanilla

1 egg (optional, see substitutions in wet additions list below)

2 tbs agave syrup (a sugar alternative from the agave plant which has a lower glycemic index so it does not raise blood sugar)

Any of the other wet ingredient additions below.....

Other ingredients

1 cup dark chocolate or carob chips (make sure to select dark chocolate chips with the shortest ingredient list -  no weird ingredients you wouldn't expect in chocolate chips - and the highest cocoa content.....above 60% is best).

Mix dry ingredients with wet ingredients and if needed add more wet or dry ingredients to get a cookie dough consistency, pretty wet but firm to mix.  Add dark chocolate or carob chips. You can add nuts, dried fruit, and/or raisins here too if you want.

Shape heaping tablespoons of dough into desired shape ( do you want a round "cookie" or rectangle "bar"?) on a cookie sheet covered with wax paper (this avoids using oil in your cookie recipe but if you don't have wax paper you can lightly oil the cookie sheet with vegetable oil.....no butter or margarine or crisco!). Bake at 350F for about 20 minutes or until bottoms turn golden color. Tops of cookies may seem slightly soft but will harden as they cool.

Wet ingredient additions/substitutions:

6 oz crushed pineapple (canned or fresh but avoid cans with added sugar)

1 mashed mango

1 mashed banana

6 oz pumpkin puree (canned or fresh but avoid cans with added sugar)

Grated zucchini or carrot

Dry ingredient additions/substitutions: 

other flours - lentil, semolina, tapioca, spelt, barley, flax

steel cut oats

ground almond meal
shredded coconut
Nuts
Raisins