Healthy Chocolate Chip Cookies with Coconut Oil

I've been hearing lots of buzz about coconut oil and it's many purposes, have you? 

I first heard about it from my hairdresser. She told me that it makes a great, chemical-free moisturizer, and she's right! It looks kind of like shaved ice, but when you rub a small glob between your palms it turns into a magical substance. I even use it on my face, and I am VERY sensitive about oily products on my face.

Apparently all the employees of the organic grocery store downstairs are gleefully adding globs to their food as a condiment. I may not go that far, but I did do a little experiment with coconut oil and chocolate chip cookies. To really test it out, I used my favourite recipe and substituted coconut oil for half the butter. The results? A success! My chocolate-loving test subjects (my boyfriend and two new moms) agree. Next time I'll go all the way with the coconut oil. 

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Coconut Oil, Whole Wheat Flour & Oats

Ingredients

1/4 cup coconut oil

1/4 cup butter

1 egg

1 tsp water

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1/4 cup unbleached flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 cups of quick oats

1/2 cup of chocolate chips (replace some or all with craisins or raisins if you like)

Method

Mix the coconut oil, butter and sugar in a large bowl with a wooden spoon. Make sure you smash out all the lumps in the coconut oil. Add the egg and water. 

In a second bowl, combine flours, baking soda, oats and chocolate chips. Add the dry to the wet. (When I am feeling lazy, I just scoop all the dry ingredients on top of the wet ingredients and give the soda a little swirl.)

Shape into little mounds on a cookie sheet and bake at 350 for 16 minutes, or until the house smells like cookies.

Cypress Falls

I have a new hiking partner - a downhill mountain biker who must temporarily slow it down while pregnant. We've been hitting up some of the gentler hikes on Vancouver's North Shore. 

 A few weeks ago, we went to Cypress Falls. It was stunning... 

 ...and sunny. (We've been having a terrible summer here on the West Coast, unlike the rest of the continent. Send us your heat! We'll trade you.)

Amazing Things: June

1. The computer industry creates as much carbon as the airline industry and concrete buildings create five times as much. In all honesty, I could be a bit more strategic about much of my internet use - from emailing coworkers who are in the same room to idle minutes hours online.


2. Baked Eggs Benny at Acme Cafe. Pesto and hollandaise together. It works.

3. McDonald's coffee is delicious!


4. When you use your own mug at McDonald's, they still use a disposable cup to transfer the coffee from the machine into your (obviously diseased and filthy) mug. Apparently, this is the "Standard Operating Procedure."


It's not that delicious.

Spring is in the air

Lilacs are my favourite flower, for both their colours and their scent. Most of the year, I wait while Mozart sniffs the flowers (and the grass, trees, building corners, cigarette butts, etc.). In lilac season, he waits while I sniff lilac bushes.

In honour of lilac season, I'm auditioning new perfumes. (Strangely, I don't like lilac perfume.) Yesterday, I tried Jo Malone's Nectarine Blossom and Honey. Loved it. Today, I tried Orange Blossom. Not my scent. I feel like I'm being stalked by jasmine. 

Say what?

Mind-blowing facts are seeking me out.

1. Taking short showers to save water? Try one less mouthful. One pound of meat takes as much water as a year of showers. Vegetarian chili it is!
2. When my lovely friend Angie gets into her new Mazda 3, the speakers play the music on her iPhone, even from her purse in the backseat.
3. Apparently, I cannot combine my passion for collecting air miles and my passion for the Maple Pecan Danish. Tim Hortons does not take Visa.
4. The Vancouver housing market is the most expensive (considering prices and income) of 272 cities including London, New York, Sydney, and every other city in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, the USA, and Ireland. Ouch.

Photo: flickr