Healthy Sesame and Chocolate Cookies
Everyone knows how much of a chocolate fanatic I am and you will always find every damn kind of cocoa based ingredient in my kitchen whether its Morde chocolates, cocoa powder, raw cacao or our Indian sugar fee brands.
The other day I was just in the mood to make something which is actually very minimalistic and which I can probably just load up on without thinking twice about the sugar content or the weight I may gain. In addition what mattered most was the time consumed. I was busy in the research of a project with a food brand and just wanted to savour something decadent without spending hours in the kitchen.
Within a few minutes of a short stroll in my kitchen, I found Sesame in plenty. Sesame is a little hard to experiment what with the bitter taste it carries. You need to be extra careful when using sesame as one of the binding agent and as a primary ingredient as well. Also remember to use roasted sesame here to give that extra kick in the flavor. Remember these are actually those very wholesome cookies which will help you to stay on track with your health goals, so even if you are a fitness fanatic, you just have to dig into that jar and relish these cookies without a worry even in the dead of night.
Packed with feel-good ingredients and delicious flavors, these flourless cookies are dessert goodness. The best thing is these are vegan, plant based, oil free, sugar free, gluten free, and contain no highly processed ingredients.
You will be shocked that these are actually made with 4 ingredients only. All you need is cocoa powder, dates, desiccated coconut and sesame seeds. Of course, you cannot substitute dates here with any other natural sweetening agent because it helps in binding the cookies together as well. Also, as for the use of dark cocoa powder, the stronger it is, the more of the chocolate flavor you will have. But you need to buckle yourself up here – You have two bitter agents here in this recipe – cocoa and sesame. So both have to be handled carefully and excess of any of them will only result in a complete disaster.
Simply loosen yourself up, grab that cup of coffee and enjoy these cookies as you head out to work or need to freshen yourself up after a hard day of work. These minimalistic cookies will become your go to snack at any given point in time…Devour and indulge, I would say!
RECIPE:
Easy, healthy, and quick to make, these cookies will help to give you that sweet kick despite not having to worry on the loaded calories. The next time you have guests coming over and you want to feed them your unique cookies, you know what to do, right?
Ingredients:
1 cup sesame seeds
¼ cup unsweetened coconut flakes
12 Medjool dates, pitted * (If using any other dates which are small in size, just increase the quantity to 16 dates)
2 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
3 to 4 Tablespoons warm water
Optional Toppings:
Drizzle or dip half with melted chocolate chips
Sprinkle coconut flakes or sesame seeds over the melted chocolate
Method:
- Preheat the oven to 350 F. Place oven rack in the center position.
- Line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.
- Place the Medjool dates in a food processor and process to break them up, about one minute. Then add all the other ingredients (except the warm water) and process for approx. 1 minute or until everything is well combined. Then add 3 Tablespoons of hot water (not boiling, just tap hot) and process for 20 seconds. Pinch the cookie dough, if it doesn’t hold together, then add the final Tablespoon of hot water.
- Next take about a golf ball size of dough (2 small cookie scoops) and roll it in your hands to form a ball, then place the ball onto the parchment paper/silicone baking mat lined cookie sheet. Try to keep the cookie size uniform. Continue until you have rolled all the dough into balls, and placed the dough balls on the baking sheet. See notes about cookie dough tips.
- After the 2nd round of cookie ball rolling, flatten each ball to form a thick disk about ½ inch thick. Firm up the edges to keep a cohesive well-formed disk. The cookies will not spread while baking.
- Bake for 16 minutes.
- After 16 minutes, take the cookies out, allow the cookies to sit on the baking sheet undisturbed for 5 minutes to firm up, then transfer to a wire cooling rack.
Enjoy!
NOTES
*Medjool dates: If using Medjool dates vs another dried date, there is no need to soak the dates as Medjool dates are typically very soft. However, if you are using a different date, test the date by pinching it. If the date is very soft, gooey, and pliable, then you can just add them to the food processor to break them up. If the dates are drier and stiff, then you will need to cover them with boiling water for about 20 minutes to soften them up before adding the dates to the food processor.
*Cookie Dough Tips for Success: The cookie dough is semi-sticky, but it should form a ball easily. Tip: The more round and smooth you make the cookie ball, the better cookie texture results. What we have found works well and creates a great cookie is the following: We create all the cookie balls. Then we wash our hands again and pick up each cookie ball and roll it again in our hands to create a very smooth round ball. The 2ndround of rolling is not required, but it does make a really nice cookie shape. Then flatten each ball to form a thick disk about ½ inch in height. These cookies do not expand in the oven.
*Storage: Refrigerate and use within 5 days. Freezes well.
