Growing up, I always had a sweet tooth. My dad and I would sit down after dinner, watching Cops or the Simpsons, and we would have a heaping pile of chocolate-chip ice cream smothered in butterscotch topping. My mom usually covered dinner but my dad handled the sweets. I believe he learned how to make these no bake cookies from his mom, my grandmother Lena Pauline. I remember watching him make this delicious cookie on the stovetop and we would wait for them to harden. They would still be a little warm, as patience is not a quality we had.
I haven’t had these cookies since I was a child. I grew up and had my own little family; time flies by. My dad passed away in February and today is his birthday. As grief still sneaks up on me, I decided I would somehow do something special today. Being that I got my sweet tooth from him, I decided to make his famous cookies as they were reminiscent of good times.
I modified the cookies and made them vegan but you can alter the recipe to be vegan or not. I also added my Healing Sprinkles to kick up the flavor and add some healthy benefits to balance out this sweet treat (a little less guilt, you know).
Ingredients:
Quick Oats [3 cups]
Crunchy Peanut Butter [1/2 cup]
Carob/Cocoa Powder [1:1 ratio – 1/4 cup]
Butter [1/2 cup]
Cane Sugar [1 & 1/2 cup]
Unsweetened Oat Milk with Vanilla [1/2 cup]
Himalayan Sea Salt [1/2 teaspoon]
Healing Sprinkles [2 tablespoons]
Directions: To work quickly and smoothly, remeasure ingredients so they are ready to go. This process is pretty quick! Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper. You can also utilize the kitchen counter (with parchment paper) if you don’t have cookie sheets.
Put the butter, sugar, milk, cocoa/carob powder, and Healing Sprinkles into a saucepan on medium. Stir as the mixture comes to a boil. Once the edges start to bubble, stir and let it continue to bubble for 1 minute. The top is bubbling lightly and it looks as if it is starting to caramelize. Remove the pan from heat.
Add peanut butter and salt. You can also add vanilla if you want. I chose the oat milk with vanilla (for my milk option) so I don’t mind skipping out on the vanilla. After the peanut butter has melted, stir in the oats.
After the mixture is blended, you can take a heaping tablespoon and drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto the parchment paper. Once you finish, you can either leave them messy or shape them up to be rounder and pretty. It takes about 20-30 minutes for the cookies to cool. You can store them in an airtight container in the fridge if you have any leftovers.
Modifications: For the peanut butter, you can substitute for creamy instead of crunchy, or use a cashew or almond butter instead. I am pretty sure my dad used the crunchy peanut butter so I stuck with that. For the butter, I used Earth Balance because it is vegan and tastes and works a lot like butter. For milk, I prefer Oat Milk but again, you can stick to dairy or make them vegan/dairy free. Technically these cookies can be gluten-free as well since there is no flour in these cookies, as long as you use GF oats. You can also just use cocoa only, leaving out the carob, as that is the original recipe. I cut the cocoa with carob because I love the nutritional value in carob as well as the richness, plus it doesn’t have caffeine.
