Nadine's No Bake Chocolate Cookies

Long ago before she became a vegan Nadine made these cookies. I got the recipe from her and morphed it in to a vegan one my using non dairy milks. I like to make them when I want a simple chocolate cookie. They are super easy to make and aren't super crumby cookie so they are great for on the go.

2 cups sugar
4 Tbsp cocoa
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup milk
2 1/4 cup minute oats
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup grated coconut

Mix sugar, cocoa, and salt in a 1 1/2 qt sauce pan. Add milk and bring to a simmer, stirring with a wooden spoon.  Remove from heat and sample (see note below). Mix remaining ingredients. Drop spoonfuls on to lined cookie sheets and let set until firm and enjoy. Store in an air tight container.

Notes:
Only once has it ever happened to me but I have cooked it and then it turned in to a brick in the fridge There was no way to cut it and I had to throw it away and lost all of the ingredients. Remove a small sample of heated mixture and place on to a small piece of parchment paper. Place sample in the fridge to see if it remains soft after 10 minutes of longer. If hardened do not use the heated mixture, you will get hard cookies. If still soft continue making cookies.

Date Balls

After seeing pictures and recipes for date balls and having dates in my cupboard waiting for me I decided to meld a few together to create my own. It took two tries for me to land on this recipe as my favorite mash up. The requirements when I was looking for reference recipes: no coffee, ingredients I already have, nutritiously dense, few ingredients. After comparing recipes I came up with this a 5 ingredient and simple recipe. You can omit the coconut if you want but with the addition of coconut it reminds me of Samoas Girl Scout Cookies.

1 cup pitted dates (I use Madjool)
1 cup oats
1 tbsp cocoa powder
1 tbsp flax meal
2 tbsp unsweetened coconut shreds


Place dates, oats, flax meal, and cocoa powder in a food processor and process together. It will eventually form a ball within the food processor which is perfect for shaping. Shape into balls, roll in coconut shreds and enjoy. Store in the fridge

Melting Chocolate

 Melting chocolate seemed like a lot of fun to me until I it started to burn and look funky. Here are somethings I learned that will hopefully help you with your melting adventures.
These tips are for double boiler methods not microwave. I use a glass bowl over a pot of boiling water and only have a little bit of the water touching the bowl where the chocolate is melting and I have found it to work well.



DARK CHOCOLATE: The easiest to melt by far.It will melt quick and not that easy to burn either, there isn't a lot added to the actual chocolate. If you are starting to run out feel free to throw more in.



MILK CHOCOLATE: A little trickier. I recommend reducing the heat once it melts and not turning it up again even if you add more chocolate. Be patient when waiting for more to melt again, burnt chocolate is a waste.


 WHITE CHOCOLATE: The most difficult. White chocolate technically isn't a chocolate because there is no chocolate solids as Bon Appétit put it. White chocolate will burn easily and  don't recommend adding more part way through. Melting too much and have extra is a better idea.




STRAWBERRIES: If you wash your strawberries just before dipping them pat them dry. The water gets into the chocolate and makes it look like it's burning. It isn't but it can be alarming when you  don't realize what happened. It took me a few times to realize just drying them would avoid the problem. If you forget you can continue and avoid the darkening spots ( it will effect coverage if you dip in to the watered chocolate) or just wait a little while. This is more evident in milk chocolate than the other two.

Have fun. A spot in the fridge is a great place to put a cookie sheet of goodies to cool.