Gluten Free Almond Butter Cookies

I have not met anyone who doesn’t like these cookies. This cookie is chewy, soft and not too sweet. They are so good, you have to try making them!

If you know me, I don’t have a sweet tooth but these guys are hitting the savory and subtle sweet spots just right. If you try making these, beware of overeating them!! Even healthy foods can be overindulged.

Flourless | Gluten-free | Dairy-free | High protein almond butter cookie with chocolate chips

If gluten-free for me?

With the trend of people going on gluten free diets because they believe it is inflammatory or causes gut issues, let me clarify some facts about gluten. Gluten is a protein within wheat. It is found in so many food products these days. Here are a list of some of the foods (not all) that contain gluten naturally:

• soy sauce

• flour

• many noodle packages have a mix of wheat flour, even if they are marketed as soba/buckwheat, soy noodles, ramen, regular pasta, egg noodles, etc.

• barley

• rye

• triticale

• many baked goods

• cereals

• processed foods like deli, sausages, battered/breaded foods

• beer

You can see how almost all food we would normally consume, contain gluten. However, not everyone is intolerant towards gluten. If our bodies lack the enzyme protein to digest gluten, we start experiencing gut symptoms that may include, but not limited to:

• bloating

• abdominal pain

• nausea

• vomiting

• diarrhea

• constipation

Even if we do experience some of these symptoms, we should figure out what other food, medications, supplements, lifestyle factors that may be contributing to these gut symptoms. Schedule a call ************ or consult with your PCP to better assess the root cause.

Why can’t I just go gluten-free?

The common risks of doing an extreme diet change is potentially becoming deficient in certain nutrients because sometimes we completely eliminate a food group due to lack of clear information, and do not know how to properly substitute with proper nutrition, we start noticing other bodily symptoms and everything goes downhill from there.

Ingredients

Makes 18 cookies

• 1 egg

• 1 cup almond butter (refrigerated)

• 1/3 cup brown sugar

• 1 tsp baking soda

• ½ tsp vanilla extract

• ½ cup semi sweet chocolate chips

• 2 squares of dark chocolate

• or a total of ¾ cup of chocolate chips/pieces

Instructions

1. Preheat oven

Preheat oven to 350’F.

2. Mix ingredients

Crack an egg into a mixing bowl and beat till egg white and yolk combine. Add almond butter, brown sugar, baking soda and vanilla extract then mix everything together for about 2-3 minutes. We want to use chilled almond butter so the cookie dough stays as cool as possible.

3. Chocolates

Cut up some chocolate pieces from the squares if you use some. Mix the chocolate chips and cut pieces into the mixing bowl and gently mix well for about 30 seconds or so.

4. Portion onto baking sheet

Place a parchment paper over a cool baking sheet. Make sure you don’t let the baking sheet sit on the stove top or above the oven because that would warm the sheet and spread the cookie dough during baking. Portion cookie dough onto baking sheet — about 1 Tbsp each.

5. Bake

Bake for 9-10 minutes then let cool on a rack for at least 10 minutes before storing away. TIP: before portioning the rest of the cookie dough onto the hot baking sheet, you could place the sheet in the refrigerator or freezer to cool it down.

6. Enjoy!

Serve and enjoy! Simply double, triple or quadruple the recipe to make more. If you host often like myself, you would want to make more because people would be demanding for it.

Dietitian Notes

Each cookie: 160cal | 12g carbs | 3-4g protein | 11g fat

This is a high protein cookie recipe without adding any protein powder, just protein from eggs and almonds.

One thing to note is that this cookie is quite high in fat, thanks to the almonds. Nuts and seeds are build from healthy oils but moderation is necessary. I’d recommend just one cookie a day as a sweet treat.

Tips & Variations

You may tweak this recipe with different nut butters and they would completely change the flavor profile. Some of the nut butters I’ve made at home with this recipe and was successful are:

• peanut butter

• cashew butter

• pistachio butter

Sweetener substitution

I have yet to try swapping out the brown sugar with a different sweetener like Stevia, monk fruit sweetener or other liquid form sweeteners. If you have, please leave a comment below about how they turned out for you!