Date night cookies

Did you see what I did there....? Haha, well its our Third Wedding Anniversary today, and so the notion of "date night" is on my brain! One day, all the stars will align for the two of us to go out for dinner...we will have the baby with a friend, I will be well and healthy, and there will be no work to be done, on any timezone. Until then, I bake. 

So as I mentioned at the end of our cleanse, I am now doing a month Gluten Free (GF). It is incredible how much better I feel having eliminated gluten from my diet. I have had all the tests done years ago, and apparently I am not coeliac, but there definitely is an intolerance there, for when I brought back all the normal foods back into our diet after just one week, I was very unwell after each serve of glutenous food! And since the day I took it out of my diet, I have been symptom free again! Married to the man descended from Comus, Italian God of drinking and feasting (no, not really), I knew I wasn't going to be able to convince Pete to give up pasta and bread for a month, so this one I'm doing solo. 

I stocked up on GF everything (although I'm having a hard time finding certain flours in the UK, is it too much to import flour just so I can bake me a cake???) and set about making GF work. And that means, making baking work. 

I found this recipe on Nourished and Nurtured for Chewy Cinnamon and Almond Cookies, and heard it whispering to me through my iPad, beckoning me to try it out. So I did. I made the addition of chopped dates though, and I really feel like it elevated the cookie to another level. The dates added some texture, some extra chewyness and the right amount of sweetness to balance the salt.  

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter, melted

5T honey

1T vanilla extract

2 1/2 cups almond flour/ground almonds

1/2t ground sea salt (I used whole....and wouldn't recommend it...)

1/4t baking soda

1t cinnamon

1/2 cup chopped pitted dates

Method

1. Melt the butter and honey in a small pan on the stove top.

2. Turn off the heat and add the vanilla.

3. In a separate bowl, combine almond flour, salt, baking soda and cinnamon and mix well.

4. Combine wet and dry ingredients and mix well.

5. Fold in the chopped dates.

6. Drop spoonfuls of mixture onto a lined baking tray and bake in a moderate oven for 7-12 minutes, or until the edges start browning. 

These are delicious straight out of the oven, but keep well and still taste good as a snack on the go in a day or two's time, if there are any left! 

So far GF way of life isn't looking so bad!! Next step, desserts!!!