Walnut Chocolate Date Cookies

These cookies are a great treat, full of chocolatey, crumbly nutty goodness. They are very decadent and go super well with coffee or milk. Also, the lack of grains makes them more sating than regular cookies in my experience, though that could be the placebo effect talking.

The recipe is simple and never really fails. It is also easy to modify with different nuts, seeds or dried berries for a variety of different textures and tastes.

Make some with white chocolate and macadamia nuts!

The main three ingredients are walnuts, dates and chocolate. These aren't the healthiest cookies, even if you replace the chocolate with berries, but damn if they aren't tasty.

Ingredients:

200 g walnuts
12 dates
1 egg
½ tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla (sugar or essence)
150 g chocolate

You will also need a way to process the nuts and dates into a uniform-ish consistency. A food processor is nice, but an electric whisk with dough hooks will do the job, or you can naturally just use some elbow grease and a fork. I like a lumpier cookie, myself.

Prep the ingredients by removing the date pits and grinding them. I like to use fresh dates, but dried ones works just fine. Grind them to a paste-like form.

You can either leave them aside and grind nuts separately, or add nuts in the processor and grind them up together. I like grinding them up separately, this way the end result is more rough and textured.

I've made some rough ones and fine grounded ones, and I like the rough ones more, they have a better mouthfeel.

Combine the dates, nuts, the chocolate and the dry ingredients. Add the egg last and fold it in to the batter.

Form the sticky batter into cookie shapes on the oven sheet. Balled dough will droop, but the batter will probably not run much during baking. The quantities in the recipe makes for about 9-12 large-ish cookies, about a single baking sheet's worth.

Bake the cookies at 170 degrees Celsius, or 388 F, for 12 minutes or until slightly browned and very fragrant.

Let them cool down about 10 minutes. They will solidify up and be easier to eat with beverages.

I think cookies will keep for one week in the refrigerator, but the years I've made these, they've lasted till the next morning at best.