How to Make Perfect Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies

One of the best ways to introduce your family to eating more whole wheat is to start with dessert.  Everyone loves a cookie (we all know that I especially love cookies) and chances are when you offer your 5 year old, or your 30 year old husband,  a delicious whole wheat cookie he will gobble it up, and ask for more.   

The only problem is sometime whole wheat cookies can be dry and heavy.  Sueann Allen, from Suzie’s Sweet Wheat, is here today to teach us how to make wonderful light and gooey whole wheat chocolate chip cookies.  

Take it away Sueann.  

Before you begin making cookies with whole wheat flour, there are a few items that I need to address to increase your chance of success.

Three Tricks to Making Whole Wheat Cookies

      1.     ALWAYS use hard white wheat for my desserts. Hard white wheat has a more subtle flavor than hard red wheat and has a much nicer texture.  Many people believe that hard red wheat is more nutritious than hard white wheat, but actually, hard white wheat is slightly more nutritious, making it my very favorite wheat to use in baking.

      2.     Always use either freshly ground whole wheat flour that was ground on the finest setting, or sift your previously-ground flour, or your cookies will be too dry and puffy. If your cookies seem too dry, you may need to decrease the flour by a couple of tablespoons. If they seem too moist, increase the flour by a couple of tablespoons. Try adding the flour amount in a recipe minus 1⁄2 C of flour and then work your way up by tablespoon until you get the exact right consistency. You may want to bake one sample cookie and then bake the rest.

Baking cookies with whole wheat can be a little more difficult than white flour because, if not done correctly, they can be heavier...but when you get it down just right...no one can tell there is wheat in them!

      3.      The key to soft cookies is to bake them just until they are soft and then let them cool on the cookie sheet or baking stone...they will bake while they cool. Do not transfer them until they have cooled for at least 15 minutes.

To Convert Your Cookie Recipe to Whole Wheat

If you have recipes of your own that you would like to convert to whole wheat, use these guidelines:

When converting white flour to whole wheat flour:

o   For every 1 cup of white flour the recipe calls for use 1 cup minus 2 T whole wheat.

o   I generally use, or 3/4 C plus 2 T whole wheat flour in place of 1 cup white flour. 

o   Unless it is freshly ground and then I can usually substitute straight across.

o   If you are using soft white wheat flour it can be substituted straight across.

This chocolate chip cookie recipe is the very best recipe for whole wheat chocolate chip cookies. They are soft, gooey, and in a word, amazing. Not one person who has ever eaten them has known they are whole wheat. I’ve actually had many people ask for the recipe, and they are surprised to find out that they are, in fact, whole wheat. I have one friend who adamantly protests against eating whole wheat. She hates whole wheat in all forms and refuses to eat anything whose ingredient list contains “whole wheat”. When she ate these cookies, she did not believe for one second that they were whole wheat. She loved them. So, if you are looking for a fabulous whole wheat chocolate chip cookie that doesn’t scream “whole wheat!” these are the cookies for you!

Grandma Pattyʼs Gooey Whole Wheat

Chocolate Chip Cookies

For a printable recipe

3 1⁄2 C whole wheat flour (make sure it is sifted or freshly and finely ground)

3⁄4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 C butter, softened

1 C packed brown sugar

3⁄4 C white sugar

1 T vanilla extract

2 eggs

11⁄2 C semisweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cream sugars and butter together. Add vanilla extract and eggs.

Beat for three minutes. Mix flour, baking soda and salt. Stir dry ingredients into wet ingredients.

Stir in chocolate chips. Drop by heaping teaspoonful’s onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake 10-12 minutes. Let cool before transferring.

Makes 3-4 dozen, depending on the size of the cookies.

The trick is to take them out when they are just barely solid and let them sit on the hot cookie sheet...this will cook them just a little longer. YUM!!!!

Sueann Allen is an average American mom, just trying to make it from day to day with four small children. Due to health concerns, she had to get her children on a high-fiber diet.  She began experimenting with wheat about three years ago and has completely removed white flour from her family’s diet.  Her children are no longer on medicine and my whole family is living a happier, healthier lifestyle.  You can read more about Sueann on her blog:  Suzie’s Sweet Wheat. You can check out her book which contain 250 whole wheat recipes:  Suzie’s Sweet Wheat

Whole Wheat Chocolate Éclair Dessert

This week I will be attending Shelf Reliance Convention.  I’m so excited to interact with other consultants, attend awesome workshops and find out what new products will be launched. To find out more about being a consultant go here.    

While I am gone I have asked Sueann from Suzie’s Sweet Wheat to share some of her favorite recipes.   

As we were talking about what she wanted to share with you she brought up this chocolate eclair dessert.  Oh be still my heart.  Eclair dessert is one of my all-time favorite foods ever!  I have never tried it with wheat flour but Sueann told me that when done right you can’t even tell there is whole wheat in it.  That is my kind of dessert.  

Here is Sueann.

 

This recipe is a guaranteed success for many reasons. It is easy, made with ingredients commonly found at home. I’ve NEVER not had it turn out...just follow these directions and you can’t go wrong. It makes an entire cookie sheet full of dessert, so you can serve many people with just one dessert. 

It has never failed to create a stir at social gatherings. Every single time I’ve made it, I’ve had many requests for the recipe. It has a whole wheat pastry crust, but the whole wheat is completely undetectable. When I mention that it is whole wheat, people are shocked! I’ve even auctioned it off for $45 dollars at an auction for Boy Scouts. This is a winner recipe through and through. If you want to make the dessert that gets the whole party talking’ this is the one to make!

Before you begin making pastries with whole wheat flour, there are a few items that I need to address to increase your chance of success.

      

      1.     I ALWAYS use hard white wheat for my desserts.

Hard white wheat has a more subtle flavor than hard red wheat and has a much nicer texture. Many people believe that hard red wheat is more nutritious than hard white wheat, but actually, hard white wheat is slightly more nutritious, making it my very favorite wheat to use in baking.

      2.      Always use either freshly ground whole wheat flour that was ground on the finest setting, or sift your previously-ground flour, or your pastries will be too dry. Start with the amount of flour mentioned in the recipe and then decrease it by two tablespoons.

If your pastries seem too flat, you may need to increase the flour by a couple of tablespoons.

If they seem too dry, decrease the flour by one or two tablespoons.

If you are making cream puffs or eclairs, try baking just one to determine if you want to add another 1-2 T of flour.

I’ve made whole wheat eclairs, eclair desserts and cream puffs and if you get your measurements right; no one can tell there is wheat in them!

  

            If you have recipes of your own that you would like to convert to whole wheat, use these guidelines: When converting white to wheat...1 cup minus 2 T (tablespoons) is the conversion I generally use, or 3/4 C plus 2 T, unless it is freshly ground and then I can usually substitute straight across. If you are using soft white wheat it can be substituted straight across.

Whole Wheat Chocolate Eclair Dessert

printable recipe

1 C water

1⁄2 C butter

3⁄4 C + 2 T sifted whole wheat flour (sift 2 times)

4 eggs

About an hour before making this dessert, get the cream cheese out and let it sit at room temperature for about an hour to soften. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Bring water and butter to a boil in a sauce pan. Remove from heat and add whole wheat flour and stir until mixture leaves the sides of the pan and forms a ball. Add eggs, one at a time, stirring well after each addition.

Spoon mixture onto a greased cookie sheet and spread very thin and evenly throughout the surface of the cookie sheet. Bake for 20-30 minutes, watching carefully, until crust is golden brown. Cool.

Mix the following:

8 oz. cream cheese (beat this until smooth then add the rest)

2 small (3.4 oz.)pkgs. instant vanilla pudding

3 C cold milk

Beat cream cheese/pudding mixture until the mixture thickens (about 2 minutes) and spread over cooled pastry crust.

Top with: 12 oz. whipped topping chocolate syrup (drizzle over the whole surface...over the whipped topping.) Refrigerate this dessert until ready to eat.

Note: If you want the crust slightly puffier, add 1-2 more T of sifted or freshly-ground whole wheat flour.

Sueann is an average American mom, just trying to make it from day to day with four small children. Due to health concerns, she had to get her children on a high-fiber diet.  She began experimenting with wheat about three years ago and has completely removed white flour from her family’s diet.  Her children are no longer on medicine and my whole family is living a happier, healthier lifestyle.  You can read more about Sueann on her blog:  Suzie’s Sweet Wheat. You can check out her book which contain 250 whole wheat recipes:  Suzie’s Sweet Wheat

Book Review: Suzie’s Sweet Wheat

I have a confession.  There are a lot of whole wheat recipes out there that I don’t like.  I think many of them are tasteless, heavy, or gritty.  I am not very happy when I spend the afternoon baking only to have my family refuse to eat it.  It makes me so mad. 

With that being said I think that wheat is a great food storage item.   It is inexpensive, readily available, easy to store, and has a very long shelf life. 

A little while ago I was at my Mom’s house and my sister in law Ashley brought over a loaf of bread.  She asked if anyone wanted some.  Well we all like to eat something someone else made, so we sliced it up and tried it.  It was really good.  I asked her where it came from and she told me that her friend, Sueann Allen, had given it to her.  Ashley went on to tell me Sueann’s story. 

Her young children had some health problems and the doctor had prescribed a high fiber diet.  Sueann researched her options and decided that a whole wheat diet was best for her family.  So she started cooking with whole wheat.  She converted all of her families favorite recipes to whole wheat. 

After hearing about Sueanne’s story and eating her delicious bread, I bought her cookbook.  Sueanne has compiled all of family’s favorite recipes into a cookbook.   Suzie’s Sweet Wheat. 

I have tried a couple of recipe and really liked all of them.    I made the Ooey Gooey Not-So Wheaty Brownies  from page 130.  And they were as advertised, made from 100% whole wheat but I couldn’t tell.  They were exactly what I wanted in a brownie.  When I asked my husband what he thought he said.  “Those had whole wheat in them?” 

I also made Out of This World Moist and Gooey Cinnamon Rolls.   I could tell that they were made with whole wheat but they were very good.  Good enough that I took some to the neighbors.

Good Things about this cookbook:

• The recipe work and are not fussy.
• The book covers pretty much anything you could ever want to make out of wheat.  There are a lot of recipes for baked goods but it also includes recipes for homemade pasta, pita bread, salads, and smoothies (she adds wheat berry puree). 
• The recipes give clear instructions and rely on standard measurements.
• This book converts a lot of family favorite recipes to  include 100% whole wheat. 

Not so Good Things About this cookbook:

• No photos.  I always want photos with every recipe.  I know I’m a visual learner.  But black and white photos would have been great.
• There is a font problem.  In a past life I was a graphic designer (I was not very good) but I did develop this thing about fonts.   All of the recipe titles in this book are screwed up.  They are readable and fine.  But it bugs me. 
• The bread recipes in this book make large batches.  That is not necessarily a bad thing but as a girl who doesn’t own a Bosch  9-12 cups of flour is way more than my little Kitchen Aid can handle.  It would have been nice to have a small batch recipe.  For those of us living with Kitchen Aids.

Overall recommendation:  I really like this cookbook.  It has encouraged me to bake with more whole wheat then I was.   This is a must have for any one that is storing a lot of wheat.

I recently returned from a trip to China, many of you have asked about it so I thought I would share a little about my experience.   This post is not about food storage so if you are looking for the recipe there isn't one.  

My brother and his cute wife live in China.  My brother is temporarily (if you can call 18 months temporary) working in Xiamen.  Xiamen is located on the eastern coast, due west of Taiwan. 

My mother, sisters and I had the opportunity to visit them and explore a little farther into the country.   It was quite the adventure.  (Thanks for donating your frequent flyer miles Dad! Your the best!)

We were able to visit Hong Kong, Xiamen, and Beijing.   China was much more foreign then I had anticipated.  I have traveled to Europe and thought that the experience would be similar.  It was not.  Everything in China was different (not bad mind you just very different).  The food, the lifestyle, the attitudes, the living conditions, the smell, the shopping. 

The thing that I enjoyed the most was visiting the Great Wall.  When I was there standing on the wall looking at how far it went in every direction I was amazed.  A gigantic wall running for miles and mile on the tops of the mountains, made entirely by hand.   As my husband would say it was “epic” 

Reader Recipe: 6 Grain Pancakes with a little more umph

Reader Recipe: 6 Grain Pancakes with a little more umph

Submitted by: Erin Black  

  

1 c     THRIVE 6 Grain Pancake mix

1.5 T   Powdered (non instant) dry milk

1/2 T   Egg powder

3/4 c   Hot Water  

Mix it all up and let it sit 2-3 minutes. Sometimes I need to add a little more water because it thickens a little as it sits. Cook it on a preheated skillet. I have one with a temp gauge and like it to be about 300 degrees or just under that.

I keep the dry stuff in little baggies and then just add the water when I'm ready to make it.

This recipe is what I make for myself and my 2 year old son. It makes about 5 small to medium size pancakes. I love to add the FD blueberries to it. You don't need to rehydrate before hand, just throw about a 1/2 cup in there with everything else and mix it up!

So good my family loves it! I love it cause it's a fast alternative to cereal.

Strawberry Lemonade

This is my brother Eric.  He is a drink snob.  I’m serious he is very picky about his beverages particularly his lemonade.  A couple of years ago I found out about his desire for truly wonderful lemonade and his aversion to the sub-par varieties.  Since then I have started noticing how wonderful lemonade can be, and also sadly how horrible it can be. 

A few days ago we had our first warm spring day.  The sun was shining, the sky was blue and we were working outside in the yard.  After a couple of hours my kids were dying for a snack and I was dying for a drink.  My little girl asked for pink lemonade.  She was thinking of the country time mix, which I no longer buy.  I thought about it for a minute and this Strawberry Lemonade was born.    

I mix it up in the blender and serve it over ice.  For the strawberries I used the powder from the bottom of a can I had just finished. But if you don't have any you can crush some freeze dried strawberries.

Strawberry Lemonade

¾ c lemon juice (fresh is delicious but bottled is acceptable)

¾ cup Freeze Dried Strawberry Powder (ether from the bottom of the can or FD strawberries that have been crushed)

¾ cup sugar

2 quarts

Ice

Blend well.  Serve immediately.

Where do I put my food storage? I built my own rotating can rack

Recently a reader, Fawn, shared this awesome idea with me.  She installed tilted shelves under the snack bar in her kitchen. 

She has always wanted rotating shelves but didn't have anywhere to put them.  Living in a small space with a very small pantry and no basement, her options were very limited.   So she got creative and with the help of her handy husband converted the shelves under her kitchen snack bar into a rotating shelf. 

She fills the shelves from the back (where the counter over hangs and the stools are -- not really easy access, but not too hard either).  Then she takes out the cans she needs from the front.

Very cleaver!
Thanks for sharing Fawn!


If you are interested in reading more about it visit her blog: Granny In a Nutshell.
Photos in this post are used with permission. 


You can share you great food storage organizing ideas too.  Fill out the form below and I'll be in touch.