Molly Ringwald was on TV the other day talking about her role in the movie “The Breakfast Club” from 1985. What an iconic movie from 30+ years ago. If you are not familiar with it, it’s about five high school students who have to report for an all-day detention on Saturday. The students realize that, despite their differences, they face similar problems. Not unlike some of the issues high school students face today.
So I was thinking, they should have had breakfast cookies to go with their detention because all teenagers in those days liked cookies, right? Okay! Why NOT eat cookies for breakfast? I could come up with at least a dozen reasons TO eat cookies for breakfast but then I could find a good excuse to eat cookies any time of day, so I suppose I’m not the best judge on that subject.
Let’s examine this further… if you think about breakfast bars made from similar ingredients, you could equate these cookies as healthier bars just made round. Or they could be a weak cousin to a granola bar without all the high fat additions. I’m trying desperately to make a supporting argument FOR eating cookies for breakfast and not sure if I’m convincing the majority of you.
What I do know is that these cookies are loaded with nutritious ingredients like flaxseed, banana, oats, egg, honey, and walnuts. They have relatively few calories (77-82 depending on which calorie analyzer I used) and are satisfying. I will say that I liked them better after they were cooled and not hot, straight out of the oven. Just FYI.
Yields 33
Save RecipeIngredients
- 2 ¼ cups old-fashioned oats
- 1 cup whole-wheat pastry flour - I used Bob's Red Mill (optional: oat flour or ivory whole wheat)
- ½ cup ground flaxseed
- 1 ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup mashed ripe banana (about 2)
- ? cup honey
- 4 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled
- 1 large egg
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- ½ cup chopped walnuts (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with Silpat or parchment paper.
- Mix together mashed banana, honey, melted butter, egg, and vanilla.
- In a separate bowl, stir together oats, flour, flaxseed, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda, and salt.
- Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and gently stir until just combined. Add walnuts at this point if using.
- Drop dough by generous tablespoonful onto a baking sheet. Gently flatten each cookie, as they won't flatten out during baking.
- Bake about 12 minutes (gauge by your oven) , or until they start to turn golden. (If baking more than one pan at a time, rotate the pans halfway through the baking time.)
- Let cookies cool on the baking sheet a few minutes before removing them to a wire rack to finish cooling.
- Cookies are dense, soft, and chewy.