Recipe: After-Party Vegan Cookies

I’m going to warn you ahead of time – these cookies have an obscene amount of butter. Try not to think about it too much. Just eat them well before you decide on your New Year’s Resolutions.

I guess you could call these “after-party,” “leftover,” or “garbage cookies”: These bad boys are great for those days when you’re feeling a little bit creative. Or, maybe you have leftover chips or snacks from a party. I used Peanut Butter Puffins and potato chips in these, but you could use pretzels or any kind of crunchy goodness you want.

I think it’s also worth saying that Peanut Butter Puffins are pretty much like my drug. They are also one of my dog’s favorite things to steal from my fingers. So yeah, they’re pretty much the greatest.

Makes 4 dozen

Ingredients

• 1 ½ cups flour
• ½ tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 14 Tbsp. Earth Balance buttery sticks (1 ¾ sticks), softened
• ½ cup brown sugar
• 1 cup sugar
• ¼ cup applesauce
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup vegan chocolate chips
• 1 cup walnut pieces (or other nuts of choice)
• 1 cup crushed  Peanut Butter Puffins
• ½  cup crushed potato chips

Directions

Line a few cookie sheets with parchment paper. I ended up using 4, putting 12 cookies on each tray. First combine your dry ingredients in a medium bowl – stir together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, and set aside.

In a second, large bowl, combine the Earth Balance, brown sugar, and sugar, and blend with a hand mixer. Once combined, add in the applesauce and vanilla and blend again.

Pour the dry ingredients over the wet ingredients and combine using a wooden spoon. You may need to use your hands a bit in order to incorporate some stubborn bits. Fold in all your fun stuff – in my case, that was puffins, chips, chocolate chips, and walnuts – and make sure all is well incorporated and adequately jumbled up.

Spoon about 1 tablespoon of batter for each cookie and form into balls. Place cookies a couple inches apart on the tray. For me, 12 on each tray was the perfect amount of room. These balls don’t spread as much if you chill them a bit beforehand. I actually just stuck them in our entryway because it was really cold outside for about 40 minutes before putting them in the oven, but you could chill in the fridge or freeze them for 15-20 minutes.

While you’re waiting for the cookies to chill, preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes. Wait until they’re cooled to try to remove from the parchment paper. They’re going to be very soft at first.

Next, forget about how many calories must be in these balls of butter and just enjoy ’em, already!