Oatmeal Cookies

Today I made some super delicious vegan, refined sugar-free oatmeal cookies.  So good!  I was inspired to bake some of these cookies after seeing the canister of oats in the pantry, untouched for months, due to our aversion to eating oatmeal during the summer.  I found the recipe over here and made only a few slight variations.  The ingredients are oats, gluten-free flour, flax seeds, safflower oil, maple syrup, baking soda, vanilla, salt, cinnamon and a banana.

The ingredients are so simple!  I had to substitute a few items, as I was running low on maple syrup (I added agave nectar) and a little short on oil.  This recipe is very versatile, but I do look forward to making a few changes next time I make them.  Next time, I will add 1/2 cup extra oats, add more salt, and make them thinner (adding to the chewiness).  You could easily make this recipe gluten-free by using g.f. oats.

I added 1/4 cup grain-sweetened chocolate chips to half of the batch (which we loved!), and Nate has already asked for raisins in the next batch.

If only

all days could be as productive as today!

Greens are in season!  Our refrigerator is packed with tons of beautiful green foods - kale, peppers, garlic scapes, tatsoi, spring onions, celery, broccoli, herbs, cucumbers, turnip greens and loads of lettuce.  We had some leftover bread, so I decided to make some croutons to go with all the salad greens.  I used a mixture of garlic, herbs, and olive oil that we used to make garlic bread a few days ago.  Just toss, add some salt and a little more olive oil and bake at 350 for 15 minutes. So easy!

I also finished sewing a runner for the dinner table.  The table was my grandparents, and water stains happen very easily - I'm glad I finally protected it.  The runner matches some napkins I made a few weeks ago to celebrate the solstice.  

This always seems to happen to me when I am seconds from being done.  I definitely need to learn some basic sewing machine maintenance if I want to be serious about sewing.

I was also able to bake up some no knead bread in my brand-new cast iron pot!  My dough never rises quite as much as I think it should, but thankfully, it's always delicious.