eggless banana chocolate chip cookies

One of the things I hate the most is when you're a good distance of the way through a recipe--like, you've sifted your dry ingredients together and preheated your oven and all that--and you realize you're missing something important. I mean, you can leave out cinnamon, but eggs? Kind of essential.

Of course, there's no one to blame but you. So you resign yourself to going online and you pore over recipes but you're always skeptical of the vegan ones and honestly, how can you make baked items taste right without eggs?!

Okay, so maybe I'm the picky one. But this time we had bananas on hand that were a little past their prime, I didn't really want banana bread (I'd been nursing a chocolate chip cookie craving for a few days), and chocolate and banana are resplendent together, as anyone who has had a banana-and-Nutella anything knows.

I'd always read that bananas were a decent egg replacement. So, even though I had eggs in my fridge, I decided to try my hand at this whole substitution thing anyway...just for funsies.

And you know what? While it's not entirely vegan (I mean, this is me we're talking about--you expect me to skip out on butter?) this non-traditional substitute really holds its own against the original.

Scratch that...it's awesome. The smell alone is worth making it. It only dirties one mixing bowl (no stand-mixer needed) and a few measuring cups and spoons. With the addition of a tablespoon of oil to make up for the fat that the original recipe's extra yolk provides, the cookie doesn't lose any of its body and still yields a lovely, gloriously chewy bite. Plus, it perfumes your whole house with a heavenly banana-chocolate scent.

So in the end, I'm a convert. I might actually prefer this one (after all, when one is tired of plain old chocolate chip, something that's new but still satisfies that craving is always a good thing!) I'm currently plotting a fully-vegan version, so stay tuned.

~*~

Adapted from smitten kitchen

Makes around 36 1.5" cookies

3/4 cup (1.5 sticks) unsalted butter, melted

1 cup white sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 tbsp vanilla extract

1 whole banana, mashed

1 tbsp oil

1 heaping tbsp espresso powder/instant coffee (if you don't have any, cocoa powder works fine too)

1 tsp cinnamon

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

2 cups chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Melted butter and the jar of vanilla I made this one time that I will be probably be using for the rest of my life.

Melt your butter in the microwave (about a minute should do it if you melt it all at once), or on the stove if you don't have one. Cream together your melted butter and sugar, til they look something like this.

I would stop here and just eat this, but since consuming melted butter and sugar isn't really socially acceptable, we'll keep going.

Add in your coffee, banana, cinnamon, oil, and vanilla. You can pre-macerate your banana, but mine was really soft so I just tossed it in and mashed it with my spatula.

Make sure your wet ingredients are well stirred and smooth, then add in your dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, salt). Stir vigorously until everything is well combined.

Now it looks all pretty.

Now add in two cups of your favorite chocolate chips. I like semi-sweet, but you could get creative and do peanut butter chips or even butterscotch.

The batter is so good that you'll be hard pressed to continue with this whole baking nonsense (and it's egg-less, so no worries re: potential sickness!) But again, for posterity, we'll pretend that it's not totally normal to eat a whole bowl of batter yourself and we'll persevere.

I like to use a little melon-ball-sized scoop--you could eyeball the amount if you don't have one, or make giant ones if you feel like. The cookies should be an inch or more apart. Just remember that if you change the size, you'll need to sit by the oven and watch, because your baking time will be different.

Bake for 11-13 minutes or until light brown around the edges. Let cool for a moment (they need to firm up a little, as they'll still be a little soft--if you try to move them now all you'll get is a crumbly mess!) Then move to a cooling sheet and let stand for another 5 minutes.

Each batch had 12 cookies--only this many from the first batch made it to this picture. You do the math.

If you, like most normal people, can't consume (or convince others to help you consume) 36 cookies at once, you can shape out the balls, freeze them on a sheet, toss them in a bag once they're frozen and then cook them whenever you want--just add a little more time to your overall bake time.

But I have a feeling that your classmates, neighbors, etc. wouldn't necessarily hate you if you made them all.

Just sayin'.