Hemp and Oatmeal Cookies

I have never been one to encourage my sons to bulk up, but when my oldest hit a major growth spurt, we started buying protein powder to supplement his smoothies. Now I’m trying to incorporate it in other ways to help fill these boys up, hence the cookies here. We use hemp powder for a few reasons: it contains only one ingredient; it has lots of naturally occurring minerals, like zinc and magnesium; it’s made in Canada; and it can be substituted 1:1 with flour.

Makes about 21 cookies. The batter takes about 10-15 minutes to prepare, depending on the softness of the butter. (Creaming the butter and sugar can be arduous so be sure the butter is soft, but not melted.) After that, its about 20-30 minutes to bake all the cookies. 

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Hemp and Oatmeal Cookies

With two teenage sons in my home, I am always looking for ways to bump up the protein and fibre in their snacks. Today I tackled cookies. I started with a basic oatmeal chocolate chip cookie recipe from Canadian Living, then added some hemp protein powder and almonds. (You can add all kinds of goodies, depending on your preferences. I have some ideas in the notes below along with some approximate nutritional information.)

Prep Time15 minutes mins

Cook Time20 minutes mins

Cooling Time15 minutes mins

Total Time50 minutes mins

Course: Snacks

Keyword: Baking, Cookies, Dessert, Oats

Servings: 21 cookies

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cups  large-flake rolled oats  See Notes, below.
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup unsweetened hemp protein powder  See Notes, below.
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 2/3 cup butter, softened
• 1 large egg
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups goodies, like a combination of chopped almonds and dark or semi-sweet chocolate chips See Notes, below.

Instructions

• Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Preheat the oven to 375F (190C).
• In a medium bowl, whisk together oats, flour, protein powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. 
• In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until fluffy. Beat in egg and vanilla extract.
• Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix until combined. 
• Add chocolate chips, nuts, or whatever your choice of “goodies” might be. 
• Drop by heaping tablespoon (15 mL) onto the prepared baking sheet, about 2 inches (5 cm) apart. 
• Bake for about 10-11 minutes, turning pan around after 5 minutes to ensure even baking. (Baking time is approximate. Take them out of the oven when they are brown on the bottom and around the edges.)
• Remove pan from oven and place on a wire cooling rack. Let cookies sit on the pan for 5 minutes or so, then place them on a wire rack to cool. 
• Keep them in an airtight container for 5-7 days or freeze them.

Notes

• The original recipe calls for 1 ½ cups of oats but I find the cookies spread a lot. Adding more oats absorbs some of the butter and makes for a more solid cookie. 
• We use Hemp Yeah Balanced Protein + Fibre by Manitoba Harvest. Protein powders are not all alike, so I cannot say whether this recipe would work as well with whey protein, which has different fat and fibre content, or with any other type of protein powder. Hemp powder tends to have a dark green tinge, so your batter might end up looking a bit like wet sand. That’s not necessarily a desirable quality in a cookie batter, but my kids assured me these cookies taste really good.(I can’t eat chocolate so I couldn’t taste test them.)
• For my first version of this cookie, I added  ⅓ cup (80 mL) of chopped, raw almonds to a measuring cup, then filled up to the 1 ½ cup (355 mL)  line with chocolate chips. You can also use: dried cranberries or other dried fruit; walnuts or pecans; pumpkin seeds; chia seeds; sunflower seeds; unsweetened coconut; or whatever suits your fancy. If you are using nuts or seeds, I would keep it to no more than ½ cup (120 mL) of the total because they add a lot of oil that can knock the flavours off balance and even upset sensitive stomachs. It’s your call though. If you go all nuts and seeds, let me know in the comments how they turned out.
• Based on the nutrition labels, the protein powder and almonds added 41 g of protein and 22 g of fibre to this batch. Per cookie, that’s about 2 g of protein and 1 g of fibre. Adding those numbers to those from the original recipe, the end result is about 3 g of protein and 2 g of fibre per cookie. Serve a couple of cookies with some fruit for a nutritious snack.

Sketch of cookies by Uliana Nemylovych – Dreamstime.com. Photos by Crystal Smith.