my hunger games

I'm running and running and running these days.
Literally.
Lots of miles.
Dirty, beautiful, hard, hilly miles.
So at almost any time of day, I am hungry.
Always. Hungry.
When I'm running I crave carbs (who are we kidding, I crave carbs all the time), and I'm always looking for hearty snacks to fit my cravings and tame my hunger.

a few phone snaps from my saturday run

Over the weekend I made oatmeal cookies and we I ate them so fast.
Too fast.
I was thinking about how good they were today, and decided to make another kind of oatmeal cookie--one minus the flour and sugar and butter, so it could count more as a SNACK, and not as dessert
(and breakfast dessert, like sometimes happens).

So without all of those things......it's technically NOT a cookie.
at all.
Don't make these when you want cookies.
Make THESE. Our favorite oatmeal cookie....you will eat way too many.

Make these when you need something to tide you over until dinner.
I would even have one of these pre or post run.
They are very lightly sweetened, I really wanted them to be full of only good things.
Play around with the honey amount if you want to make them sweeter.  

Good For You Chocolate Chip Oatmeal "Cookies"

makes 20-24 cookies

Ingredients 

1/2 cup coconut oil

1 cup peanut butter

1/2 cup raw honey (this makes them very lightly sweetened--add more honey if you want more of a sweet cookie)

2 large eggs

2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract 

3 cups rolled oats 

1 cup unsweetened shredded coconut

1/4 cup ground flax

1 teaspoon baking soda 

1 teaspoon baking powder 

1/2 tsp salt

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon 

1/2 cup chopped almonds

1/2 cup dark chocolate chips
edited to add
lately I've been adding:
1/2 cup hemp seeds
1/4 cup chia seeds
extra almonds

preheat oven to 350°

In an electric mixer, combine coconut oil, peanut butter, and honey. Add in eggs and vanilla and beat on high speed for a few minutes. 

In a separate bowl combine, oats, coconut, flax, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Mix. 

Slowly add in dry mixture to peanut butter mixture, mixing slowly. Stir in chocolate chips and almonds. 

Drop by the spoonful onto parchment, and then smash down with a spoon 

(these don't spread while baking)

Bake for 8 minutes.

Now as tempted as you will to eat these straight out of the oven......don't do it! They LOOK like a cookie. They SMELL like a cookie. But they aren't a cookie, and need to cool first, I promise. 

My kids devoured these after school and begged to take them for their snack tomorrow....so I think they passed the test. 

What are you favorite snacks to eat 

when you are always hungry?