Delicious Reading: Birthday Cookies and Build Your Bite

March is a big birthday month around our house. My father-in-law, one of my nephews, my mom, my son, an aunt, uncles, friends � we could have cake just about all 31 days.

Today I am thinking about cookies and my friend Gina, who happens to share a birthday with my mom on the Ides of March, March 15. She and I met when we were in a community theater production in my hometown of Kankakee, Illinois. We went to different high schools and she was two years older than me, but we hit it off and kept in touch, even when she went away to college the next year.

I spent many a late night at the house she shared with her father and brother. Once, around 1 a.m., when most bright ideas like this occur, we decided to make cookies. We wanted them to be fat-free. In addition to substitutions like applesauce for oil, we were also swapping � or leaving out � ingredients we discovered we were out of as we went along. We chiseled a few of our finished products off the cookie sheet before we gave up and threw them out, along with the sheet they were stuck to.

We�re grown up now, each godmothers to the other�s second child, and much better cooks.

Gina recently told me she has mastered the fat-free cookie we so disastrously attempted. It inspired me to look for �healthy� cookie recipes. I found one on a blog called Build Your Bite, at buildyourbite.com. The creator, Joy, began the blog as a way to document her journey through the world of vegetarian eating. She believes being healthy does not mean giving up flavor, and provides many recipes of all types that prove it.

These are not fat-free � they contain peanut butter. They would require modifications for Gina � they require two eggs, and she is now vegan. But they still seem nutritious enough that I can justify having them for breakfast. I�ll make sure to whip up another batch on March 15.

__Flourless Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies__

__Ingredients:__

1 cup creamy peanut butter

1/2 cup pure maple syrup

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1 cup gluten free rolled oats

1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

2 eggs

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/8 teaspoon sea salt

(Note: I used natural peanut butter and regular rolled oats and my cookies came out very soft. They were delicious, but would not be easy to transport.)

__Directions:__

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a bowl, beat peanut butter, maple syrup, eggs and vanilla.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the oats, baking powder and salt.

Add dry mixture to wet and beat until combined.

Beat or stir in the chocolate chips.

Drop by spoonfuls onto a baking sheet.

Bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes, or until the center is cooked through.