Healthy cranberry oatmeal cookies with cacao
These easy to make healthy oatmeal cookies are packed with superfoods such as cacao, cranberries and sunflower seeds. They are lightly sweet and make a great snack.
Servings 15 people
Calories 182kcal
Ingredients
- ½ cup sunflower oil
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- 1 egg
- ½ teaspoon vanilla
- ½ cup whole wheat flour
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon pumpkin spice seasoning
- 2 cups rolled oats
- ½ cup dried cranberries
- ¼ cup sunflower seeds
- 2 tablespoons cacao nibs
- Turbinado sugar or sugar crystals optional
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- Beat together oil, sugar, egg and vanilla with whisk or mixer until well mixed.
- Add flour, baking soda, salt and spices. Mix again until well combined.
- Stir in oats, cranberries, sunflower seeds and cacao nibs
- Scoop out dough using a one tablespoon measure and place on a baking sheet with some space between as cookies will spread out. Press down to slightly flatten each cookie. Sprinkle tops with sugar crystals if desired.
- Place tray into a hot oven and bake for 8-10 minutes or until the cookies are lightly golden brown. Cool on the pan for five minutes upon removing cookies from the oven. Then transfer cookies to a cooling rack and allow to cool before storing. Repeat until all cookies are baked.
Notes
Serving size: two cookies
Tips for BEST results
Use a hand mixer instead of mixing by hand. This definitely makes mixing easier but I also found the cookies to have a more cohesive texture when I used the hand mixer for the first two mixing portions of the recipe. When I hand stirred, the cookies ended up more crumbly.
Remember that every oven is different. So your cookies may take a bit longer or shorter to cook. I suggest starting with the 8 minute mark and then checking frequently after that point until they are done and you avoid having burned bottoms.
Allow the cookies to cool on the pan for a few minutes before transferring them to a cooling rack. They are still super soft when they come out of the oven and the ingredients start to stick together more as they cool. If you don’t wait, you may end up with broken cookies.
Fully cool the cookies before storing them in an airtight container. If they are warm, moisture will form on the inside of the container and you will end up with wet cookies.
Nutrition
Calories: 182kcal | Carbohydrates: 21g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 10g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 11mg | Sodium: 64mg | Potassium: 82mg | Fiber: 2g | Sugar: 10g | Vitamin A: 16IU | Calcium: 16mg | Iron: 1mg