Flour Sack Mama's Soft Squash Cookies

One way of ensuring nothing from the garden goes to waste has been blanching, pureeing and freezing small batches of our organic summer squash from earlier in the year.  It's been fun baking that into a new cookie recipe that's comfort food for brisk fall days and cold winter nights.  These cookies are soft, more like a muffin top.  I'll be baking them in a demonstration at East Tennessee's Biggest Bake Sale coming up soon!

Flour Sack Mama’s Soft Squash Cookies

Ingredients:

A

1 ½ cups organic whole wheat pastry flour or white-wheat flour

¾ cup old fashioned rolled oats

1 TBS milled flax seed

¼ tsp salt

½ tsp baking soda

½ tsp baking powder

½ tsp cinnamon

½ tsp allspice

B

¾ cup organic, course, turbinado or demerara sugar

6 TBS organic butter

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

½ tsp almond extract (optional)

C

1 ⅓ cups cooked, pureed non-GMO zucchini or yellow squash

D

¾ cup dark or 60% cacao chocolate chips

½ cup shelled walnuts (optional)

⅓ cup dried cranberries

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Combine A ingredients by hand with large mixing spoon. Combine B ingredients with large mixing spoon, then add to A ingredients.  Stir until just mixed. Fold in C ingredient (squash) to A and B mixture. In food processor, pulse D ingredients until coarsely chopped.  Fold into batter. Line metal cookie sheets with baking parchment. (If you don’t use parchment you must lightly spray pan with oil.) Scoop by Tablespoon-sized dollops onto parchment.  Bake approx. 12 minutes, or until lightly browned.  Cool for 5 minutes before removing from pan and place on wire rack to complete cooling.  Cookies will be soft and not crispy.

Makes 3 dozen (36) cookies.  One cookie has approx. 90 calories, 4.5 grams fat, 11 carbohydrates.

*I prefer to use organic and non-GMO ingredients whenever possible.  If those are not available, substitutions can be made according to your preferences.