Wheat-free Sugar-free Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

I make these cookies a lot. Mostly for my wheat-free friends (maybe you've had one?). I'm not much of an Oatmeal Raisin cookie girl, but I actually like them.

I took the recipe from the Stevia website, and made it wheat-free, and changed up a few other ingredients. I made them over and over and over again, tweaking it a little each time, until I think I got it right. Sometimes I got suggestions from wise friends that I incorporated as well. I guess you can say I got obsessed with this recipe. Pretty funny, considering I'd really rather have a chocolate chip cookie.

Oh, and I didn't actually use regular Stevia - I've heard from too many people that it has an aftertaste. Never having baked with any Stevia product before, I tried a product called NuStevia which is not supposed to have the aftertaste. I certainly didn't detect any. I got it here: NuStevia Powder at iHerb.



If you are wheat-free/gluten-free, I'm thinking you will really like this cookie. It's a soft texture (not uncommon for wheat-free cookies), but not quite cake-like. They freeze very well, too.

Wheat-free Sugar-free Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

Makes about 2 dozen 2" cookies

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup raisins (packed)
• 5 oz apple juice
• 1/3 cup raw cashews or walnuts, coarsely chopped
• 1/4 cup Sorghum (or Soy flour)
• 1/2 cup butter or butter substitute, softened
• 1 tsp NuStevia
• 1-2 Tbs pure maple syrup
• 1/2 tsp. almond extract
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk, lightly beaten
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 1/2 cup rolled oats
• 3/4 cup Sorghum flour
• 1/4 cup Oat flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 3/4 tsp cornstarch or arrowroot
• 1 - 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp Xanthan Gum
• Optional: salted sunflower seeds and pumpkins seeds, golden raisins, chocolate chips.

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (175 degrees C). Parchment paper on your cookie sheet is recommended, or you can grease your cookie sheet.

1. Place the raisins and apple juice in a small pot and simmer over low heat for 15 minutes.
2. In a mixing bow, cream the butter, nuts, and 1/4 cup Sorghum flour.
3. Add the NuStevia powder, Maple Syrup, Vanilla, a sightly beaten eggs
4. Cream about 1/3 of the stewed raisins and all of the juice into a blender or processor.
5. Stir the creamed raisins into the butter mixture. Then add the milk and oats.
6. In a separate bowl, mix together the flours, baking soda, cinnamon, cornstarch, Xanthan Gum, and salt and blend together well (a whisk is a good tool for this).
7. Stire the flour mix into the butter mixture, and add the rest of the raisins.
8. Mix until just blended (don't overmix).
9. To get a consistent size, use a cookie scoop (I used a medium size) and place each on the baking sheet.
10. Press each down slightly with the palm of your hand to flatten them out a bit.
11. If you're including the seeds and golden raisins, press them into each cookie
12. Bake for 11-12 minutes, being careful not to overbake.

Let them cool slightly before eating (if you can :-)

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