P.B. Cookie "Nice" Cream Sandwiches
100% dairy, egg, and refined sugar free & 100% INDULGENT
This recipe exists because I already had a whole jar of peanut butter from last week's Peanut Noodle with Sesame Tofu recipe sitting on the counter glaring at me, and then it somehow stumbled gracefully into a batter of cookie dough. It's a peanut butter time of the month for me.
Nice cream
The bananas do more than act as a base, they're the perfect natural sweetener and binder for this 2-ingredient raw, chocolate ice cream!
Nice cream. I forget about you more than I should when my sweet tooth awakens, but when I do remember you and plan far enough in advance to have bananas ready and frozen, I am easily the happiest girl in a 10 mile radius.
Nice cream is decadent, cold and creamy, just like soft serve. I always flavor it with chocolate, because, well I'm who I am, but also because I think the bitterness of the raw cacao powder tones down the extra sweet taste of the ripe bananas while also absorbing some of the natural liquid the bananas produce after freezing, ensuring it stay extra thick. My trick is to never add extra liquid to the mix. A lot of recipes call for adding at least a splash of plant-based milk. In my experience, it just makes the blend turn to a puddle of banana soup in a short period of time. My advice, just stick through it even when it all seems way too thick to keep blending. Keep going. Keep scraping down the edges of the food processor or blender, and soon you'll have "nice" cream as luscious as soft serve. promise.
I don't have a precise recipe for this, I just advise you to feel it out, and blend 3-4 frozen bananas in a food processor-- it's easier if you chop the bananas into chunks first--then add in about 1/4 cup of raw cacao powder (I always add more because I love it extra chocolatey) or cocoa powder, and blend until smooth. Serve immediately or put it back in the freezer to harden up.
This is such a brilliant recipe that I've been making for over 2 years now, and it's cool to see how popular it's gotten in the time since I've discovered it. If you haven't jumped on the nice cream train yet, these peanut butter cookie sandwiches are as good a time as ever to go ahead and jump.
Peanut Butter Cookies (for Ice Cream Sandwiches)
I took this recipe from my cookbook and adapted it a bit so that they would spread nicely, and stay soft even after freezing for multiple hours.
Makes a dozen cookies
1/2 cup creamy all natural peanut butter
1/4 cup neutral oil (like sunflower or grapeseed) or melted coconut oil
1 cup coconut sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 ripe very banana, mashed
3/4 cup white whole wheat flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
Chocolate Nice Cream, for serving
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees, and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
In a bowl combine the peanut butter, oil, sugar, and vanilla and mix until combined. Then mix in the mashed banana.
In a separate bowl combine the flour, baking soda, and salt, then mix it in with the wet ingredients until combined. Drop about 1/8 cup of batter onto the cookie sheet leaving enough space in between each, and bake for about 8-10 minutes or until the cookies brown. Remove from the oven and allow them to cool completely before assembling the sandwiches and filling them with nice cream.
SERVE, or place back into the freezer to harden until you're ready to enjoy.
Notes: I added a dairy-free chocolate drizzle (1 cup dairy-free chocolate chips melted with 2 tbsp of coconut oil) on the top of each cookie for aesthetics and some hazelnuts around the edges of the sandwich for a bit of crunch. These things are optional :)
And now I must leave you to finish a midterm paper about speyside single malt scotch (strange but exhilarating life I live)... But I will be back with more snack ideas and creations soon! Xx