carbango bean cookies

It's been an interesting culinary week at our house. As I mentioned in an earlier post that Emerson has been, ahem, challenging me at the dinner table. I've resorted to making "kid food;" less-than-exotic tasting kid-friendly concoctions that require a bit of doctoring to get Jeff to eat them.

I pulled out my copy of Deceptively Delicious by Jessica Seinfeld. My aunt Linda gave it to me when Em was born, and for a blissful 2 year or so, I thought I'd never need it. But sadly, Emerson has decided that healthy food is the enemy, so I'm resorting to sneaking things in here and there. Not a great way to teaching healthy eating habits, but I digress.

In the last couple of weeks, I made the Aloha Chicken Kabobs (epic fail on my part), Italian Meatloaf (3 out of 4 Girlings devoured it. Guess who was the holdout?), Mini Pizzas (Pete CANNOT get enough of these. I don't love the pita crust, but it's ok if you add a bit of salt. Emerson wouldn't touch them.), Tortilla Cigars (Ditto the meatloaf. I have to say that these are even better the next day!), Mozzarella Sticks (gonna have to give this another go)and Buttered Noodles (these were, thankfully, a hit-as I mentioned in my earlier post). But the real kicker were the cookies we made yesterday- chocolate chip cookies with garbanzo beans. Whole, unhidden garbanzo beans. I was very skeptical, to say the least. Emerson, for her part, didn't seem remotely phased that we were putting beans into a cookie. I could probably put dandelions into cookies and she'd eat them.

But, are you ready? The "carbango" {as Emerson pronounces it" bean cookies are pretty darn good. Definitely a cakey consistency, but the beans totally lose their saltiness and blend right in. And they look like butterscotch chips, so if you're having a hard time, you can just tell yourself that they're chips. And guess who else thinks they're pretty neat?

Score!