Almond Cookies

Last night I was in the mood to bake something healthy. I finally decided to just wing it with my can of almond paste — I couldn’t figure out what to do with the egg yolk I wouldn’t use to make amaretti, so I had nixed those plans. I had decided that if the recipe worked out, I’d write it down. If it didn’t work out, I would pretend the whole experiment never even happened. Lo and behold, they were great — even my anti-whole-wheat husband liked them, which is saying a lot. Here’s what I concocted:

1 can of almond paste (in retrospect, the food processor should have been my friend, but the kids were asleep and that thing sounds like a tornado ripping Dorothy away to Munchkin Land –put it through your food processor first)
1 large egg
1/2 cup oil (or you could use butter or applesauce)
1 cup of milk (I used 1/3 cup powdered milk with a cup of water because we were low on milk, and it was after 9pm)
1/3 brown sugar (you can experiment and decrease the sugar content — I probably will in the future)
1 1/2 tsps almond extract (I love almonds, people!)
1 tbsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup quick cooking oatmeal
2 cups whole wheat flour
6oz bag of slivered almonds
Hershey’s kisses (optional way to make them into a chocolaty delight)

Preheat your oven to 350°F. Mix the wet ingredients. Add the dry ingredients. Dump the almonds into the batter/ dough. Drop balls of dough onto a greased cookie sheet (or use parchment paper if you’ve got some on hand). (Optional Hershey’s kiss love: stick a Hershey’s kiss upside down into the dough ball and reform the dough into a ball.) Bake for 8 minutes, or until golden and delicious. Cool on a wire rack, and don’t eat them all at once.

So, I’m not the best recipe writer. I’ll clean this up at a later date when I add it to my recipe section. They tasted good with or without the chocolate addition, though.