Week 14 Dish 2: Vegan cranberry walnut oat cookies

I finished my renal placement, it went so fast (probably because it was only a week long) but was pretty useful! I talked to a lot of patients with kidney transplants, on dialysis, and with lots of other signs. There was a patient with aortic regurgitation with a diastolic murmur and a collapsing pulse, which I have only seen once before. Definitely useful! Now I'm on to my ENT week, let's see how that goes....

To continue the sweet and sour theme (mostly so that I can finish the cranberries in the freezer) I decided to make cookies with cranberries as my second recipe this week. The original recipe said dried cranberries but the frozen ones work just as well, hope you enjoy them :D

Makes ~20 (depending on size)
Ingredients
2 cups oats
2 cups wholemeal flour
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 cup canola oil
1/2 cup agave/ honey
3 tbsp golden syrup (optional, depends how sweet you want the cookies. I used 3 and next would probably use 1-2)
1 cup water
3 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup chopped cranberries (fresh, frozen or dried unsweetened)
1/2 cup walnuts
Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and line two baking trays with grease proof paper.
2. Mix together the oats, flour, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg. Then add the remaining ingredients other than the cranberries and walnuts.
3. Stir until almost combined, then add the cranberries and walnuts and finish mixing.
4. Scoop heaped tablespoons of the batter onto the baking trays. They do spread a bit so leave about 1.5 inch gap between them. I made 21 cookies but they were quite big so you can probably get about 30 if you want smaller ones.
5. Bake for 10 minutes (maybe less if they are smaller), allow to cool for a couple of minutes on the tray before transferring to a cooling rack to cool completely. Sweet and sour goodness!

Original recipe: Vegan cranberry and walnut oatmeal cookies

Week 14 Dish 1: Vegan orange cranberry muffins

HALF WAY!!!!! That's right, as of the end of week 13, I am officially half way through my baking challenge and this is the first recipe of the second half! Frankly, I'm really proud of the fact that I've managed to keep it going for 13 weeks. I feel like I'm in my stride now, I can definitely do this. I've only got two more weeks of firms followed by 4 weeks of Christmas holiday, which will definitely make things easier.

So for the first recipe of the second half, I decided to bake something sweet and sour: vegan orange and cranberry muffins! We have had cranberries in our freezer for ages and my mum asked me to finish them so I thought this was the perfect recipe (though I didn't use them all - means I have to make them again, what a shame :p). Cranberries are always sour, but they just taste so good in these muffins. As usual, very quick and easy to bake so give them a go!

Ingredients
2 cups wholemeal flour
2/3 cups sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup orange juice
1/2 cup canola oil
2 tbsp orange zest
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups cranberries (fresh or frozen), roughly chopped
1 cup pecans/ walnuts, roughly chopped
Method

1. Preheat oven to 190 degrees C. Line a muffin tray with muffin cups.
2. In a large mixing bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and salt.
3. Make a well in the centre and add orange juice, canola oil, orange zest and vanilla extract. Combine until half mixed, then add the cranberries and walnuts and finish mixing.
4. Fill the muffin cup 3/4 full and bake for 23-27 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Once cool enough to handle, transfer to cooling rack to cool completely. NOM NOM NOM!

Original recipe: Orange cranberry muffins