Week 5 Dish 2: Vegan cinnamon oatmeal raisin cookies

It's official, my Final Year Dinner (FYD) outfit is now complete! FYD this year is at the beginning of November and I really hate leaving things to the last minute so I bought an amazing dress last week and managed to find the perfect shoes over the weekend. Now I have the accessories too so I'm all set! The only thing I have to do now is make sure I don't put on any weight till then - a difficult task considering what I've just baked today!

So far most of my main dishes (the ones I count as my two per week) have been relatively healthy, but this one definitely isn't (though I did reduce the sugar, but they are still sweeet). I couldn't help myself, they just sounded so scrumptious and the reviews made it even harder to resist - so I did the only thing I could and baked them :D I can still smell the cinnamon-y goodness in the air...

Makes 24
Ingredients
1 cup vegan margarine
2/3 cup sugar (reduce to 1/2 if you want them less sweet)
2/3 cup brown sugar (again reduce to 1/2 if you want them less sweet)
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp soya milk
6 tbsp applesauce
2 cups plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp salt
4 tsp cinnamon (2 if you're not a huge cinnamon fan)
2 cups oats
1 cup raisins
Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and line three trays with grease proof paper.
2. Beat together the sugar and margarine until creamy.
3. Add in the vanilla, soya milk, and apple sauce, and beat more until well combined.
4. In a separate bowl mix the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, salt, and cinnamon until evenly blended.
5. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix together well. Finally mix in the oats and raisins.
6. Drop heaped tablespoons of batter onto the trays 1 inch apart. Bake for 12-15 minutes (longer if they are slightly bigger - I had 21 in total so they were bigger and needed about 18 minutes). Cool for 5 minutes on the trays and then place on a wire rack to cool completely.

Original recipe: Vegan cinnamon oatmeal raisin cookies

Like I said, these are pretty sweet so use less sugar if you want. I'm sure the flour can be substituted with wholemeal too to make it slightly healthier. If anyone does try that, let me know how they turn out! I'm going to take these to the hospital tomorrow to share with my team, hope they like them.....:)

Vegan peanut butter fudge (Easy peasy)

Ever since I went to New York last year I have become addicted to peanut butter flavoured things thanks to Reese's peanut butter cups (also sold in St Mary's hospital shop, yum). So when I saw this recipe I just had to give it a go. This is another quick, busy-schedule recipe. Like the vegan chocolate, it takes no time at all so anyone can do it. I took some fudge in with me to my placement and shared it with my team - they all loved it which made me very happy! Extremely yummy but also equally calorific so you have been warned ;)

Ingredients
3/4 cup vegan margarine
1 cup peanut butter
2 cups icing sugar
Method

1. Melt the margarine in a saucepan over low heat. Remove from heat and stir in peanut butter until smooth.
2. Stir in the icing sugar a little at a time until well blended (it will look a bit lumpy at first but keep adding more sugar and it will be fine).
3. Scoop into a 9x9 inch baking dish and pat down. Chill until firm and then cut into squares for eating. Store in the fridge of course otherwise it will go all mushy!

I reduced the sugar down to 2 cups from 3 2/3 cups in the original recipe and I think it's just the right amount of sweet, hope you think so too :)

Week 5 Dish 1: Vegan apple cookies

It's now been officially over a month since I began my blog, and I'm very happy with how it's going so far. I think I can definitely keep it going for another 5, can't I? Here's hoping! It's been a pretty exciting week actually, I've just had vaccines for my elective which really isn't that far away - April next year. But it really brought home the fact that it means finals aren't far away either (eeek!) so I've started reading a bit more.

My mum has gotten another bag of apples this week soooo it's time for another apple recipe. I made this recipe on Sunday but haven't had a chance to put it up until now - I decided to do cookies since I haven't done any yet. These cookies are really moist and filling and just so very scrumptious, if I do say so myself. Give them a go!

Ingredients
2 cups oats
1 1/2 cups wholemeal flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp brown sugar
1 cup soya milk
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/4 cup melted coconut oil (cheapest to buy from VB)
1 1/2 cups grated apple
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional, or other nut of your choice/ optional)
1/3 cup raisins (or other dried fruits/ optional)
Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and line 2 baking trays with grease proof paper.
2. In a large mixing bowl stir together the oats, flour, baking powder, cinnamon, salt and brown sugar.
3. In smaller bowl whisk together the milk, applesauce and coconut oil. Pour this mixture over the dry ingredients and stir in the apples, walnuts and raisins until just combined.
4. Spoon out serving spoonfuls of dough and drop onto the tray, 2 inches apart. Flatten them slightly for easier baking. Bake for 15-17 minutes and cool on the tray for 2 minutes before transferring them onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Original recipe: Vegan apple breakfast cookies
As these cookies are really moist, best to store in the fridge if they aren't eaten within a couple of days.