Chocolate Chip & Bacon Cookies (A little cheat!)

I just made these cookies, and they are FANTASTIC! I'd say they are the 1st Paleo TREAT I've made that isn't a little off. Seriously, I made the worlds worst banana bread the other day! These are not strictly Paleo, but they are a good treat. They are still grain free with really decent ingredients.

The ones I made were from the cookbook Make It Paleo. There is a variation of the recipe on their website HERE. In the cookbook, they leave out the palm sugar when candying the bacon. My bacon never got super crispy (not sure what I did wrong). They also recommend a brand of chocolate chips on the website, but in the cookbook just recommend 72% dark chocolate chips. The best I could find was Gheradelli 60%. Yah, probably not superb, but better than nothing :-) Plus, sweets are what I miss most with this Paleo thing and I figure if this is the worst I cheat, then I'm still doing good.

I really think the cookies would be just as good without the bacon. The bacon is fine, but I don't taste it that much. Plus, pure maple syrup is really expensive, so if you can save on it I say just make the chocolate chip cookies. They are great!

From PRIMAL PALATE:

FEBRUARY 12, 2011

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Candied Bacon

The other day we received an email asking us to "primal-ize" a recipe forcandied bacon chocolate chip cookies. Excited and ready for this challenge, we got right to work. For this recipe we used our grain free chocolate chip cookie recipe, and added in a delicious recipe for candied bacon. Let's just say Bill made sure this treat didn't last too long in the house.

Candied Bacon Ingredients:

• 5 slices nitrate free bacon
• 1/4 cup pure maple syrup
• Coconut palm sugar

Candied Bacon Process:

1. Preheat oven to bake at 350.
2. In a medium size mixing bowl, toss bacon in maple syrup.
3. Lay bacon on a parchment lined baking sheet.
4. Sprinkle bacon with coconut palm sugar.
5. Bake for 20 minutes.
6. Remove bacon from oven and place strips on a cooling rack.
7. Crumble candied bacon for cookie batter.

Cookie Ingredients:

• 3 cups Blanched Almond Flour
• 1/2 cup Palm Shortening (or unrefined Coconut Oil)
• 1/2 cup Pure Maple Syrup
• 2 Omega 3 Eggs
• 1 tsp Baking Soda
• 1 tsp Salt
• 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
• 1 1/2 cups Enjoy Life Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips

Cookie Process:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. In a medium sized mixing bowl combine dry ingredients.
3. In a small mixing bowl beat eggs, maple syrup, and vanilla extract with a hand mixer.
4. Pour wet ingredients into dry and beat with hand mixer until combined.
5. Add palm shortening into batter, and continue to blend until combined.
6. Stir in chocolate chips and candied bacon.
7. Drop balls of dough on parchment lined baking sheet, about a tablespoon in size.
   
8. Bake cookies for 15 minutes at 350.
9. Let cool and serve.