Her Modern Kitchen

Eating & Living in Austin, Texas

Desserts

Chocolate Cherry Wine Cookies

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My Mom had this saying, which she always found hilarious, though she never drank.  I’m sure you’ve heard it…

So in honor of the little meme that makes my Mother giggle,  today I cooked with wine – and restrained myself from sipping straight from the bottle. 

The cookies I chose to make combined my favorite red wine pairings – dark chocolate and dried cherries.  These cookies were healhified per my usual means and turned out delicious.  They can not only be considered heart healthy from the antioxidants found in the red wine, cherries and chocolate but they’re also low-cal and low-fat.  Very diet friendly!

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If you’re in the mood for a treat and have some excess red wine to use up, I definitely suggest this recipe.
It’s probably best paired with a freshly opened bottle of red wine!

Chocolate Cherry Wine Cookies

Rich chocolate cookies with a hint of red wine and dried cherries.
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Prep Time 25 minutes
Cook Time 8 minutes
Total Time 33 minutes
Servings: 38 cookies
Calories: 76
Ingredients Method

Ingredients
  

  • 1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 3/4 cup unsweetened baking cocoa
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/4 cup Smart Balance butter
  • 1/4 cup Chobani 0% plain yogurt
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 3/4 cup light brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 1/2 cup dry red wine
  • 1/2 cup chopped dried tart cherries
  • 1/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chip minis

Method
 

  1. Preheat oven to 375°.
  2. In a separate bowl, combine flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt, stirring with a whisk. Place sugar and butter in a large bowl; beat with a mixer at high speed until well blended.
  3. Add vanilla, wine and egg; beat well. With mixer on low speed, gradually add flour mixture. Beat just until combined.
  4. Fold in cherries and chocolate chips.
  5. Drop by tablespoonful 2 inches apart onto nonstick baking sheets.
  6. Bake at 375° for 8 minutes or just until set. Remove from oven; cool on pans 5 minutes. Remove from pans; cool completely on wire racks.

 

 

Fails to Follow Directions

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Confession: I suck at following directions, at least in the kitchen.

It’s not because I don’t read the recipe or  forget a step in the process.  It’s a deliberate, conscious effort to stray. The motivation behind this is mostly due to the fact that I always want to healthify my food. Healthify is probably foreign to most of you so let me explain.

Definition of HEALTHIFY (verb) the act of increasing the nutritional benefits of a specific food or recipe by substituting more nutritious ingredients

Examples of HEALTHIFY
“I just healthified this cake but swapping the oil for non-fat yogurt!”
“These cookies were healthified with flaxseed and whole-wheat flour.”
“We enjoyed healtified egg salad with avocado instead of mayo.”

Merriam-Webster, healthify is officially ready for insertion into the 2014 edition. Please remember to credit me prior to publishing.

Now, the only problem with healthifying a recipe is that you can’t healthify every ingredient. And I admit, at times, I get a bit carried away.
Whole Wheat Flour! Agave! Yogurt! Flaxseed! Almond Milk!

When you find yourself changing more than a third of the ingredients, it’s safe to say that you no longer healthified the recipe. You created an entirely NEW recipe – which is exactly what happened to me this weekend.

I set out to make my Mom’s traditional Chocolate Chip Cookies.  Buttery, chocolatey, chewy goodness. And the kicker here is, that I had absolutely no intention of keeping any of these cookies for myself and began baking knowing I would be giving these away to friends.  But, my inner healthifying baker took over and before I knew it, substitutions were flying high.

  • Half of the butter was replaced with greek yogurt
  • All-purpose flour was mixed with whole wheat
  • 18 ounces of chocolate chips became 4 ounces of semi-sweet mini chips, 1/4 cup of flaxseed, 1/3 cup coconut and a 1/4 cup raisins
  • The sugar was halved and a squirt of agave was added
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The kitchen, mid-healthification while I ran amuck searching for healthy swaps and additions.

Wham-Bam! My Mom’s Chocolate Chip Cookies were no more.

These babies had just completed 12 weeks at The Biggest Loser camp and after 11 minutes in the oven, they were ready for their big reveal. So how did these cookies turn out?  Let’s do a little comparison of the original recipe versus the healthified chocolate chip cookies.

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