Ah, cookies.  The great divider.  At an event last spring a fellow attendee and I were discussing cookbooks.  I was of the mind that dessert is an occasional indulgence, giving it free reign for decadence.  She chided that vegan desserts should use all whole ingredients—no white flours, no refined sugars.  They should be health food, so that vegans can be a face of superior health, she claimed.

While I think there’s room for the opinion that desserts should emulate health food (i.e. there’s not much better than a raw cashew shake from Sunpower Natural Café in Studio City), I also think that sometimes a dessert can just be a dessert.  It’s not supposed to be our everyday diet; it’s a once-in-a while treat.  When the bulk of our diets are nutrient-dense whole foods and bunches of leafy greens, I’d say there’s no problem in having a chocolaty cookie littered with gooey chocolate chips every now and again.

While these Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies from The Vegan Table do use whole wheat pastry flour, they are a far cry from any nutrition bar you’d find in a hiker’s backpack.  For the sake of science, of course, I taste-tested these cookies all along the way– their sweet endings to their cookie dough beginnings.  (That’s another great benefit of using ground flaxseed and water instead of chicken’s eggs—no worries of Salmonella.)  These rich and mouthwatering cookies would be a fabulous addition to a holiday cookie party tray or sandwiched around vanilla Coconut Bliss for a dinner party dessert.