Thank You, Alton

I would be so ungrateful (sniffle, sniffle) if I did not publicly thank (hiccup) Alton Brown (sniffle) for his strangely good lentil cookie recipe. Yes, I said LENTIL. Red Lentils to be exact. 

I like to pretend sometimes that I'm a good cook (and Blair encourages the behavior) so sometimes I turn to the Food Network for inspiration. Lately I've been recording lots of old episodes of Good Eats, an Alton Brown staple on the Food Network. I like it because it combines food history, food science, and good recipes. His skits are over the top and are often pretty amusing as well as educational.  

I wasn't sure I would find any inspiration on the Good Eats show all about lentils. Really, there's only so much you can do with them: soup and cold mush that might pass as a salad. But then when he started going on about a baked good made with lentil puree, he had me. I had to try this. Was he just acting when he took a bite of the lentil cookies and looked like he actually enjoyed it? Well, apparently not. I made them and they're good. Really. Not the decadent treat kind of delicious, but definitely good. 

In addition to lentils, they have oatmeal and dried fruit in them so you feel like you're actually eating something a little more healthy than a usual cookie. I wish Food Network provided nutritional information on their recipes so I could confirm this. I bet they would be good with chocolate chips, too. I'll try that when I can eat chocolate again (Ella doesn't do well when I eat chocolate...something in it must irritate her). Anyway, here's a link for the brave who want to try these for themselves. Oh, and FYI, I did use all purpose flour (sorry, Alton!) and I found that baking them for only 12 minutes yielded a more moist cookie. I only baked a few at first then scooped out the rest of the dough into balls to freeze individually before moving to a plastic bag for long term freezer storage. Now I can pull a few out at a time to bake whenever I want a sweet chocolate free treat. Enjoy if you dare!