Everyone who cooks with avocado understands the plight of trying to guess the perfect ripeness. You can buy them at almost-perfection and hope for the best, or go from green and wait for the day when they feel just right. More often than not, I overshoot and wait too long, leaving me with a bowlful of just-past-prime avocados that need eating ASAP.

Naturally as someone who consumes way too many cookies, whenever something needs to get used up, I get baking right away. This time, I subbed out all butter in a pretty standard chocolate chip cookie recipe with avocado. If you’re going for vegan cookies, you can use your favourite no-dairy brand of semi-sweet chocolate chips.

I tried two versions: one rolled in sugar before baking, and one without. I do not recommend rolling these in sugar, as they get super sticky (and not in that nice gooey cookie kind of way).

As noted below, these are best enjoyed in the first day or two of making them. I didn’t experiment with freezing, but I’m not sure they would fare well due to the avocado’s potential to go brown or go off.

Sidenote: For people who read regularly, I haven’t posted since late March (oops), so you can expect more regular posts to come back.

Ingredients

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• ¼ tsp. salt
• 1 cup avocado, mashed
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2 tbsp. honey
• 2 eggs, at room temperature
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 cup dark chocolate chips

Method

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

In a medium-sized bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, and salt.

In a separate bowl, mash together the avocado, sugar, and honey. Mix in eggs and vanilla until well combined.

Stir the dry mix into the avocado mixture until a sticky dough is formed. Fold in the chocolate chips (don’t be shy). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and create 1-inch balls — this will create about 24 cookies total.

Bake for 8 – 10 minutes until just done – you don’t want them to be too golden. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for 5 minutes on a cooling rack. Enjoy!*

*These are best enjoyed in the first two days of baking, but will stay good for up to 4 days.