Chia Tollhouse Cookies

Remember my chia seeds post? As promised, I experimented with the incredible ch-ch-ch-chia seeds. My research said that I could use chia gel to replace HALF the butter in my baked goods, so I went all out and made a modified batch of Toll House Chocolate Chip cookies.

First step was to make some chia gel...mix 1 tbsp. of chia seeds (they look almost like poppy seeds) with 8 tbsp. of water. Let it sit for just a minute, and you have GEL. I took a photo but it really didn't look like the real-life stuff in my bowl. In real-life, it looked like caviar. Every tiny seed surrounded with a transparent jelly coating. Definitely not something that I felt I wanted to eat. But I pressed on.

Next step, I followed the Toll House recipe, exactly, except for the butter. This is a good cut-down-the-butter recipe, as the original recipe calls for TWO STICKS of butter. Yup. Hello clogged arteries. One stick of butter equals 8 tablespoons, so into my mixing bowl went ONE stick of butter and 8 tbsp. of my slimy chia gel. Once it was all mixed up, my batter looked pretty normal...the seeds were visibly scattered throughout, and it seemed a little moister than usual, but it looked like cookie dough.

They came out of the oven and looked pretty darn good:

I was still a little wary, though. It was hard to imagine how the slippery, slimy chia gel could cook up into a delicious cookie...

My final verdict after the taste test...WOAH! These cookies were so good. They didn't taste like an original Toll House cookie. They just tasted like a really good chocolate chip cookie. They were lacking the usual crispy edges that the butter provides, but they were incredibly moist and chewy. Turns out that slimy texture turns into chewy perfection once it's baked (couldn't even taste any seeds)!

They cut the fat in HALF, and added healthy omega 3's...these seeds will be stocked in my cupboard from now on. Try 'em!! :)