Maple Strawberry Muffins and Flourless Cashew Butter Cookies

I'm giving a lunchtime presentation at work tomorrow on a topic that most colleagues probably don't really care about, so I thought I'd lure them there with baked goods. I didn't want to make more brownies or cupcakes, so I though muffins would be nice. But I wanted a twist and remembered the random fresh strawberries in my fridge. Maple Strawberry Muffins seemed perfect though not healthy by any means. I then caved and thought about a cookie and knew I wanted a nut butter cookie. Thus, the Cashew Butter Cookie was born.

Maple Strawberry Muffins

The recipe I used is very close to this Vegan Blueberry Muffin recipe I found online.

Ingredients

2 cups flour, I used half wheat and half white
1/3 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup soy milk
1/4 cup margarine
Egg replacer for one egg, I used 1 TB ground flax mixed with 3 TB water
1 tsp acidic fruit juice, I used some pineapple juice but lemon/orange/lime will do
2 TB real maple syrup
1 cup fresh or frozen strawberries

Preheat oven to 400 degrees and lightly grease a muffin pan. In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add the soy milk, margarine, egg replacer, maple and pineapple juice and stir until mixed. Add the strawberries.

Spoon the batter in to the muffin pan, filling each cup about 2/3 full. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until muffins are golden brown.

The muffins are a little messy because I cut up the strawberries, but they were pleasant.

Flourless Cashew Butter Cookies

I found this recipe for Flourless Nut Butter and Whatever You Want Cookies on vegweb and decided it seemed intruiging and ridiculously easy.

Ingredients

1 cup of cashew butter
3/4 white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 TB ground flax seed mixed with 3 TB water
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Dark chocolate morsels to top cookies

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Mix everything until well combined.

Cover dough and refrigerate for about 30 minutes.

Form 1 tablespoon dough balls for each cookie. Arrange on an ungreased baking sheet, spacing 2 inches apart. Press down slightly with a fork to make criss cross typical of peanut butter cookies. Top with chocolate.

Bake cookies until puffed, golden on bottom and still soft to touch in center, about 12 minutes. Cool on sheets 5 minutes. Transfer to racks; cool completely.

The cookie dough was amazing! I had no idea how much they were going to spread out, however, so I evidently smushed them too flat :( That or the recipe should have called for baking powder, not soda. I'm debating throwing them out, but I'm sure someone at work will eat them...