Banana Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies

Woohoo! How long has it been since my last post...? eek. I've been on a vacation, going around Hong Kong and Korea and now I'm back. I've been eating like I'm about to hibernate, bought all kind of Asian goodies and weird phone accessories and finally tried out wakeboarding (whether you believe me or not, I am a total pro). I thought I would gain 10 pounds but looks like all the water activities I did made me lose weight instead. Bring on the bikini weather! Although, it's more like just laying still nakkedd...it's a desert in LA.

You should see my phone accessories. They're super popular in Korea and so funny! You can stick like an object into the earphone plughole. I can't really explain, but now my iphone looks like an apple. If you find me on Facebook you can see it! I've got all kinds of other attachments too. Heehee. Although, I don't know if I want to keep using my phone so much because of this article.

Frequent Cell Phone Users Slobber More
How funny and gross is that? The investigation found out that heavy users of mobile phones had increased salivary flow rate, blood flow rate and volume of parotid glands. Those are our salivary glands. You know how your ears get hot after being on the phone too long? Well, that heat and radio frequency radiation emitting from your phone is absorbed by the tissues where you use your phone (hopefully that's your ear). All that heat can cause the adjacent tissue to expand and increase in volume and the radiation absorbed by the water in the tissues can further raise skin temperature and modify blood flow too.

Hopefully, we'll be talking less on our phones and more face-to-face time. Or we'll find ourselves slobbering and spitting all over each other. EW.

I made these cookies before I left DC, so I could use everything up in the fridge! Super fast and easy to make. You can always freeze the ones you don't eat and then toast them up or microwave them for a healthy snack. I always have a few of these in the mornings. If you're not a fan of chocolate, add in nuts, shaved coconut blabla etc... you get the idea :)

Banana Choc Chip Oatmeal Cookies
Makes 2 dozen

Guilt-free goodies

Ingredients
1 cup Oatmeal
1/2 cup Flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

1 Ripe banana
1/4 cup honey and 1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
2 tbsp butter (room temp)
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup Dark or semisweet Chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350F.
First, cream the butter and sugar until nice and fluffy. Whisk in the egg, honey, mashed banana and vanilla extract.

In a large bowl, mix all the dry ingredients together (oatmeal, flour, cinnamon, powder, baking soda, salt)

Add the wet mix to the dry (or vice versa) and mix until incorporated.

Lastly, fold in the chocolate chips (or/ and nuts) and then pop it into the oven for 10-12 mins.

Straight out of the oven!

Chocolate Banana Maple Cake

I like to eat my own baked goods because I know how much butter has gone into it and I can adjust the sweetness of it. When I eat a cookie that's soft and chewy, I can bet at least 2 sticks of butter and a cup of sugar went into making them. When I eat a piece of decadent cheesecake, I know that's a pound of butter, cheese, sugar, and if it's frosted, that's another pound of butter, powdered sugar and food coloring. Yeah, I'm guilty of eating all those goodies...I like to indulge myself once in a while. What can I do?

So sometimes I come up with ways to justify eating a ton of sweets! Which leads me to my factoid of the day for you in this journal article. It will make you want to eat that evil chocolate cake sitting in your fridge.

Factoid: Too little sleep activates Fat Genes
It's a well known fact that your BMI is highly heritable and we have a lot of genes that are involved with satiety, fatty acid storage, energy use and metabolism. If you're sleep deprived, it'll activate the expression of those genes that promote obesity.

So which devil would you choose? Study more, maybe get an A and get fat fat fat or go to sleep, get a B anyway and be slim.

Eh, I prefer sleeping... besides this cake is healthier than your average fair. But you'd never know because it is SOO delicious.

Chocolate Banana Mabel Maple Cake

Oozing with chocolate

Ingredients
1 tbsp butter
100g (3.5oz) melted Dark Chocolate (60% Mexican chocolate, otherwise add 1 tsp cinnamon)
1/4 cup Olive oil
1 Ripe banana mashed
1/4 cup plain yogurt
2 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1/2 cup maple syrup + 4 tbsp raw brown sugar

1.5 cups flour
1.5 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/4 cup slivered Almonds (Optional)

Preheat your oven to 350F.
Then, melt your chocolate and 1tbsp butter in the microwave at 20 secs at a time. Remember to stir each time so that it doesn't burn. Once that's all fully melted, leave it on the side for a bit.

Whisk all the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, salt) together in a separate large bowl.





Do melt your chocolate in a large-ish bowl and put in the oil, smashed banana, vanilla, yogurt, egg, syrup and sugar.  (cinnamon if not using mexican chocolate)


Then add your wet ingredients with the dry and stir until JUST mixed. If you've never baked, you don't know the power that is to NOT mixing your batter like crazy. Mix it too much and your baked product becomes a dense dry brick!

Gently fold in your almonds and chocolate chips if you want. Reserve some almonds to sprinkle on the top.

Put it in a 9x11 baking pan, sprinkle almonds and bake it for 25-30 mins. A toothpick poked into the center should come out clean when it's done.

Let it rest for at least 5 mins before you try to cut it and devour it. Because it is a really moist cake so you need to let it cool down to hold its shape.

After that, you can go all cookie monster over it!

Straight out of the oven!