Gluten and Dairy-Free Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Clusters
These bite-sized oatmeal chocolate chip clusters are absolutely divine. I call them “clusters” because they are bite-sized and look more like a cluster with all the chocolate chips in them rather than a nice round cookie.. They taste AMAZING when they are still warm so the chocolate is gooey. Make sure you indulge in one after they come out of the oven once they have cooled a bit.
A Note On The Absence of Key Allergens / Sensitive Foods
If you have food sensitivities or allergies to dairy, gluten, and/or eggs, these clusters are gluten-free, can be dairy-free (if you find dairy-free chocolate chips), and egg-free. Sorry, I can’t say they are nut-free as I used almond flour to make these. Unsure if you have food sensitivities? Book a naturopathic assessment and we can figure it out!
What makes them gluten-free? The recipe uses superfine blanched almond flour and gluten-free rolled oats. Oats don’t inherently have gluten in them but often are processed in or on the same equipment that processes gluten-containing flour so there’s a possibility of cross-contamination. It shouldn’t be a huge problem if you are not gluten intolerant/sensitive or allergic. If you don’t do well with gluten, make sure you get the gluten-free rolled oats to ensure they aren’t cross-contaminated with gluten.
Why egg-free? Instead of using one (1) egg, I used 1 flax egg. 1 egg = 1 flax egg for reference and to make a flax egg, you just have to combine 1 tablespoon of ground flaxseeds with 3 tablespoons water. Give it a stir and let it sit for about 10-15 minutes so it becomes a bit thick. The flax egg helps act as a binder for the ingredients and thickener however it doesn’t have any rising properties and so recipes with a flax egg may not rise as much unless there are other rising agents in the recipe. These cookies keep the same shape and almost the same size throughout the entire process of baking.
You can totally replace the flax egg with a regular egg as per the rule above. I haven’t tried this with a regular egg yet but if you do, let me know how it worked out in the comments :)
Dairy-free? Instead of using butter, I used cold-pressed virgin coconut oil and melted it. The chocolate chips used are dark chocolate chips and dairy-free.
A Note on Other Key Ingredients
A Word On Date Sugar: Date sugar is a natural sugar so it’s better than the refined and processed white/brown sugar. You can easily substitute coconut sugar in a 1:1 ratio if you want and cannot find date sugar. What I noticed using date sugar for the first time was that when it mixes with the wet ingredients, it forms a thick light-brown liquid that looks like a thinned out paste.
Coconut - Don’t Skip Out On This: Unless you absolutely hate desiccated (shredded) coconut or are sensitive/allergic, this really provides a great flavour to the clusters. The combination of oats and coconut really amplifies the taste of an oatmeal clusters to me. I also usually add shredded coconut to my oatmeal cookies.
Gluten-Free & Dairy-Free Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Clusters
Makes about 13-15 clusters
INGREDIENTS:
1 Flax egg (see above for how to make a flax egg)
1/4 cup melted coconut oil
1/3 cup Now Foods Canada date sugar (or any other date sugar)
1 tsp Vanilla extract
1 cup Superfine blanched almond flour (I used Kirkland from Costco)
1/2 cup gluten-free rolled oats
1/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/3 cup dark chocolate chips
METHOD:
1. Mix the flax egg, cooled coconut oil, date sugar, and vanilla extract until combined in a mixing bowl.
2. Add in the almond flour, rolled oats, shredded coconut, salt and baking soda. Mix until combined and a sticky dough.
3. Fold in the chocolate chips. You can use your clean hands to combine everything into a big ball of cookie dough.
4. Place in fridge for 10-15 minutes to firm up. Chilled cookie dough just develops a better taste.
5. Preheat your oven to 350 F.
6. Roll the dough into small balls - approximately 1 tbsp of dough. Place on a parchment paper-lined cookie sheet and flatten with the palm of your hand. Clusters won’t rise or spread a lot once baked as they isn’t any eggs in the recipe.
7. Bake on a middle-oven rack for 10-11 minutes. Take them out of the oven and let them cool for about 4 minutes before placing them on a cooling rack so they don’t break apart. If you move them prematurely, they will fall apart :(
NUTRITION FACTS:
PER 1 cluster (Nutrition info from Cronometer)
172kcal | 13.2g Total Carbs | 2.1g Fibre | 11g Net carbs | 3g Protein | 12.5mg Total Fat | 2mg Total Cholesterol | 1.6mg Choline | 26mg Calcium | 1.2mg Iron | 5.7mg Magnesium | 74.6mg Potassium | 98mg Sodium
