Baking with Mini Me

Although Little L doesn't look that much like me (depending on who you talk to), she definitely has some of my personality traits.  She is a reader, a talker, a shoe-lover, an eater, and her flair for drama is not altogether unfamiliar territory. Just ask Hubbs ;)

Today, at one point when I was trying to do something on the computer and she wanted to nurse, my request for a few more minutes was met with an immediate slumping down into a heap on the floor, followed by her throwing herself face down while whining/faux-crying in loud, dramatic fashion.  It was a grand spectacle, for sure.

While reading her Howard B. Wigglebottom book, Little L came to the page when all of the other characters are laughing at Howard.  She totally fake laughed as she read the page.  Then she turned the page, only to quickly return to the laughing page and repeat her soap-opera-villlain laugh.  So stinkin' cute.

Anyway, I decided to do some easy peasy baking with Little L today.  I'm not much of a baker or a cook, but I found some ebony-hued bananas in my fridge and a Pinterest pin for using them.  This isn't my recipe, but here's what I used/did:

2 super ripe bananas
1 cup of quick oats
1 heaping soup spoon of (natural) peanut butter (I'll probably add more next time though)
lots of chocolate chips

I let Little L dump the quick oats into the bowl where the nasty looking bananas sat.  She wasn't satisfied with just dumping the one scoop, however, so she reached into our quick oats bin and scooped a bit more to add to the mix.  Most of it ended up on the floor, though; thank God for Dustbuster hand vacs.

Anyway, I then added the peanut butter.  At this point, Little L's curiosity got the better of her and she reached her little hand into the mix, getting mostly a fistful of raw oats and peanut butter.  Her next move was to shove her hand into her mouth, resulting in a very peanut buttery mess all over her face and every surface she had contact with before I managed to corral her into the bathroom.

When I added the chocolate chips, I poured some into my hand, then had Little L grab them from my hand and throw them into the big mixing bowl.  She very much enjoyed this step, and so I probably added a few more chips than I normally would.  I then mixed everything up by hand.  Little L shoved her fist into the mix once or twice more, but after that the novelty had worn off and she was off to look for a book.

Using a spoon, I dropped the mix onto a wax paper-lined baking sheet and baked everything for 18 minutes (the recipe says 350'F for 15-20).  Though the baked end product wasn't all flat and circular like normal cookies, it had a good macaroon-ish shape that in no way, shape or form looked like the picture on Pinterest.  Of course. 

When the cookies cooled a little, I gobbled one up and was pleasantly surprised by the somewhat chewy, soft texture.  For being so freakin' easy that an 18 month old could make it, the cookies were pretty tasty!

In the future, I probably would add a few more choco chips, another spoon of peanut butter, and some sweet coconut for good measure, but this was a great way to use up my old bananas and get my baby girl involved, and now I have some pretty healthy cookies to nosh on!