We are making healthier choices these days and if you want to know why we decided to develop a healthier sugar cookie, keep reading.  Otherwise click here to skip to the recipe.

It’s never too late to chase your dreams

Did I tell you that I went back to school? After years of consideration, I am becoming a Certified Personal Trainer.  I eventually want to become a Health Coach and Fitness Nutrition Specialist, but personal training is the first step.  It is a lot harder than I thought it would be, and yet it’s all the things I love to study.

To give you an idea of the challenge it has been: I need to memorize human anatomy, the names and locations of the bones and muscles etc, including details about organs like the names of the heart valves. In this course, it was all crammed into 1 chapter and an assignment for 1 week.  Thankfully I learned part of it in high school, but back then we took an entire semester to memorize it.  I wasn’t able to re-learn it all in one week, and to keep from falling behind, went on in my lessons while I practiced a little every day.  Without a good grasp on those terms, the rest of it isn’t making sense….aak!   Students who have passed the final exam are encouraging me to keep pressing forward and eventually it will all fall into place.  I’ve never felt so inept at school before!

There are important people in my life that are struggling with health and most of the conditions were preventable with proper diet and exercise. I’m going to school so I can educate and motivate about life styles that prevent disease.  While I study we are making changes in our own home to better nurture our family health.

Even when it comes to treats, we are choosing health giving foods.

My son found a set of adorable Easter themed cookie cutters when we were out shopping Saturday. I bought them and then remembered our healthier choices campaign.  I had an expectant little boy ready to make some baking memories with his mom, so we developed a healthier cookie recipe together and frosted them with vegetable tinted icing. They were pretty good, but not so good that you lose all self control.

These aren’t low sugar cookies and are not diabetic or weight loss appropriate, but for growing kids who burn plenty of energy, they are cookies with fiber and trace minerals that I don’t mind serving as a once in a while treat.

1 cup butter, softened

2 cups Unrefined Sugar (Evaporated Cane Juice*)

2 eggs

1 lemon, zested and juiced

4 cups Fresh Ground Hard White Wheat Flour** (Spooned in and leveled off, not packed)

2 tsp Baking Soda

1 tsp Salt

Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.  Add eggs one at a time beating well after each addition.  Stir in lemon juice and zest. In a large bowl combine flour with baking soda and salt.  Beat flour mixture into the butter mixture a little at a time (so it doesn’t cloud up into your face.)  Chill for 3 hours for easier handling.

Roll dough out onto a lightly floured surface about 1/4 inch thick and cut with cutters. We like to give the cutter a little wiggle once it’s well seated in the dough, making it easier to move the cookie to the cookie sheet.  Place cut cookies 2 inches apart onto greased cookie sheets.  Then bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes.  Let cool about 5 minutes on the cookie sheet before moving to a wire rack.  Makes about 4 dozen cookies.

*Aldi sells evaporated cane juice under the label Morena.  It’s less than $2 for a 4lb bag and unlike refined sugar still has the trace minerals found in the original sugar cane.

**We buy our wheat berries in 26 lb buckets from walmart.com for around $15 each.  Then grind them just before using with this grinder (affiliate link.) Wheat oxidizes quickly once ground and the oils become rancid becoming bitter and carcinogenic.  Wheat also loses 40% of it’s vitamin content over the first 24 hours after grinding, so we grind our flour fresh each time.   We use fresh ground flour in pancakes, waffles, homemade bread, pizza crust, tortillas, biscuits, cookies, muffins etc.

After learning about the links of artificial food dyes to cancer and neurological damage, we’re skipping it for more natural alternatives.  Not only are these safer, BUT they are health giving in their own way.

Reduced Sugar Frosting

16 oz Neufchatel Cream Cheese

1 Stick butter, softened

2 cups powdered sugar The original recipe called for 2 lbs of powdered sugar!!!!

Beat the cream cheese and butter together until it’s completely smooth.  Any visible lumps at this point will stay visible on the cookie (mine had lumps!)  Once it’s super smooth, beat in the powdered sugar a little at a time.  The vegetable powders will further thicken the frosting as does chilling, so if you prefer you can add as little as 4 Tbs of powdered sugar, or use 4 Tbs powdered Erythritol for a sugar free frosting.

Divide your frosting into separate bowls for each color.  For green we added a little matcha powder, but freeze dried and powdered spinach would provide a more vivid green.  (This was the color that had the most flavor and it wasn’t too kid friendly.  They broke off the green part of the carrot for eating. Adults didn’t mind it so much.)

For yellow we used a small amount of dried ground turmeric. It had no flavor and was the prettiest frosting of all.

For Pink we used freeze dried strawberries that I crushed with a rolling pin.  I didn’t think of it until later, but my small coffee/herb grinder would have made a much finer powder for no visible chunks.  Any freeze dried fruit would work here, like cherries or raspberries.  We bought ours at Aldi.  Beet powder would also make a beautiful color.  Think of all the color varieties of freeze dried foods!

For Orange we mixed turmeric and strawberry powder together.

For the Bunnies, we used strawberry frosting, mini chocolate chips for the eyes and a raw almond for the nose. (It was such a new way of thinking for us to not automatically grab for candies for the facial features and we really had to think about what we had on hand that might work. Everything except the matcha and wheat berries were from Aldi.)

The chicks had turmeric frosting, with a mini chocolate chip eye, and a pepita for a beak.

The carrot had turmeric and strawberry frosting for the root, and matcha frosting for the tops. Grant (6) really wanted to add chocolate chip eyes to all the carrots, and now I wish I had let him.  I’m still learning how to be a good mom and to know when to say yes and when to be the safe boundary for them.  My oldest is 18 and I’m starting to think learning to be a good mom is a forever journey.

Are you interested in learning more about frugal healthy options for the family?  Tell me about some healthy choices you’ve been making lately.