Healthy Families for God

I’ll never forget the look on the poor girl’s face (and her mom’s!) when we said we don’t eat sugar and respectfully declined her Girl Scout cookies. And I didn’t even get to the part about them containing the even more dangerous trans fats!

We’re not much for even natural sweets around here (give me a big bowl of air-popped organic popcorn with coconut oil and Himalayan sea salt instead!), but I got a little inspired (thanks Allie!) to make a homemade, HEALTHY Samoa/Caramel DeLite Girl Scout cookie. Since we were at it, we decided to also give the Tagalongs a shot since those used to be our favorite.

So the kids and I set forth to make them. We used organic freshly-ground whole wheat flour, raw honey, raw coconut oil, unsweetened shredded coconut, good-quality butter without added hormones, and carob/cocoa powder to make sure these cookies were completely free of refined sugar and full of good fats. I didn’t try it, but I bet these could easily be made gluten-free even!

And while I think they turned out pretty amazing, I have honestly never eaten a Samoa before so I have nothing to compare it to. You’ll just have to let me know yourself!

(Now, bear with me for my photographs–Not only do I do this all without a stand-mixer but I do it with my teenage son’s camera phone too!)

For the Samoas/Caramel DeLites
Makes about 12 2″ cookies
You will need:

For the shortbread:
2 cups white whole wheat or whole wheat pastry flour (or an all-purpose gluten-free flour blend)
1/2 cup butter, softened (from cows not treated with rBGH of course!)
1/4 cup honey
1 tsp pure vanilla extract (none of that imitation junk)
1/2 tsp unrefined sea salt

For the caramel:
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup honey
1/2 tsp unrefined sea salt

For the chocolate sauce:
1/2 cup virgin coconut oil
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup unsweetened carob, cacao, or cocoa powder (we use carob because it doesn’t contain caffeine and has other nutritional benefits and we can’t afford cacao!)
2 Tbsp heavy cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp unrefined sea salt

1/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
Candy Thermometer

To make the shortbread, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Mix the softened butter and honey in a mixing bowl with an electric mixer (stand mixer of course if you have one but I am not so fortunate. Maybe I should add a “donate” tab to the side of my website so I can try and earn one. Nah.). Mix until creamy and then add in flour, a cup at a time. Add vanilla and salt and mix until well blended.

At this point, you can either roll out the dough onto a floured surface in the shape of a log to simply slice circles, or you can roll out dough 1/4-inch thick and cut with a 1 1/2″ biscuit cutter. Place cut circles onto a cookie sheet (or baking stone which is what I used). Bake for 12-16 minutes (less if using a metal cookie sheet) until the bottom and edges are very slightly browning. Cool.

Reduce the oven heat to 300 degrees and spread shredded coconut onto a baking sheet in an even layer. Toast just for a few minutes–watch carefully–until it is the level of toasting that you desire.

To make the caramel, get a sink of cold water ready. Heat the cream in a small heavy-bottomed saucepan until tiny bubbles start forming where the milk touches the pan–just before a simmer. Stir in the honey and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to an active simmer (low-med.) and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon while the candy thermometer is in the pan (but not touching the bottom), for about 15-20 minutes, until the mixture reaches 240 degrees F. To stop the caramel from cooking, very carefully set the bottom of the saucepan into the cold water without getting any water into the caramel. Stir until it thickens slightly and remove from sink.

Spoon caramel over (or dip in) cookies to cover the top. When done with all the cookies, put a layer of toasted coconut onto the caramel and gently press into caramel. Have a large cookie sheet with parchment paper ready for the next step.

To make the carob/chocolate sauce, set up a double boiler. Put coconut oil and honey in the top of the double boiler and heat over low-medium heat until melted, stirring occasionally. Add carob/cocoa powder, salt, vanilla and cream and stir (or whisk) until well blended. Remove from heat and let cool slightly while continuing to stir.

Dip bottom of cookies into chocolate sauce and set onto parchment paper. Drizzle chocolate sauce over the top of the cookies and refrigerate at least 3 hours to harden chocolate before removing from parchment paper. Enjoy!

For the Tagalongs, prepare the shortbread and chocolate sauce as directed above. To make the peanut butter filling, you will need:

1/2 cup peanut butter
2 Tbsp butter
2 Tbsp pure maple syrup
1 tsp vanilla extract

Mix all ingredients together until well blended and spread/pipe over top of shortbread cookies. Set on a potato masher or other wire holding tool and dip in chocolate sauce. Set on parchment paper and refrigerate until chocolate is hardened, at least 3 hours. Now these I have something to compare to (although it’s been about 6 years!), but they are just like the “real” thing–only better. None of that chemical, trans-fatty taste hidden by artificial flavors. Our new favorite cookie!

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