Vegan Hazelnut 'Sablé' Cookies

Sablé cookies are a French classic that contains generous amounts of sugar and butter. The following recipe produces cookies with a similar sand-like texture but in a much healthier manner. The star ingredient in this recipe is the hazelnut that gives the cookies a great nutty, and at the same time sweet, flavor. These original 'sablé' cookies are vegan and refined-sugar-free.

Crumbly 'sablé' cookies with authentic hazelnut flavor. Crunchy on the outside and chewy in the middle, these cookies are one of my friends' favorites. They melt in the mouth and make you reach out for more! They can be enjoyed as a post-workout snack thanks to the generous amount of protein they contain.

Ingredients:

• 200 g hazelnut butter

• 3 tbsp maple syrup

• 60 g sesame seed flour

• 50 g dark chocolate (for the topping)

Preparation:

1. In a mixing bowl, combine the hazelnut butter and the maple syrup. Mix well.

2. Slowly incorporate the sesame flour.

3. Make small balls from the mixture. Press each ball with a fork to create roughly round shapes.

4. Bake the cookies at 180 degrees C for 8 minutes (or until the sides are lightly golden), then turn off your oven and leave them inside for another 2 minutes.

5. Once baked, transfer the cookies to a cooling rack, where you can proceed with drizzling melted dark chocolate on top of them.

6. When the chocolate sets, the cookies are ready to be consumed.

The recipe makes around 20 medium-sized cookies.

Remarks:

1. Make sure the maple syrup is at room temperature before adding it to the hazelnut butter. Otherwise, you risk your mixture to become too stiff and dry.

2. The cookies may easily burn due to the amount of hazelnut butter, so watch them carefully while in the oven.

3. You can replace the sesame seed flour with flax seed flour, it works just at well.

4. Another modification you can try out is to use a mixture of hazelnut and almond nut butters as an alternative to using just hazelnut butter. What this does is create a slightly lighter texture for the cookie as almonds have less fat content than hazelnuts.

5. The recipe yields semi-sweet cookies that focus on the hazelnut flavor rather than enhancing the sweetness. If you have a sweet tooth and you find that the cookies not are sweet enough for you, try adding an extra table spoon of maple syrup.

Idea:

• As all the three ingredients for the cookies can be consumed without being thermally processed, you can make raw protein energy bites out of the cookie mixture. These protein bites are just as delicious as the cookies. Naturally, they are soft and not crumbly as the sablé cookies. This is another way to enjoy this delicious and healthy combination of flavors.