Recycled almond and cacao nib cookies

I love making food from scratch. Bread, milk, jam, pastry, all sorts of things you could buy but are so much nicer when you make them for yourself. One problem with making some of these things is you end up with left over bits and pieces and if you are not careful you could end up with a lot of waste. 

I have mentioned before that I like to make my own almond milk. It tastes cleaner, is much cheaper than buying almond milk from the supermarket and you know exactly what has gone into it. The only problem is you end up with all this left over almond pulp. It would be ridiculous to throw it away, as there is nothing wrong with it, but what to do with it all? I put the pulp in the freezer when I make milk and then I tend to use it in baking or for dips. But I am in need of some new ideas of what to do with it all, I am starting to get a backlog.

I recently bought this book, which has a recipe from some tasty look almond cookies, so I decided to give them a go, with a few tweaks of course!

These cookies were a hit. I took a plate to my sisters house and they didn't last long. What I like about them as are not too sweet and the cacao nibs give them a coffee type of bitter kick. They get a nice crunchy crust but stay nice and moist in the middle. YUM. The almond pulp worked beautifully instead of buying almond meal, so I now have another recipe to help me recycle the pulp I save from making nut milk. Even better they are really easy to make and taste great with a glass of homemade nut milk.

Ingredients

1 1/4 cups almond pulp (from making almond milk or you could use almond meal)
1/4 cup cacao nibs
1/2 cup plain spelt flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp sea salt
1/3 cup coconut sugar
1 tbsp spoon flax meal
3 tbsp coconut oil (melted)
1/2 tsp vanilla

extra coconut oil for greasing the baking tray

Process 

Place flax meal and 3 tbsp of water together in a small bowl and stir to combine, this will make you an "egg" to help bind the ingredients, leave it to sit for 5-10min to thicken. Place almond pulp in the food processor and pulse to make sure it is really fine. Transfer to a bowl and stir in the flour, cacao nibs, baking powder, salt and sugar. Melt coconut oil and add to dry ingredients, add your flax "egg" and vanilla. Stir well. Place mixture in the fridge for at least 30min until it is really cold. 

Preheat oven to 170 degrees. Grease two baking trays with extra coconut oil.  Take mixture out of the fridge and roll into small balls. Place on a greased baking tray and press down gently. Place in the oven for 7-10mins or until the edges are starting to go brown. Cool on a rack.