Taste of Tuesday: Banana Oat Breakfast Cookies

Hi everyone!

I'm linking up with Ashley from Let's Get Bananas and Jessica from Blissfully Miller for Taste of Tuesday!  Today I'm sharing a recipe I originally found on Pinterest (from the blog Watching What I Eat) and decided to try out a couple of weeks ago for a craaazy weekend at work. I wanted an easy to grab, tasty and good for you breakfast to eat when I knew I would be snoozing my alarm till the very last minute before work - these fit the bill!

Also, I apologize for the seriously gross photos - I was cooking these at 11pm, hence the horrible lighting. I was kicking myself as I took them....

Banana Oat Breakfast Cookies
*Adapted from Watching What I Eat

What you need: 
2 ripe bananas, mashed
1/3 cup peanut butter (your choice - creamy or chunky!)
2/3 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups quick oats or old fashioned oats (I used a mixture of both since I was low!)
1/4 cup chopped nuts
1/4 cup chocolate chips

*optional: 1 scoop vanilla protein powder, 1 tsp butter flavor extract

What you do:
1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. In a large bowl, mix together the mashed banana and peanut butter until combined.

3. Add the applesauce, the extract(s), and the optional protein powder to the peanut butter/banana mix and stir until combined.

4. Add the oatmeal, nuts, and chocolate chips to the mixture and stir, stir, stir until it's all mixed together!

5. Let the "dough" sit for 10 minutes.

6. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
7. Drop the "dough" onto the cookie sheet by the spoonful, aiming for 16 smaller cookies or 12 large ones.

8. Bake the cookies for 20-30 minutes until they reach your preferred state of "done" - I recommend a longer baking time to dry out the cookies a bit, mine ended up being kind of wet and soggy especially after a couple of days in a container.
9. Let the cookies rest for 5 minutes on the cookie sheet and then transfer them to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Store the cookies in a covered container, and if it gets past a couple of days, consider putting them in the fridge so they don't get... unedible. Enjoy the cookies in the morning or as a snack - both options are delish!

xx, Amy