Happy Halloween!!
Eek! I’m so excited! I just love this holiday. Not only does it mark the beginning of the big holiday season, but it’s also simply a wonderful time for everyone (adults included) to dress up, let loose, and enjoy eating TONS of treats!
To celebrate, my stepson and I finally carved our pumpkin over the weekend.
Honestly, I’m glad we waited to carve out this gigantic beast because pumpkins always seem to dry out and wrinkle up pretty quickly. Pretty ghoulish, right? And what made it even better was the fact that we had plenty of pumpkin seeds to roast and enjoy while watching a movie. Even though we had fully intended to watch a Halloween movie, we decided instead to watch Home Alone. Yep, we watched a Christmas movie days before Halloween. Weirdos.
You can bet I’ll be watching a scary movie tonight, though! (My hubs is shocked that I agreed). I typically can’t stand to be scared, but this is the one day of the year when I feel I should be a good sport and play along. I’m pretty sure my head will be buried in a pillow the entire time, though 
I also plan on scarfing down a bunch of popcorn and finishing off the rest of these delicious Raw Jack-O-Lantern Cookies. I made a batch of these treats a couple of days ago (using oat flour) and rolled the cookies out nice and thin before adding the icing and chocolate chips. Unfortunately, I only got a picture of them pre-icing:
Well, those bad boys didn’t last very long. In fact, they didn’t last more than 10 minutes. Fortunately, this is a quick and simple recipe so I was able to whip up a second batch of cookies in no time to ensure that I’ll have a special treat to enjoy tonight when my sweet-tooth kicks in. This time around I decided to use whole rolled oats instead of oat flour and left the cookies pretty thick. Once again, they were awesome. It’s killing me right now knowing that there are more cookies in the fridge just waiting to be eaten….
So, to everyone out there, I wish you a Happy Halloween! Have so much fun, be safe, and whip up some of these yummy cookies if you have a little extra time and want a special, healthy, and tasty treat!
- 1 cup walnuts*
- ¼ cup pecans*
- ¼ cup rolled oats or oat flour
- 2 Tbs. lucuma powder (optional)
- 1 Tbs. flaxseed meal
- ¼ tsp. cinnamon
- ⅛ tsp. nutmeg
- ⅛ tsp. ground ginger
- pinch of sea salt
- 6 Medjool dates, pitted and chopped
- ~~For the icing:
- ½ cup coconut butter
- 2 Tbs. carrot juice**
- 12-15 drops liquid stevia
- vegan chocolate chips for the eyes, mouth, and stem
- Place the walnuts and pecans in your food processor and pulse until broken down into an almost flour-like consistency and beginning to stick.
- Add the rest of the ingredients except for the dates and blend until fully combined.
- Finally, add the dates and process until the dates are broken down. By now the mixture should be really sticking and clumping together. You’ll know the mixture is ready when you can pinch off a bit and easily roll it into a ball in your hands. (If the mixture isn’t sticky enough, add a bit of water one teaspoon at a time).
- When the mixture is ready, pour it out onto a cutting board, clump the pieces together into a big ball, and use a rolling-pin or the palms of your hands to evenly flatten it out. Dust the rolling-pin with a tiny bit of oat flour if you’re having a hard time rolling out the mixture. When you’re done, it should be between ¼-1/2 inch thick, depending upon your preference.
- Use a round cookie cutter or the top of a jar or cup to cut the mixture into circles (and add stems to make them look more like pumpkins if you prefer). Roll the leftovers back into a ball, roll out flat, and cut into more circles until all of the mixture has been used up. Place the cookies in the fridge for at least a couple of hours to help them become more firm.
- To make the orange icing, melt the coconut butter in a double broiler or in a glass jar set in hot (not boiling) water. Add the carrot juice and stevia and whisk all of the ingredients together.
- When the cookies have had time to harden a bit, remove them from the fridge and coat them with a thick layer of icing. Add the chocolate chips and place the cookies back in the fridge for at least ten more minutes to allow the icing to set.
- Store in the fridge in a sealed container.
- Enjoy!
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These are so cute! I would gladly have eaten these as a kid instead of candy on Halloween. I would gladly eat them now
My hubs ate the leftover candy on Halloween night and I polished these guys off
These are so adorable and they look delicious, too! What is lucuma powder? I’ve never heard of it.
Oh, it’s amazing! Lucuma is a Peruvian fruit that looks a bit like a large, yellow avocado when you slice it open. The powder is naturally sweet (but not too sweet) so I like to add it to desserts and smoothies–it has a caramel-like flavor (this is the closest I can compare it to bc it has a really unique flavor). It’s also high in beta-carotene, fiber, and iron