Equipment
Ingredients
Wet Ingredients
- 1 banana, overripe and heavily spotted
- 100 g light brown sugar, packed
- 30 ml neutral oil
- 5 ml vanilla extract
- 1 egg, room temperature
Dry Ingredients
- 120 g rolled oats
- 125 g all-purpose flour
- 3 g baking soda
- 2 g kosher salt
Mix-ins
- 85 g semisweet chocolate chips
Nutrition (per serving)
Nutrition is estimated per serving. Nutrients without complete source data are omitted.
Full nutrition
- Calories
- 87 kcal
- Protein
- 1 g
- Carbohydrates
- 14 g
- Fat
- 3 g
- Fiber
- 1 g
- Sugar
- 8 g
- Sodium
- 88 mg
- Saturated Fat
- 1 g
- Monounsaturated Fat
- 1 g
- Polyunsaturated Fat
- 0 g
- Cholesterol
- 9 mg
- Potassium
- 59 mg
- Calcium
- 16 mg
- Iron
- 0.3 mg
- Magnesium
- 9 mg
- Phosphorus
- 19 mg
- Zinc
- 0.2 mg
- Vitamin A
- 5 mcg
- Vitamin C
- 1 mg
- Vitamin D
- 0.1 mcg
- Vitamin E
- 0.1 mg
- Vitamin K
- 0 mcg
- Vitamin B6
- 0.0 mg
- Vitamin B12
- 0.0 mcg
- Thiamin
- 0.01 mg
- Riboflavin
- 0.02 mg
- Niacin
- 0.1 mg
- Folate
- 5 mcg
- Water
- 7 g
- Alcohol
- 0 g
- Caffeine
- 3 mg
Sources: Aggregated Public Data, USDA FoodData Central
Method
Preheat your oven to 175°C (350°F) and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a medium mixing bowl, thoroughly crush the overripe banana using a fork or potato masher until completely smooth and pureed.
Add the light brown sugar, neutral oil, vanilla extract, and room temperature egg to the pureed banana. Whisk vigorously until the mixture is fully combined and slightly frothy.
In a large mixing bowl, combine the rolled oats, all-purpose flour, baking soda, and kosher salt. Pour the wet banana mixture into the dry ingredients and gently stir with a rubber spatula until just combined and no dry flour streaks remain.
Pour the semisweet chocolate chips into the dough and gently fold them in until evenly distributed.
Scoop roughly 30g portions of dough onto the prepared baking sheet, spacing them 5 centimeters apart. Gently press each mound flat, as low-fat doughs will not spread naturally in the oven.
Bake in the preheated oven at 175°C (350°F) for 10 to 12 minutes, or until the edges are lightly golden and the centers appear just set.
Remove from the oven and let the cookies rest on the baking sheet for 3 minutes before transferring them to a wire rack to cool completely.
Chef's Notes
- Using bananas with extensive brown spotting or entirely black skin is crucial for both sweetness and maximum moisture in lower-fat baking.
- Because these cookies lack the butterfat that causes traditional cookies to spread, they will retain whatever shape you press them into before baking.
- For a bakery-style aesthetic, reserve a small handful of chocolate chips to press gently into the tops of the cookie dough mounds just before baking.
- Always measure your flour by weight rather than volume; excess compacted flour will make this lower-fat dough unpleasantly dry.
Storage
Refrigerator: 1 week — Store in an airtight container to maintain maximum moisture.
Freezer: 3 months — Freeze baked cookies in a sealed bag, or freeze portioned dough balls to bake on demand.
Troubleshooting
Cookies resemble thick, puffy cakes rather than traditional cookies
Cause: The lack of butterfat prevents the cookie dough from melting and spreading outward during baking.
Fix: Cannot be fixed after baking.
Prevention: Manually press the dough mounds flat to your desired final cookie thickness before putting them in the oven.
Cookies taste bland or lack sweetness
Cause: The banana used was too firm or yellow, lacking the necessary developed fruit sugars.
Fix: Cannot be fixed
Prevention: Ensure the banana skin is heavily spotted with brown or almost completely black before pureeing.
Cultural Context
Oatmeal cookies became an American staple in the early 1900s following the popularization of rolled oats as a health food. Integrating pureed fruit like applesauce or banana as a fat substitute gained immense traction during the lower-fat diet trends of the 1990s. Today, this technique remains a beloved way to create tender, everyday treats with a more robust nutritional profile, perfect for casual snacking or game day platters.
