I’ve always thought that one of the great definers of age is the time that you go to sleep at night.
For the very young, that can be early – as a small child, Pete remembers being sent to bed whenever the theme music for the ABC News came on at 7pm. On the other end of the scale, I’m in my late forties, and I’ll often be sound asleep by 10pm.
Big Boy, who is now in his twenties, is currently keeping vampire hours, a sure sign of youth. As a result, he’s routinely wide awake and completely alert six hours after we’ve had dinner, and will come stalking into the kitchen to forage for food.
One morning, I woke up to find that he’d made a serious dent in my supply of Amedei Chuao chocolate. I invented these cookies that same day – they’re an amalgam of the two triathlon cookies I’d created for Marty a few years back (with less butter and brown sugar), and hopefully they’ll provide enough low GI energy to keep the starving wolf away from my chocolate stash.
If you’re missing any of the ingredients, you might want to consider the original triathlon cookie, or the updated version – both are filling and delicious. This version makes use of Pete’s muesli supplies, our neverending stash of apple butter, and the lovely Buratto flour that Tania gave us. The cookies aren’t particularly sweet, but they do offer a rich, complex mix of flavours.
- 100g unsalted butter
- 125g dark brown sugar
- 75g apple butter
- 1 large (59g) egg
- 200g Buratto flour (or substitute plain/AP or spelt flour)
- ½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (baking soda), sifted
- ¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
- 75g organic rolled spelt
- 100g semisweet chocolate chips (I used Callebaut 54% dark callets)
- 75g dried blueberries
- 75g dried cranberries
- 50g finely chopped candied peel
- 50g blanched roasted hazelnuts, chopped
- handful of pepitas and sunflower seeds (optional)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (I used homemade)
1. Preheat oven to 170C or 150C with fan. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, sifted bicarbonate of soda, and salt. Add the rolled spelt, chocolate, hazelnuts and dried fruit, and stir to combine.
2. In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter, apple butter and sugar until combined, then beat in the egg and vanilla. Add the dry ingredients and mix until just combined.
3. Roll the dough into 4cm balls, and place them on a parchment lined baking tray. Flatten each cookie slightly and bake for 20 minutes or until golden brown.
4. Allow to cool on a wire rack before storing in an airtight container for midnight munchies!
Fig Jam and Lime Cordial 
What an excellent idea. I’ve been looking for a snack my super-healthy teen would eat. This is it, I’m sure
Sally, they’re not quite sweet enough for Big Boy to scoff, so he’s going through the jar slowly. I’ve told him he’s to keep away from my chocolate stores at 1am.. :)
Wow, Celia… these sound like a great energy booster for growing lads!
Thanks Lizzy, I hope so! :) (Not sure he’s still getting any taller though..maybe just growing outwards! :))
Great recipe, Celia! I am going to keep those in mind for a future baking adventure! Also, very wise move to protect your precious chocolate.. you are a wise, wise woman! ;-)
Thanks Sally – they’re quite easy to make, and end up a softer, chewy cookie rather than a crunchy one.
Your Big Boy Wolf thinks it would be better with chocolate instead of fruit :)
I know that darling, but he’s not getting a choice. If I make regular chocolate chip cookies, he’ll eat five of them in one go at midnight. :)
Those look fantastic – a great idea!
Thanks Nick! It was a case of raiding the pantry and then throwing everything I found into a cookie :)
These look great. The only thing I would have to change is substituting apple sauce for the egg.
I never thought of doing that! I just subbed the apple butter for regular butter..
They look great and I hope they manage to protect your chocolate stash. I think I would have been upset to see it raided!!!
Caroline, I’ve actually HIDDEN the Chuao now – not particularly well, but out of line of sight (which is usually enough to confuse a marauding wolf). AND I made some milk feuilletine chocolate for them to nibble on instead. :)
Archie is up all night too and yes, gets into the fridge late and pantry late at night also. He loves to eat the cooking chocolate too but also eats pickles and jars of olives and swallows the brine water – gets furious if I throw it out. I have to hide everything that’s important for a recipe. These look like great fuel-food with so many lovely flavours and textures and good for you also. Love how you stacked them xx
Charlie, the problem is that if I serve dinner any later, the rest of us get fat as it ends up just before we go to bed! How bizarre about the pickling liquid – Archie has unusual tastes!
I’ve crawled out of bed early to do paperwork, and my stapler is missing – Big Boy was finishing an assignment last night, so I know where it is, but I don’t have the heart to wake him up to get it. Honestly, it’s like living with pixies. ;-) xx
They sound great Celia, and having him slow down while he munches means he’ll hopefully eat less. Chocolate cookies can just be inhaled, these ones need to be chewed :) x
Becca, that’s so true, thanks for understanding – is it the same for girls? Do they sleep strange hours and eat all night as well? :) xx
Not so far Celia. MiddleC still sends herself to bed about 9:30 each night and needs a full nights sleep, but littlej has always had issues there and can lay awake for hours. My girls just seem to go through hungry weeks where you can’t fill them up fast enough, then a couple where they just pick at food. It seems to cycle. Boys are just bottomless puts :)
Hi Celia – this is probably a really silly question, but how do you make apple butter?
Wendy, we make pectin from new season apples, then pass the leftover pulp through a sieve. Then we add sugar, brown sugar and lemon juice, pile it all into a roasting pan, and bake it for a couple of hours until it’s thick and caramelised, then can it. I’ll try to take photos next time we make it, but it might not be for a while.. :)
These look like the perfect, solid cookie to fill up hungry people…young and old!
Jane, thank you – they’re a bit more cakey than solid. Pete’s quite taken with them.. :)
YUMMO! They look amazingly delicious! :D
Thanks Sandy! I’m pretty sure they’d be easy enough to convert to vegan.. :)
Have added this to the stash of recipies to fill the growing child. There would be great scenes in this house if someone got into my chocolate stash ; ). How do you make your apple butter?
Hi Tania, I was just explaining that to Wendy above. When we make pectin, we use whole apples, then we bake the sieved pulp with sugar, brown sugar and lemon juice until it’s a thick paste. We scrape it into jars and hot water process it – it seems to last for ages! :)
They look so lovely……guess I’ll have to make some apple butter now.
Have you made power bars for the hungry young folk?
Elaine, I’ve tried in the past, but they’re not keen! They don’t mind if it’s shaped like a cookie though.. :)
Never mind the growing children :) ! I can be found at the fridge or pantry door when the clock strikes thirteen quite often!! [Hate to tell: that makes me a growing ‘child’ also!] And tho’ I am not a biscuit [or any other] baker, these look very, very interesting :D !
See Eha, that means you’re still YOUNG! :)
You HAVE made me feel good :D ! On a day I needed it :) !
Your cookies sound like the perfect addition to lunchboxes, Celia. I am on a hunt for wholesome, filling and yummy treats to make and these tick all the boxes, thanks! :)
Chris, thank you, I do think you could use any combination of fruit and nuts!
These look great- I like the reduced sugar- and all the added fruit and nuts.
I’ve noticed my sons never just ate one cookie- it was always a handful at a time.
Heidi, the cookies develop a better flavour with a couple of days in the jar – it’s very interesting! :)
I don’t even know what 1am looks like anymore! Lovely ingredients Celia :)
Me neither Tandy! I’m out like a light by then! :)
Nice recipe, Celia. I hope it stems the rampant nocturnal foraging!
Amanda, I KNOW you understand – from memory, didn’t you have a bottle of vanilla vodka disappear from your pantry? ;-)
When John’s son is here visiting I swear he never goes to bed. Also, I think the thinner they are the more they eat. These cookies look very healthy.
I’d have cried if he’d gotten in to my “good” chocolate. :)
Maureen, I wasn’t happy.. ;-)
Nice recipe. “I’m in my late forties, and I’ll often be sound asleep by 10pm” and I’m in my late fifties and I’ll run to bed at 9pm to read for an hour! :)
Rose, I like to do that too! Or to go to bed early to watch a little telly. Honestly, I’m such an old fart sometimes! :)
These look good. No marauding wolves here yet just a hungry husband when he finishes an evening shift. I hide things regularly and he gives up way too easily.
Jo, that’s good – my boys are quite persistent! :)
Hehe I remember the anguish when you found out that he had gotten into your stash! I think the cry could be heard all the way from our house ;)
I wasn’t happy, was I? ;-) He could at least have eaten the Callebaut callets – I wouldn’t have minded nearly as much. But he got into my Chuao!!!
I love your cry of “it’s like living with pixies”! Pixies with size 9 feet:)
Shoemaker’s elves? ;-)
Love the fruit addition here Celia, it makes for a great excuse to eat more ;)
Lisa, we can convince ourselves that it’s “healthy”.. :)
PS. I blogged about our beetroot dip a while back here:
https://figjamandlimecordial.com/2010/07/16/in-my-kitchen-july-2010/
Thanks for the link Celia, love the vibrant colour on the dip!
Those cookies look like the perfect vampire snack. The boy and I are both night owls and the wonderhub is an early bird. I’d eat those cookies for breakfast with hot coffee. Noms! Maz.
Maz, that’s why you’re still young! I’m hopeless past midnight – I’ve been known to be reduced to weeping if I’m not allowed to go to bed.. ;-)
These look lovely, and not too sweet…enjoyable any time of day:)
Thanks ED!! We seem to be eating them at all hours.. :)
Hi celia I made some apple butter for the first time this weekend I found the recipe on http://www.chickensintheroad.com could u share your recipe.
Chris, I’ll see what I can do about a post. Basically, we make apple butter with leftover apple pulp, which is sieved and then mixed with sugar, brown sugar and lemon juice. The mix is then spread out in a roasting pan and baked in the oven until it forms a thick paste, which we then hot water process in jars.
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