Banana Peanut Butter Ice Cream Sandwiches

It all started with some rotten bananas...

Of course the first thing you think to make with rotten bananas is banana bread, which was my plan. I was looking forward to a delicious gluten free banana bread. It was Sunday morning and I decided to whip up a loaf and have it with my coffee.

I began to collect my ingredients...brown rice flour...tapioca flour...potato starch...!!! Ah! I was out of potato starch! I could have run to the store but being that I had yet to have my coffee and I was quite the sight for sore eyes...I decided to save myself (and the rest of the world) the embarrassment and not make this gluten free...but now that I had deviated from my original plan, my creativity began flowing. Banana cake? Nah...Banana pudding...ick...cream pie? No. COOKIES?! Hmmm...

I googled banana cookies and found the following recipe, which sounded very original and I was intrigued.

Recipe from Annie's Eats.

Ingredients:

½ cup unsalted butter, at room temperature

1 cup sugar

1 egg, at room temperature

1 cup of mashed bananas (about 2 ½ large bananas)

1 tsp. baking soda

2 cups flour

pinch of salt

½ tsp. cinnamon

½ tsp. nutmeg

½ tsp. ground cloves

1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350°. In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter and the sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the egg and continue to beat until well incorporated.

In a bowl, mix the mashed bananas and baking soda. Let sit for 2 minutes. The baking soda will react with the acid in the bananas which will in turn give the cookies their lift and rise.

Mix the banana mixture into the butter mixture. Mix together the flour, salt and spices and sift into the butter and banana mixture until just combined.

Fold chocolate chips into the batter. Drop into dollops on baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake for 11-13 minutes or until nicely golden brown. Let cool on wire racks.

After I finished and let the cookies cool, they were still so soft. I waited for my taste tester to come over (aka my boyfriend Jon) to see what the verdict was.

"MMMMMMM!!!" says Jon.

"TELL ME THE TRUTH!" I said. The same old song and dance.

"They're great, but they are very soft and not in a regular soft cookie type of way." The truth comes out. Suddenly he has a great idea! "Make ice cream sandwiches!"

So I did.

Obviously, you can choose whatever type of ice cream you want (I made two or three with vanilla) but there's something about Bananas and Peanut Butter...perfection!

Stocked up!