Lady Adventure

Cookies and Milk

This post will involve chests.
But it will also contain biscuits - or cookies, if you will.
You've been warned.




Anyway, as my chesticles are no longer simply living rent-free in my jumper and are finally earning their keep in my new role as a Yummy Mummy, I find myself having to keep up enough supply to satisfy my little porker of a son. Up until now, I had been relying on obscene quantities of chocolate biscuit cake, but I thought I ought to do something a little less decadent to maintain production. In other countries, particularly the US, one would turn to a pill or tablet of some form with a very scary name - domperidone or motillium, an antidopaminergic drug (no idea what that means, just copied it from Wikipedia to look smart) - but here in Germany you are prescribed a tea.

Thus, I went off to our local herb store with a note from my midwife in my grubby little paw:


and picked up a bag of stuff that looks like it came straight from a café in Amsterdam:


It contains majoram, dill, black cumin and boxthorn. It tastes ... virtuous (= disgusting but good for you.)

So I decided to make lactation cookies. Now, if there were ever a name to put you off a foodstuff, then it's 'lactation cookies', but the idea is that these cookies contain galactagogues (substances to increase milk supply). I found some recipes on the internet but they were revoltingly sweet, so I twiddled a bit and came up with the one below. These cookies are very delish, and if you are not currently lactating (and do not desire to do so) never fear: they will not suddenly make you leak dairy. However, they are healthy - oh, who are we fooling? They take a nod in the direction of healthy - and would make a nice present for a new mother.

You need:

• 2 large (tablespoons) flax seed, preferably milled
• 3-4 large (tablespoons) water

Put the flax in a small bowl, cover it with water and let it soak and swell.

Cream

• 225g butter
• 200g brown sugar (I use even less sugar and more cinnamon for the taste.)
  

Add

• 2 eggs

Sift in

• 200g flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• some cinnamon and ginger to taste

Mix in

• 2-3 large (tablespoons) Brewer's Yeast
• Approx. 150g - 200g oats (not oatmeal!)

and

• 150g dark chocolate chips (we're not martyrs, after all)

Drop in small balls on a cookie sheet, bake for about 12-14 mins at 375°F / 180°C, till they're reached the desired brown-ness (I like them golden, my husband likes them dark.)

A note about the ingredients:

• I love ginger, but be careful - it's apparently not the thing to eat if you've had stitches or other wounds, as it's a blood thinner.
• Brewer's Yeast can be both at a healthfood store. It tastes kind of salty but it's the thing that gets your ... um, juices going ... and you can't taste it in the finished cookie.
• Oats are filling (and breastfeeding mothers are often in a state of constant starvation), contain lots of iron and work wonders on the ol' digestive system. Need I say more?
• (Milled) flax seed - according to the Internet, unmilled flax seed just runs right through you, barely stopping to take photos. I use unmilled flax seed, I just use a bit more and ... here's the secret, Internet bakers ... I chew my cookies! Uh-huh! Unmilled flax seed makes the cookies nice and crunchy. But milled flax seed is good, too, honest. Just use what you can find.