Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Smoothie Recipe featuring @NielsenMassey vanilla

One of my most indulgent and impossible to ignore food cravings is chocolate chip cookie dough. Whether it’s Ben & Jerry’s ice cream or anything else, there is something about that rich, decadent flavor with just a tiny hint of salt that drives my tastebuds and my MOAR MOAR MOAR brain circuits absolutely nuts. Obviously, even the types of cookie dough that are safe to consume (like the ones sold in ice cream) are not an “every day” food, so I wanted to create a recipe for a sweet treat that tastes decadent, but made of nutritionally dense ingredients that carry no risk of salmonella or e coli poisoning. (TIP: Most people, me included, have been told all our lives that only the raw eggs in cookie dough are a concern. Raw flour is actually just as likely or more likely to be contaminated with poisonous pathogens.)

When Nielsen Massey was nice enough to provide me with a bottle of their premium vanilla extract to sample, I decided to make my move. When you smell or taste this extract side by side with a “regular” pure vanilla extract, you’ll notice that the flavors in this one are richer and deeper and more complex. (I compared this side by side with a store brand from my local grocery store chain.) The flavor in this premium vanilla makes a noticeable difference in the flavor of the smoothie, and it is a star player in fooling my taste buds into thinking I have just had a cookie dough shake. (Spoiler: this smoothie contains no actual cookie dough. No cookies were harmed in the making of this shake.) The fat in cookies acts as a flavor carrier, which is probably why I love cookie dough SO MUCH. That flavor and the velvety mouth feel is what I was trying to reproduce in this smoothie.

So when your inner lizard brain, which frankly doesn’t care about your health goals, will not shut up about wanting cookie dough, try feeding it this instead, and see if you can distract it long enough to make a salad sound like a good idea. (Ha ha. Just kidding, salad is good too…)

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Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Smoothie

Author Meghan Gray

Ingredients

• 1 cup milk
• 1 scoop unflavored protein powder
• 1/4 cup rolled oats
• 1 ripe banana
• 2 Tablespoons sweetener of choice
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt
• 1 Tablespoons chocolate chips chopped

Instructions

1. Combine all ingredients except chocolate chips in blender and blend until smooth.
2. Add chocolate chips and pulse until evenly distributed.
3. Garnish with additional chopped chocolate chips, if desired.
4. Serve!

Recipe Notes

DO NOT be tempted to add the chocolate chips to the blender without chopping first. You will be disappointed unless you have one of those highly intelligent, robot blenders that do everything but wash and wax your car, because the chips get clumped up under the cutting blade instead of mixed into your smoothie. You also very much want a RIPE banana. The banana is supposed to fade into the background and provide texture, but if it's green the green banana flavor jumps out and ruins the illusion.

A note on ingredients: You can substitute plain yogurt, SILKEN tofu, or low fat sour cream for the whey protein powder if you prefer. I did not taste test any of those substitutions. You can get Nielsen-Massey 32 oz. Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Extract on Amazon.com.