For anyone who has traveled outside the U.S. you know that chocolate chip cookies are relatively hard to come by. I find this odd considering how positively delightful a treat these cookies are. Especially when they are freshly baked and you burn your mouth a little on the oozing chocolate because you just couldn’t wait to bite into this steaming, delicious-smelling cookie in your hand. Now that I think about it, freshly baked cookies might just be one of the most soul-warming foods there is. One of my goals in life is to know a handful of cookie recipes by heart, so that on a whim when friends come over I can say, “hey who’s in the mood for cookies?” And then promptly whip up a batch before anyone can say “only if you’ve got milk.”

But let me not ramble any longer on a topic I’m pretty sure anyone who reads this will be in agreement with: cookies, especially ones with chocolate in them, are good. And these cookies are no exception. Kenya is not known for its wide selection of chocolate chips – or even chocolate for that matter. So I had to be resourceful with my ingredients. I ended up roughly chopping a Cadbury dark chocolate bar, which was scrumptious. While these cookies were a bit more breadlike than I had anticipated, who doesn’t love bite-sized chocolate banana bread? They were good warm, fresh out of the oven. They were were good a few hours later when they had cooled completely. And they were good the next day when I brought them into the office to share (after having one for breakfast too).

Banana Chocolate Chunk Cookies
Recipe inspired by Afri Chef

3/4 cup butter
1 egg
1 cup mashed ripe banana
1 cup sugar
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup chocolate chips or 1 chocolate bar roughly chopped

Preheat oven to 400° F. Grease a baking sheet (or you can use an ungreased cookie sheet).

In a large bowl, add flour and baking soda and mix well. Add remaining ingredients and mix well. Drop by tablespoon or so (depending on how large you want the cookies) onto the baking sheet. Bake for 10-12 minutes just until they begin to turn golden brown. They will finish cooking when they’re removed from the oven. Allow to cool at least 10 minutes.