Menses munchies: Faux Starbucks ginger molasses cookies

By Giselle Wedemire
 
Welcome back to Menses Munchies, a feature just for us girls where I regularly spotlight sweet, calorific vegan treats that I've found help me chase away my menstrual camps and make me feel less like an ogre that's set on destroying the nearest village.

For me, PMS is a sneaky bugger that creeps up on me gradually like a tip-toeing Scooby Doo villain until it's finally on my heels. Before I know it - BAM - I'm sobbing into a bowl of ice cream while watching Sister Act 2. It's not even a sad movie, and yet this has definitely happened to me in the days leading up to my very own shark week.

During these times, sweet and terrible-for-me treats are a godsend, and for a while, my favourite vegan treat for PMS times was the ginger molasses cookie at Starbucks. When I first went vegan years ago, I had looked high and low on Starbucks' website, scoured the internet, and chatted with baristas before I eventually came to the conclusion that those chewy and bakery-soft morsels of heaven were indeed cruelty-free, especially since my super sensitive tummy never flipped a switch whenever I indulged.

Then, last year the coffee chain revamped its line of bakery treats by advertising that they had switched over their recipes to include 100% real butter in every product. Boo-urns, no more cookies for this vegan hormone factory.

Believe it or not, these are not actually Starbucks ginger molasses cookies.
Even better, these are homemade!

To fill the void that's now been left by those amazing vegan cookies that live on in my heart, I turn to Isa Chandra Moskowitz's timeless recipe for Sparkled Ginger Cookies (in Vegan with a Vengeance). With a few tweaks, this amazing recipe gets taken to a whole. 'nother. level.

If you follow these instructions exactly, these cookies may satiate even the most intense PMS-induced sweet tooth cravings -- and they stay incredibly soft for a homemade cookie.

To achieve mega PMS-busting cookie potential, I suggest you follow this recipe to a T in all areas except the following:

• Reduce the sugar to about 3/4 cup instead of the full cup. 
• Omit the 4 tbsp. sugar that's called for in the topping (unless you like having a sugary topping for cookies; I don't, because it makes a mess and also because I don't much care for sugar overload, so I skip this step entirely).
• Bake the cookies on a parchment paper-lined tray, one batch at a time. For the first 8 minutes, bake your cookies on the oven's top rack, then move to the lowest rack for the remaining 2 minutes. This helps your cookies to develop a crunchy exterior while letting them remain chewy and soft in the middle.

It's that easy, and if you're like me and Mr. Picky Bitch, it's super cheap to make too, because it's got really ordinary, everyday ingredients that we always have on hand. The only problem is that the cookies aren't anywhere near as big as the ones you get at Starbucks, but you can totes load up on two or three at a time to remedy that problem.

Even better than munching on a few of these bad boys during lady time is laying on a generous scoop of vanilla ice cream in between two cookies and settling in for a night of Great British Bake Off while holding a heating pad to your abdomen. #bliss

Do you have terrible-yet-tasty vegan treats that you turn to in times of PMS distress? Have you ever cried while watching Sister Act 2? Let me know by tweeting me at @PickyBitchez.