Easy Peanut Butter-Oatmeal-Banana Cookies

Peanut butter and banana are meant to be together! These healthy oatmeal cookies combine the two in sweet glory for a dessert you can eat for breakfast.

There’s something about the combination of peanut butter and banana that’s so deeply satisfying and delicious, it’s hard to imagine one without the other. I ate lots of this combination on toast and sandwiches, both as a child and as a college student, and I still eat it today. Not only do peanut butter and banana fix hunger pangs right up, but they’re both nutritious and inexpensive ingredients—making them essential healthy grocery items for working families and college students.

You can combine them on toast, but you can also mix them in plenty of other ways, including in cookies. When I was avoiding gluten a few years back, I stumbled upon a gluten-free oatmeal cookie recipe that incorporated bananas and peanut butter, and it was a game changer. I ate those tasty little morsels for breakfast, snacks, and dessert… and once, I even ate them for lunch.

This easy-as-pie cookie recipe is full of peanuts and peanut butter, mashed ripe banana, and healthy oats. They can act like a meal if you want them to, or they can be a sweet treat at the end of your long day—and they’re absolutely divine with a glass of milk. If you’re as into peanut butter as I am, you can even drizzle on some extra peanut butter after they’re baked.

Are These Easy Peanut Butter Oatmeal Banana Cookies Healthy?

Yes! These cookies are oat-based and don’t contain any white flour or butter, which makes them healthier than most cookies. The sweetness in these cookies comes entirely from mashed ripe banana and coconut sugar, which are both natural and unrefined forms of sugar. Peanut butter and peanuts are both full of protein and healthy unsaturated fats, while bananas provide lots of potassium, fiber, and vitamins B6 and C. Oats are high in fiber, naturally low in fat, and deliver lots of other important nutrients in trace amounts.

These nutrient-dense cookies are gluten-free and vegan, too. So go ahead, eat some for breakfast!

Building On The PB-Banana Combo

Even though I’m obsessed with peanut butter and banana flavor symbiosis, my kitchen creativity gets the better of me every time I make these. That means I’ve added all kinds of great stuff to this recipe, and I’ve ended up with a lot of tasty cookies as a result. Here are a few variations I’ve found to be excellent.

• Add dark chocolate chunks to the batter: This addition turns your cookies into a dark chocolate dream!
• Drizzle melted chocolate on top instead of peanut butter: Reese’s cup with oats, anyone? That’s basically what your cookie is when there’s chocolate on top. You can drizzle the peanut butter on, too, for extra decadence.
• Substitute pecans for peanuts: The only thing better in these cookies than peanuts is pecans, in my opinion!
• Substitute golden raisins for peanuts: The peanut butter still holds down the nutty flavor without the peanuts, and the golden raisins give the cookie a PB and J vibe. You can keep the peanuts in if you like, but you risk the cookies being a bit too “stuffed.”

Serving Suggestions

Serve these tasty cookies with a tall glass of milk, whatever type you enjoy. They make a great quick breakfast alongside something with a little more protein, such as a Boiled Egg or some Scrambled Egg Whites. For dessert, you can eat them warm out of the oven with one of these Almond Joy Coconut Ice Cream Bars, or perhaps some delicious Frozen Yogurt.

Recipe