Lactation cookies- what's the hype?

Any breastfeeding mamas out there struggling to keep up their milk supply for their hungry babes? I’m with you. As much as I wish I was one of those super moms who pumps 10,000oz for their freezer while still adequately feeding my baby, I’m not. I had a solid milk supply in my freezer at the beginning of my breastfeeding journey but at about 6 months in, that started dwindling. And I started to panic. I believe my decrease had a lot to do with the fact that I have to pump for 6 hours of the day when my baby is at daycare instead of being able to breastfeed her on demand. And let me just add that pumping while going to school and work is HARD. Sometimes I can't even find a place to pump at school and have to postpone a pumping session. Then my body gets confused and it's frustrating. No one told me how hard that was going to be, but that's a whole other blog post.

So naturally, I googled ways to up my supply. I settled on lactation cookies because 1. they got some decent reviews by mamas who swear by them and 2. they looked so dang good. And since apparently we burn calories while breastfeeding, we can definitely treat ourselves to a few cookies once in a while. (Especially if they could help us produce more, amiright.)

I combined a few different recipes from Pinterest and made my own recipe. GUYS I have remade these cookies probably 8 or 9 times now. I have never done that with a recipe, ever. They are THAT amazing... and I think they might work?

The brewer's yeast, oats and flax seed are all the “breastfeeding superfoods” that many say can help increase milk supply. I have heard from several moms who say that eating these foods doesn’t help, so each person is different. I personally found them to be effective. After eating a batch I went from struggling to even pump 2oz in a 30 min. session to getting around 5 oz. Whether this is mind over matter, who really knows. Maybe my supply is actually increasing because I’m eating more calories in the day. I’m ok with that. All I really wanted was an excuse to eat more cookies.

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Miracle Cookie Recipe:

Preheat oven to 375*

Ingredients:

2 tbsp. flax seed

4 tbsp. water

1 cup of butter (OR 1/2 cup applesauce and 1/2 cup coconut oil -I usually do this)

1 cup white sugar

1 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

1/3 cup peanut butter (optional)

2 cups whole wheat pastry flour (or just white all-purpose flour if you're not feeling healthy)

3 cups oats (quick or old fashioned work fine)

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

3-6 tbsp. Brewer’s Yeast (I usually do 5)

1 1/2+ cups chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Mix flax seed with water in a cup and set aside

2. Cream together the butter (or applesauce/coconut oil) and sugars.

3. Mix in the eggs

4. Add vanilla and peanut butter and mix

5. In a separate bowl, mix together flour, oats, baking soda, salt, Brewer’s Yeast

6. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix that

7. Dump in those choc. chips and mix- yay arm workout

Bake for 10ish minutes. This usually yields 3 dozen for me.