Elizabeth Barbone

Would Enjoy Life "Oatmeal" Cookies deliver? Or is this a company with more style than substance?

I remember the first time I saw Enjoy Life products. I was visiting Madison, WI and a store there had a HUGE display set up in the gluten-free aisle. I remember thinking that the packaging was so pretty. Each box had a bold, colorful picture and the "Enjoy Life" logo was darling with a fork for the "E". But then I wondered, was this style over substance?

This thought was with me when I torn into a box of "Soft Baked No-Oats 'Oatmeal' Cookies." It had been a few years (I am guessing about four.) since I saw that original display. For some reason, I had never tried their products. Now was the moment of truth.

When I pulled out the tray, the cookies looked *just like* they did on the cover of the box. This, to me, is a good thing. I hate it when the package photo in no way looks like what is in the package. The cookies looked almost homemade, which is always a good thing.

As soon as I opened the cello wrap, I could smell sorghum flour. I won't say it was overpowering, but it did definitely smell like sorghum not oatmeal. And of course, there are no oats in these cookies. There also isn't any wheat, dairy, peanuts, tree nuts, egg, soy, fish or shellfish. This list makes up the "top ten" common food allergens. But Enjoy Life doesn't stop there! Oh, no! These cookies are also free of corn, potato, sulfites, sesame and casein. Pretty nifty, huh?

The cookies promised to be "soft." Many, many times gluten-free cookies aren't soft. They aren't even in the neighborhood of being soft. These cookies delivered. Just like the package promised, the cookies were soft!

Not only were they soft, they were superb! Studded with currants and fragrant with cinnamon and vanilla these cookies were really good! Honestly, you would *never* know they were free of all those allergens. These were just honest-to-goodness great cookies.

The only two drawbacks I noted, and these were tiny little drawbacks, was that the sorghum flour lent a slightly gritty texture to the cookies and the cookies skewed a little sweet. Neither of these attributes would stop me from buying these cookies again, or recommending them to you. Enjoy Life No-Oats Oatmeal cookies have both style and substance.

Twelve cookies come in a box and I paid $3.69 for a box. They are available at grocery stores and on-line at the Gluten-Free Trading Company

Summary: Fantastic allergen-free cookies. Nice and soft. A little sweet with a subtle gritty texture. Nice balanced flavors of spices. Three and a half stars