These Good Night Cookies feature nutrient-dense ingredients that help support sleep. It’s a bonus that chocolate, cherries, oats, and pistachios all taste delicious in a cookie!

I developed these Good Night Cookies after stumbling on products marketed as “insomnia cookies,” which claimed to contain ingredients that help promote a good night’s sleep. I was already familiar with the nutrients in the key ingredients, and I’ve even created a previous dessert recipe (see my Good Night Cherry Crisp) that incorporated many of them. But with a house full of cookie monsters that happen to love all these ingredients, I knew I had to create my own version of sleepy-time cookies!

The key ingredients in these cookies all play different roles in supporting sleep. Tart cherries, pistachios, oats, and dark chocolate are all good sources of naturally occurring compounds that help promote relaxation and restful sleep. 

• Tart cherries and pistachios both contain naturally occurring melatonin. Our bodies naturally produce more melatonin in the evenings to prepare us for sleep, but foods that contain melatonin can help boost natural levels to promote a restful night of sleep. Melatonin helps reduce cortisol (the stress hormone), thereby helping to calm your nervous system and helping you relax.
• Pistachios are also a good source of vitamin B6, which helps your body produce melatonin. 
• Oats contain tryptophan (which you may associate with a Thanksgiving turkey and the sleepy feeling after that big meal!). Tryptophan is an amino acid that our bodies convert to serotonin and then into melatonin, making it a sleep-supporting nutrient.
• Dark chocolate contains magnesium, which helps regulate hormones like cortisol and melatonin. Magnesium supports cortisol suppression, lowering this hormone and stress along with it. Magnesium helps increase production of melatonin, which helps regulate your sleep-wake cycle. Magnesium also increases a neurotransmitter called GABA, which promotes relaxation and reduces feelings of anxiousness. 
  

It takes time for your body to digest foods and release the nutrients they contain, so I recommend having your Good Night Cookie at least two hours before bedtime. You can enhance the effectiveness of these cookies by having them with a glass of milk - I recommend regular dairy or soy milk, both of which are good sources of tryptophan. Plus, the additional protein and fat in the milk helps mitigate the blood sugar response to the sugar and carbohydrates in the cookies. And don’t discredit the carbs in these cookies, either - carbohydrates help tryptophan do it’s job!

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