Meet my favourite holiday cookie of 2014 – the vegan and gluten-free Snickerdoodle! I’ve been testing all kinds of Christmas cookies this year and I decided to pick the best of the bunch and share that recipe with you before the holidays. The humble-looking Snickerdoodle doesn’t get enough respect in my opinion; it’s often overshadowed by spicy gingerbread, decorated sugar cookies, and fancy flavoured shortbread, but I think that needs to end today! My favourite kind of Snickerdoodle is chewy with a crisp edge, craggy/textured/crinkly, and of course, rolled in cinnamon sugar. Oh yea. I can’t get enough of the doughy, cinnamon-y simplicity.
It’s been a goal of mine to make my vegan Snickerdoodle recipe gluten-free. I actually found that I prefer this version over the one with wheat flour that I posted on the blog 4 years ago; there’s just something so flavourful about the nutty, sweet, and buttery combo of oat flour and almond flour that I adore! Whenever you want your cookies to have a lovely chewiness to them (and light buttery flavour), add a bit of almond flour into the mix. A little bit goes a long way though. I made the mistake of making a shortbread cookie entirely out of almond flour and it was way too chewy/tacky (and stuck to the teeth!) – lesson learned. I’ll nail that shortbread recipe some day, but for now…snickerdoodles!
Other exciting things about this recipe:
1) Prep time = 15 minutes, Bake time = 10 minutes
Yes, that means you can be eating these bad boys in under a half hour!! Isn’t that what it’s all about?
2) Snickerdoodles make your house smell amazing. This is the perfect recipe to pop into the oven before guests arrive.
3) For the fat component, I used virgin coconut oil instead of vegan butter. I’m happy to say it worked great and meshed with the flavours so well! Thumbs up for healthier fat swaps.
One last thing. I experimented baking the dough as balls (image left, below) and also flattening with a fork (image right). When I flattened with a fork, the cookies came out quite flat and spread out (as you’ll see in most of the photos), but when I left the dough as balls they had a bit more thickness and lift to them and weren’t as spread out. I think I prefer not flattening them out – plus it saves an extra step too. Just an FYI. You can always try some rolled and some pressed with a fork and see which you prefer!
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Snickerdoodles (vegan + gluten-free)
Yield
10-12 cookies
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
Classic Snickerdoodles made vegan and gluten-free! These cookies are crispy around the edge, chewy in the middle, and coated in a cinnamon sugar. I KNOW. For a non-gf version, try my other Snickerdoodle recipe made with whole wheat pastry flour.
Ingredients
Wet ingredients:
- 1/2 tablespoon ground flax seed + 1 1/2 tablespoons water
- 1/3 cup cane sugar (see note)
- 1/4 cup virgin coconut oil, melted
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 tablespoon almond milk (optional, see directions)
Dry ingredients:
- 1/2 cup + 1 tablespoon gluten-free oat flour*
- 1/4 cup + 3 tablespoons almond flour (not almond meal)
- 1/4 cup sorghum flour
- 2 1/2 tablespoons arrowroot powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
- 1/4 teaspoon fine grain sea salt
- Pinch of cinnamon
Cinnamon sugar topping:
- 1 tablespoon cane sugar
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
Directions
- Preheat oven to 375°F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. In a small bowl or mug, mix the flax and water to make the flax egg. Set aside.
- In a medium sized bowl stir together the sugar, melted coconut oil, and vanilla until incorporated. Add in the flax egg and stir until combined.
- In another bowl, whisk the dry ingredients together (oat flour, almond flour, sorghum flour, arrowroot powder, baking soda, cream of tartar, salt, and pinch of cinnamon). Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and stir well. The dough will be very dry at first, but it will come together if you get in there with your hands and knead it a few times. Add the optional almond milk if your dough is too dry. You need to be able to form balls of the dough without it cracking, but you don't want it super wet either (or it will spread out too much when baking).
- Mix the cinnamon and sugar together in a small bowl. Take about 1.5 tablespoons of dough and roll into a ball. Roll in cinnamon sugar and place on baking sheet at least a couple inches apart. Repeat for the rest.
- Bake for 10-11 minutes. (I baked for 10 minutes and the edges were slightly crispy after cooling.) For a soft cookie, bake less time. For a crispy cookie bake longer. Cool for about 3 minutes on the baking sheet and then transfer to a cooling rack until completely cool.
Tip:
- If you don't have store-bought oat flour you can make it at home. Simply add rolled oats into a high speed blender and blend on the highest speed until a fine flour forms.
- I don't recommend subbing the cane sugar for coconut or Sucanat sugar - in my previous trials it came out too dry.
Nutrition Information
(click to expand)PS – See all my cookie and square recipes here!
Contest Winner:
Congrats to Elicia K. for winning the big OSG Holiday Giveaway!! We have sent you an email to collect your info. Thank you for everyone who participated and gave us all kind of awesome flavour ideas for our tea! I would like one of each please.
We are gearing up for Adriana’s first Christmas and I can’t wait to experience it as a family of 3! I’m looking forward to a bit of downtime over the holidays too. While it’s been a great year, it hasn’t left me with much free time and I’m hoping to wind down and chill out with friends and family as much as possible to close out the year. And hockey, LOTS of hockey!!! hah. I’m not sure when I will be posting a recipe next, but if you’d like to see what we’re up to you can follow my weekly posts on the Baby blog until then (you can also follow @theglowspot and @ohsheglows on Instagram). And of course, take a peek at my recipe archives – there are about 500 vegan recipes to chose from.
Anyway, I’m really excited for 2015 and have some fun news coming your way in the New Year! I’m so thankful for your support this year, and every year. It’s definitely been a year I will never forget. I hope you all have an amazing holiday surrounded by family, friends, great food, and good cheer!
Has anyone tried freezing the dough to bake later? I want to make the dough ahead of time.
Hey Betsy, I haven’t tried freezing this particular dough, but I have had success freezing dough balls from my other cookie recipes before. I like to freeze the pre-portioned dough balls on a lined plate, then transfer them into a freezer bag with the air sucked out. You can thaw them at room temp before baking (and sometimes you can add an extra 4-5 mins bake time and bake directly from frozen). Again, I haven’t tried this with this particular cookie, but if you do I’d love to hear your results!
You always have amazing recipes! Can the oat flour be replaced with sorghum flour? My kiddo has an allergy to oats.
Hey Jenn, I haven’t tried it, but I can’t see why not. Please let me know if you try anything out! Id love to know how it goes.
What could be used instead of almond flour? Coconut or cashew flour?
Hey Sophia, Hmm good question! I haven’t tried anything other than almond flour. I would think cashew flour would be the closest sub if it’s very finely ground. I wouldn’t recommend coconut flour as it’s very “thirsty” and absorbs a ton of moisture in baked goods. If you try anything please let me know how it goes!
After 4 years of gluten free living, I’ve given in to one of my favorite cookies and I am not disappointed! Next time though, I may have to double the recipe as I fear half of this batch will end up in my stomach before I make it to my New Years party. Thank you!!
haha I hear you on half the batch ending up gone before a party…so happy you love it Krista!
I made these last night and they are already gone! I subbed the sorghum flour for coconut flour and they turned out great! I think I’ll add the optional almond milk next time since they didn’t really flatten though. Thanks for a new favorite recipe!
Hey Alyssa, I’m so glad they worked even with the flour swap! Coconut flour can be a tricky one so I’m surprised it worked. That’s so great!
Amazing recipe! Delicious and easy to make!!!
Hello, Angela. I have a problem with this recipe. I have made the snickerdoodles three times but they just dont want to flatten out, although I add more and more milk in the dough. Please, can you give me some advice?
Hey Ema, Hmm I’m not sure…did you make any changes (even small ones) to the recipe? Did you use almond meal instead of almond flour? Just trying to think of things that could inadvertently thicken the dough.
Hi! I’ve made these a lot and love them. THANK YOU! Do you know if I can freeze the dough?