Vegan Snickerdoodle Cookies
Soft, chewy and just the right amount of tang, these vegan snickerdoodle cookies are the perfect holiday treat and made healthier.
Cookie season is my favorite season. I use it as my excuse to recipe test as many cookies as I can…it’s for the blog! But truly it’s for me…and you of course! These Snickerdoodles are especially special to me because they are one of my favorite cookies. Their unique sugary and tangy flavor always has my heart.
Why You’ll Love These Cookies
- These cookies are soft & chewy. They are the kind of cookie with the perfect center that stays soft even after day 1, if they even last that long.
- Completely vegan and made without butter. As I’ve mentioned in some previous posts. For foods I love to eat frequently (like cookies), I often try to replace ingredients higher in saturated fat like butter with whole fats like cashew butter. Also helps to provide more fiber, which is an added bonus.
- Easy to make and you make the dough in just one bowl. Just mix the wet, then the dry, roll into dough balls and roll into the cinnamon sugar coating. Bake and enjoy.
Key Ingredients and Substitutions
- Cashew Butter: Instead of butter, I opted to use cashew butter as an alternative. This also helps keep the saturated fat down, which is a big point personally for me. Cashew butter is pretty neutral in flavor, so if you plan to make a swap, I’d suggest using a creamy almond butter (if you have access to a Trader Joe’s, my favorite is their raw almond butter).
- Vegan Yogurt: I used a plain unsweetened vegan soy yogurt by Silk for this, but you can also do this with other plain unsweetened yogurts as well. The yogurt helps keeps the cookies very soft. I have tested with and without the yogurt and honestly recommend keeping it in the cookie for the perfect texture.
- Aquafaba: This is the leftover liquid you get from a can of chickpeas, and it is used as an egg replacer. I like to open my can and drain the liquid out into a jar and use that as needed for recipes. You can use the leftover chickpeas to make something tasty like these Chipotle Orange Chickpeas.
- Light Brown Sugar: I use organic light brown sugar to ensure that the sugar is indeed vegan. The natural molasses in the sugar also helps to further make these cookies ultra soft.
- Cream of Tartar: This ingredient is pretty essential for your snickerdoodle cookies. It’s what gives snickerdoodles their distinct taste.
- Cinnamon: Goes into our dough and also mixes with our sugar coating.
How to Make Vegan Snickerdoodle Cookies
Start by mixing your wet ingredients together in a bowl along with your sugar, salt, cream of tartar and baking soda.
Now add in your flour and fold it into your wet mix until a smooth mix forms. Before forming cookie shapes, combine your sugar and cinnamon in a separate small bowl and set to the side.
Take a cookie scoop or 1 1/2 tablespoons of dough and roll into a dough ball. Carefully toss your cookie in the cinnamon sugar mixture to coat and then place the dough ball on a lined baking tray.
Tips for a Soft and Chewy Cookie
- Spoon your flour into a measuring cup or use a food scale. Avoid sticking your measuring cup into the bag of flour when measuring. Instead, use a spoon to scoop flour into the measuring cup. This will prevent you from having a cookie that is too floury, which will dry out your dough and make your cookies hard.
- Use light brown sugar instead of white sugar. Brown sugar is moist and soft because it has the natural molasses mixed into it. If you don’t have brown sugar, use regular white sugar and add 1 teaspoon of blackstrap molasses to your wet ingredients.
- You don’t need to chill your dough. Chilling the dough may result in a more cakey cookie result. We want these to be melt in your mouth kind of chewy.
- Press down on the cookie dough balls before placing in the oven. Because of the nature of the ingredients, these cookies do not spread. To help them achieve the perfect shape, lightly press down on the cookie dough before baking in the oven.
- Cooking time does matter. For a super soft cookie, bake for 9-10 minutes and leave undisturbed on the baking tray when they come out of the oven to cool. If you want a firmer cookie that has more of a crispy edge, cook for 11-12 minutes.
Frequently Asked Questions
I have only tested these cookies with all-purpose flour. If you wish to make a gluten-free snickerdoodle, I highly recommend these gluten-free and vegan snickerdoodle cookies by Veggiekins.
The cream of tartar helps to give your cookies that classic tangy flavor associated with snickerdoodles. It also helps keep your cookie soft and chewy. While you can replace the baking soda and cream of tartar with baking powder, it won’t yield the same cookie. I highly recommend getting the cream of tartar for the classic cookie flavor, so make some sugar cookies instead.
Chilling is not required with these cookies. Once you mix your ingredients, grab a cookie scoop and roll the cookies into balls. If the flour is measured correctly, you should have dough that you can roll in your hands without it sticking. They will be soft, so be careful with the dough.
If you’d like to make these cookies nut free, you can try these with vegan butter, creamy natural sunflower butter or try it with tahini if you love the flavor of tahini (use a good quality tahini for best results).
Storage
These cookies will stay soft and chewy for 5 days in an airtight container at room temperature. If you want to keep them longer, freeze them! Wait for them to cool and then place them in an airtight container or freezer bag and place in the freezer for up to 1 month.
More Holiday Cookies to Try
- Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookies
- Chewy Ginger Molasses Cookies
- Double Chocolate Peppermint Cookies
- Cowboy Cookies
- Vegan Thumbprint Cookies
- Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies
Vegan Snickerdoodle Cookies
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 20 minutes
- Yield: 15–16 cookies 1x
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
- Diet: Vegan
Description
Soft, chewy and just the right amount of tang, these vegan snickerdoodle cookies are the perfect holiday treat and made healthier.
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup creamy cashew butter, salted
- 4 tbsp aquafaba
- 2 tbsp vegan yogurt
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp almond extract, optional
- 1/2 cup organic light brown sugar, packed
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp cream of tartar
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 cup (125 g) all-purpose flour, (spoon & leveled)
Sugar Coating
- 3 tbsp organic cane sugar
- 1 tsp cinnamon
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350F. In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine your cashew butter, aquafaba, vegan yogurt, vanilla extract, almond extract and brown sugar then mix everything together.
- Add your cinnamon, cream of tartar, baking soda and salt and mix to well combine into the wet ingredients.
- Now spoon and level your flour into a measuring cup and add to the wet ingredients. Fold the flour together until a slightly sticky dough appears.
- In a small bowl, combine your sugar and cinnamon and mix well.
- With a cookie scoop or tablespoon measure, scoop equal dough into your hand and roll carefully into a ball.
- Toss the dough balls into the cinnamon sugar mixture to coat the dough and then place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
- Lightly flatten the cookies with your hand or a spatula and then place in the oven to bake for 9-10 minutes.
- Remove from the oven and allow the cookies to cool about 10 minutes before touching them as they will continue to ‘cook’ while sitting on the hot pan.
Notes
Aquafaba refers to the liquid from a can of chickpeas. I drain the liquid from the can of chickpeas into a small jar and then save the chickpeas for other recipes.
Spoon your flour into a measuring cup or use a food scale. Avoid sticking your measuring cup into the bag of flour when measuring. Instead, use a spoon to scoop flour into the measuring cup. This will prevent you from having a cookie that is too floury, which will dry out your dough and make your cookies stiff or cakey.
Use light brown sugar instead of white sugar. Brown sugar is moist and soft because it has the natural molasses mixed into it. If you don’t have brown sugar, use regular white sugar and add 1 teaspoon of blackstrap molasses to your wet ingredients.
Avoid chilling your dough. It will result in a more cakey cookie result. We want these to be melt in your mouth kind of chewy.
Press down on the cookie dough balls before placing in the oven. Because of the nature of the ingredients, these cookies do not spread very much.
For a super soft cookie, bake for 9-10 minutes and leave undisturbed on the baking tray when they come out of the oven to cool. If you want a firmer cookie that has more of a crispy edge, cook for 11-12 minutes.
If you tried this recipe or any other recipe on the blog, then let me know what you thought in the comments below! And if you loved it, don’t forget to rate it too. Feel free to follow on Instagram, Pinterest, and TikTok for the latest nutrition tips and recipe videos.
★ Catherine
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These are so easy to make and truly melt in your mouth! I love that you created them without butter as I also try to keep my saturated fat consumption down. Cant wait to share them with my family!