Vegan Cookies

March 9, 2006 1:40 PM

Anyone have an especially good recipe for vegan cookies?

OK, so there are good recipes for vegan cookies, but far more that produce inedible lumps of plant matter. Do you have a tried and true recipe that is awesome?

posted by ITheCosmos to food & drink (12 comments total)

Aren't all cookies vegan? AFAIK, I have never had a meat cookie.
posted by JJ86 at 1:50 PM on March 9, 2006

JJ86: Vegans don't eat milk, eggs, or butter (among other things).
posted by mbrubeck at 1:52 PM on March 9, 2006

I've made great vegan cookies (mostly oatmeal or oatmeal raisin) by using non-vegan recipies and simply substituting a banana for an egg and margarine for butter.
posted by helios at 1:54 PM on March 9, 2006

Same here helios. We use an egg-replacer made by Celimix, but the banana works most of the time.
posted by WinnipegDragon at 2:04 PM on March 9, 2006

I have lots of recipes for vegan cookies —I'm a vegan baker. Anything in particular you're looking for?

A couple of general things: you can substitute a good vegan margarine (Earth Balance, if it's available where you live) for butter with great success. Earth Balance also makes a good shortening. For cookies that don't need to taste buttery, use half shortening and half margarine. For the egg substitution, use Ener-G Egg Replacer if you can get it. It's a powder mix of tapioca starch, potato starch, and a couple other things that you mix with water. It works very well as a binder and doesn't leave your cookies as damp as banana or applesauce will (though those are fine substitutions, too).

If you want something specific, I'm happy to share my recipes. Feel free to email me (email's in profile).
posted by smich at 2:06 PM on March 9, 2006

I could give you a couple, but they require a dehydrator. Do you have one?

If not, how about a recipe for vegan fudge instead?
posted by dobbs at 2:07 PM on March 9, 2006

Replacing eggs in baking is easy. Mix together in a separate small bowl:

1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
2 Tbsp. flour
3 Tbsp. water

for each egg you want to replace. (You can double, triple, whatever these proportions.) Add them to whatever you're baking. I've used this very successfully in carrot cake, banana bread, gingerbread, different kinds of cookies and muffins. Just don't use it for anything that really does need eggs, like angel food cake.

You can also replace eggs with applesauce, soy flour (1 Tbsp. per egg), mashed banana, and pureed prunes. I like the above method best, though, because I always have the ingredients on hand, and it's least likely of the methods I've tried to affect the taste.

This is my default chocolate-chip cookie recipe. They're really good, and non-vegans don't notice a difference. (Two of them told me they were the Best. Cookies. Evar. actually.)

1 cup margarine (I use Celeb - it's non-hydrogenated)
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 tsp. salt
2 (homemade fake) eggs
1 Tbsp. vanilla
2-1/2 cups flour (actually, you can use up to 4 cups of flour -- the more flour you use, the denser, chewier the cookie; the amount listed here is for a texture that most people like)
1 cup nondairy semi-sweet chocolate chips (I like The Decadent by President's Choice, if you're in Canada)

1. Preheat oven to 350F. In a large bowl, cream together margarine, sugars, and salt.
2. In a small bowl, beat "eggs." Then add to margarine-sugar mixture. Add vanilla and combine. Slowly, little by little, add flour, stirring constantly to combine. Continue until all flour is well combined (it will get harder to combine the more flour you add).
3. Mix in chocolate chips. Form dough into 1-inch balls and place on an ungreased baking sheet. Then, as Laura puts it, "flatten them with a fork, wish them well, and put them in the oven." They'll be ready in about 10 to 12 minutes, or when golden brown.

Makes about 3 dozen cookies.

(both recipes are from The Teen's Vegetarian Cookbook by Judy Krizmanic)
posted by Melinika at 4:10 PM on March 9, 2006

Peanut Butter Cookies, adapted from Ten Talents:

Cream together:

.5 cups peanut butter
.5 cups honey
.25 date or raw sugar
.25 cup oil
.25 tsp salt
.5 teaspoon vanilla

Add and mix in
1 cup ww pastry flour
4 tbs wheat germ or flour

Roll into little balls and press down with a fork. Bake at 350 for 10 minutes.

You can replace the peanut butter with 50/50 almond butter and tahini, and replace some of the vanilla extract with almond extract to get yummy almond/sesame cookies.

My notes say "also good with chocolate and Kahlua" but I don't remember the details on that.
posted by alms at 5:14 PM on March 9, 2006

Chewy chocolate chocolate chip cookies I made these, and they became my roommate's favorite cookies. (Neither one of us is a vegan.) Lots of people at work loved them, too. You have to make sure you get chocolate chips that don't have dairy in them. (Cocoa butter does not have dairy in it, but lots of people think it does.)
posted by Airhen at 5:30 PM on March 9, 2006 [1 favorite]

Unbeatable vegan chocolate chip oatmeal cookie recipe

This has been a favorite of mine for years and years. I've made them dozens of times and they always come out fabulous.
posted by ursus_comiter at 6:28 PM on March 9, 2006 [1 favorite]

The only good vegan cookie is a cookie-shaped piece of dark chocolate.
posted by rxrfrx at 5:49 AM on March 10, 2006

Indian-spiced food has *the* best vegan dishes, hands down. Check out the vegan section on the Naughty Curry blog.
posted by courtney-clove at 12:20 PM on March 12, 2006