3 years ago

Weekly Spotlight: How to Bake the Perfect Vegan Holiday Cookies!

Holiday baking season is here and you might be gearing up for your own holiday cookie bake-off! You can definitely make vegan or plant-based cookies to bring and to wow your guests. The key to making amazing vegan cookies is understanding how to bake cookies and how to make them vegan. First is understanding what you’re going to have to replace. Usually, with cookies, it’s just butter and eggs, but depending on your baking needs, you might also need to make your cookies gluten-free. Check out this Ultimate Gluten-Free Vegan Baking Substitution Guide to have your gluten-free baked goods turn out amazing! Either way, check out these tips for How to Avoid 6 Common Baking Mistakes.

For replacing butter and eggs, use vegan butter and you can use flax eggs, chia eggs, or vegan egg substitutes. There are even unsalted dairy-free butter if you need them. In some recipes, a wonderful plant-based alternative like applesauce or banana works well. For egg white substitutes, you can use agar powder or aquafaba (chickpea brine) for it. If you need more information about how to bake and cook without using eggs, check out this guide How to Cook and Bake Without Eggs!

These holiday cookies are perfect for your holiday bake off, but also make a wonderful treat to share with friends and family around the holidays. If you’re looking for more ideas, check out these 25 Plant-Based Holiday Cookie Recipes That Will Fill Your Home With Cheer and even Celebrate National Cookie Day With These 15 Vegan Christmas Cookies!

We also highly recommend downloading the Food Monster App — with over 20,000 delicious recipes, it is the largest meatless, vegan, plant-based, and allergy-friendly recipe resource to help you get healthy! And don’t forget to check out our Weekly Meal Plan Archives!

This week, we’re bringing delicious, fully vegan, and plant-based ways to make the perfect holiday cookies!

Quick Tips For Amazing Holiday Cookies:

You don’t need a hand mixer for creaming together your vegan butter and sugars. You can stir it together by hand, if needed, and even get your kids involved to help. However, for recipes that call for using a hand mixer, the fluffier the butter and sugar, the better the cookies.
While the cookies are baking, keep the oven door closed. Opening the oven door makes lets out the heat that’s needed to bake your cookies. Instead, turn on the oven light and watch the cookie magic happen!
Make sure you let the cookies cool a bit before eating. This helps them firm up a bit so you can pick them up. Don’t worry, if you’re aiming for soft cookies, they’ll still be soft even if you let them cool.
Wait until the cookies are cool before you decorate them. If you’re decorating warm cookies, the icing will melt and get messy. For recipes where you’re looking to create snowmen or snowflakes, it’s best to let the cookies cool completely so your design will come out neat and even.

Joining the Bake-Off

Source: Soft Baked Snickers Cookies

These cookies are perfect to share with family and friends, and even include in your holiday cookie bake-off! Depending on what you want to include on the holiday dessert table, these cookies are here to give you some ideas. Have you ever thought of using rosemary in chocolate chip cookies or creating amazingly chewy double chocolate cookies? Look no further!

Cookies to Decorate

Source: Holiday Gingerbread Cookies

These classic holiday cookies are sure to win the day at your holiday table or for your cookie decorating competition! These cookies also make wonderful gifts for family and friends and can be a great way to get kids involved in the kitchen.

Holiday Cookies

Source: Soft and Chewy Ginger Molasses Cookies

The best part of baking holiday cookies is choosing what flavor combinations you want to create! These cookies are perfect to make around the holidays so you can explore different textures and sorts of cookies without having to start from scratch. Try out these Blood Orange and Rosemary Cornmeal Cookies by Alice Carbone Tench or these Sweet Potato Christmas Cookies by Sara Oliveira! You can even whip up a batch of these Christmas Hazelnut Cookies with Homemade Nutella by Lena Novak! If you’re looking for a twist on gingerbread cookies, try out these Lemon Gingerbread Thumbprint Cookies by Robin Browne!

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