Many years ago, I was gifted a copy of The Allergen-Free Baker’s Handbook by Cybele Pascal. Everything in this sweet tome is free of gluten, dairy, eggs, peanuts, tree nuts, soy, and sesame. That includes all types of cakes, pies, pastries, and of course, cookies. I decided to try the vegan gluten-free double chocolate chip cookies first, and we weren’t the least bit disappointed. In fact, I recently decided to bake them again, and update this post with new photos, notes, and nutrition facts. And, I’m sharing it as the first recipe in our 12 days of holiday cookies!
Double Chocolate Chip Cookies made Vegan, Gluten-Free, and Nut-Free
Unlike many allergy-friendly cookies, these bake up perfectly tender and chewy. Below are some additional notes and tips for baking the best vegan gluten-free double chocolate chip cookies. And, we have a recipe video created by Cybele herself!
For Chocoholics: These are very rich chocolate cookies. They’re higher in cocoa than a lot of double chocolate chip cookies, but don’t taste like intense “dark chocolate” since they’re well balanced with sweetener. Obviously, I used dairy-free chocolate chips, not chocolate chunks, but you can choose whatever works for you.
Flour Blend Notes: The first time I baked these double chocolate chip cookies, I followed the recipe to the letter, using Cybele’s basic gluten-free flour blend. However, the second time I used King Arthur Baking Blend, since I had it on hand. The blend already contains xanthan gum, so I omitted the xanthan gum in the recipe. The cookies came out a little thicker, a touch crumbly, and they tasted a wee bit “gluten-free,” if you know what I mean. They were still delicious, but not quite as cohesive. So the flour blend you use does matter! It can also affect the baking time. So keep an eye on things if you do make changes.
Superfine Brown Rice Flour: You might notice that Cybele calls for this ingredient in her flour blend and in this chocolate chunk cookies recipe. She uses superfine brown rice flour exclusively, since it is less gritty than some brands of brown rice flour. But it can be hard to find and is often more expensive than regular brown rice flour. You can simply use regular brown rice flour. What I like to do is grind the brown rice flour in a spice / coffee grinder before using to aid in a finer grind. It’s not quite as fine, but does help.
Dough Refrigeration & Freezing: The dough is ready to go right away, but if you opt to refrigerate the dough for a few hours, it is slightly easier to shape, and the cookies bake up a little thicker. I sometimes bake just a few cookies and then keep the dough in the refrigerator for up to a week to bake on demand. You can also roll the dough balls and freeze them, to bake later. If you opt to bake all of the dough, you can freeze any leftover cookies.
Special Diet Notes: Double Chocolate Chip Cookies
By ingredients, this recipe is dairy-free / non-dairy, egg-free, gluten-free, nut-free, peanut-free, soy-free, vegan, vegetarian, and generally top food allergy-friendly.
- 1¼ cups Basic Gluten-Free Flour Blend
- ½ cup cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon cream of tartar
- ½ teaspoon xanthan gum
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ⅓ cup canola oil (or other neutral baking oil)
- ⅓ cup plain rice milk (or milk beverage of choice)
- ⅔ cup sugar
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 cup Enjoy Life ricemilk chocolate bars, chopped into chunks (about 4 [1.4-ounce] bars), or 1 cup dairy-free chocolate chips
- Preheat your oven to 325°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour mix, cocoa powder, cream of tartar, xanthan gum, baking soda, and salt until thoroughly mixes and all clumps of cocoa are broken up.
- In a large mixing bowl, beat the oil and milk alternative on medium speed for 30 seconds. Add the sugar and vanilla, and mix for 20 seconds.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients in your mixing bowl. Mix on low speed, scraping down the sides of the bowl. Fold in the chocolate chunks or chocolate chips.
- Scoop out the dough by the heaping tablespoonful and place on the baking sheets, 12 per sheet. Wet your hands with a little water and roll the dough into balls, moistening your hands again as necessary.
- Bake the cookies in the center of the oven for 12 minutes, until just set. Do not overcook, as chocolate burns easily. You want the inside to remain chewy, not dry.
- Let the cookies cool for 5 minutes on the baking sheets before transferring them to a cooling rack. They will firm up more as they cool.
More Vegan Allergy-Friendly Baked Good Recipes
Gluten-Free Red Velvet Cake with Vegan Velvet Frosting
Top Allergen-Free Brownie Bites
Allergy-Friendly Cherry Oat Scones
14 Comments
Made these and had the same issues others had. My dough came out to be pretty granular and there’d be no way to “Scoop out the dough by heaping tablespoonfuls and place on the baking sheets”, that’d just result in piles of crumbs on my sheet. That said, it did pack together surprisingly well. So I made little patties instead of balls and it turned out great! Excellent recipe I just wish the dough was a little more wet.
Interesting. It is Cybele’s recipe, but the pictures above our mine – I tried it out myself! If the dough is too dry, don’t hesitate to add another splash of liquid (water or more milk beverage). When I have a vegan cookie dough that is too dry, I just add more liquid, about 1 teaspoon at a time, until it comes together. Adding more liquid actually works well with cookies like this. However, adding more oil would make them too greasy. I hope that helps!
This is one of the most successful allergen free cookie recipes I’ve ever made! Could definitely get too dry to manipulate as others said, but I was a bit more liberal with rice milk which helped a lot. I used enjoy life chocolate chips, which for some reason I had to actually push into the dough for them to stay IN, but rolling in balls fixed that problem. End result was delicious!
So glad you enjoyed the recipe Kay! And thank you for leaving your own notes.
Made these today, not sure what, but I did something wrong. The dough was a tad dry/crumbly when I finished mixing. I think I mixed it all in too fast. Anywho, that meant they cooked in ball shape instead of melting down to gooey cookies. They still taste amazing though. I’ll just have to be mindful next time….There will be a next time.
Hi there, I just made these and followed the recipe exactly with the exception of using a different kind of chocolate chip. They taste great but did not flatten out at all….they just cooked as a ball. Any suggestions?
Hi Sharon, that’s bizarre. I’ve baked Cybele’s recipe a few times, and never had that happen. Do you live at higher altitude? The dough should be quite soft, so it shouldn’t stay in ball form. Very odd.
I have never seen cookies like these before, they sound delicious!
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Alisa,
Can I use regular flour for this recipe?
Thanks a lot
Yes, but the amounts may vary slightly – I haven’t tested it with regular flour myself. Omit the gum and use 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour. If the dough is too dry, add a splash of additional milk alternative to make it moister (since there are no eggs, do not add more oil – this can make cookies greasy). If it is too wet, add more flour as needed. For a double chocolate cookie recipe that I’ve created/tested, see my recipe in Go Dairy Free
One word … YUM! Just shared! 🙂
Shirley
Thanks Shirley!
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