I love icing, but not fluffy cake. I know, I’m the odd one out, but stick with me here. To fulfill my cravings I frost another delicious dessert, cookies! Recently, I got the wild idea to create some unique frosted fillings for holiday sandwich cookies, and these delicious beauties were born: Mint Chocolate Chip, Lemon-Iced Gingerbread, Berry Sugars, and Maple-Doodles.
I used an assortment of Enjoy Life Cookies in these recipes because a) they come in so many awesome mix & match flavors for making holiday sandwich cookies with both crunchy and soft options; b) they are just so darn good that EVERYONE likes them (and almost everyone can eat them – they’re allergy-friendly); c) they’re dairy-free and gluten-free so both Tony and I get to indulge; and d) they are perfect for joining in the virtual Gluten-Free Cookie Exchange!
Check out all 18 recipes in our virtual gluten-free cookie exchange, listed in the order they appear in the photo, left to right, row by row:
- Gluten-free Chocolate Chip Butterscotch Cookies Recipe from Vegetarian Mamma
- Dairy-free Gluten-free Vegan Orange Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe from Sarah Bakes Gluten Free
- Gluten-free Snickerdoodles Recipe from Only Taste Matters
- Dairy-Free Gluten-free Vegan Ninjabread Men Recipe from Flippin’ Delicious
- Dairy-Free Gluten-free Vanilla Wafers Recipe from gfJules
- Dairy-Free Gluten-free Cranberry Bliss Oatmeal Cookies Recipe from Making It Milk Free
- Dairy-Free Gluten-free Strawberry Thumbprints Recipe from Learning to Eat Allergy-Free
- Dairy-Free Gluten-free Holiday Sandwich Cookie Assortment Recipes from Go Dairy Free
- Gluten-free Cranberry Lime Cornmeal Cookies Recipe from Cafe Johnsonia
- Gluten-free Caramel Hot Chocolate Cookies Recipe from Faithfully Gluten Free
- Dairy-Free Gluten-free No Bake S’mores Cookies Recipe from My Gluten-free Kitchen
- Dairy-free Gluten-Free Sugar Cookies Recipe from Allergy Free Alaska
- Gluten-free Pfeffernusse Recipe from Fearless Dining
- Gluten-free Dark Chocolate Peppermint Cookies Recipe from Maebells
- Dairy-Free Gluten-free Flourless Chocolate Pecan Cookies Recipe from Around My Family Table
- Dairy-Free (option) Gluten-free Chocolate Gingerbread Bars Recipe from Gluten-Free Palate
- Gluten-free Snickerdoodles Recipe from Gluten-Free Homemaker
- Gluten-free Christmas Wreath Cookies Recipe from Gluten-free Frenzy
So which holiday sandwich cookies are my favorites? I have to go with the Mint Chocolate Chip filling with Soft Baked Double Chocolate Brownie Cookies (pictured at the top of this post and in the image below; with crunchy cookies just above – awesome from frozen!) followed by the Berry Creme Filling with Sugar Crisp Hand-Crafted Crunchy Cookies (pictured just above). But I must admit, they’re all pretty darn amazing.
This post is sponsored by Enjoy Life Foods, but we have been big fans (and consumers) of their cookies for years!
Special Diet Notes: Holiday Sandwich Cookies with Fun Homemade Cookie Fillings
By ingredients, all of the flavors below are dairy-free / non-dairy, egg-free, gluten-free, nut-free, peanut-free, soy-free, vegan / plant-based, vegetarian, and generally top food allergy-friendly.
- ¾ cup powdered sugar
- ¼ cup non-hydrogenated shortening*
- Pinch salt
- ½ teaspoon peppermint extract
- Matcha powder, optional (for color, but tasty too!)
- 2 tablespoons Enjoy Life Mini Chocolate Chips
- 1 teaspoon lemon extract (or to taste)
- Turmeric, optional (for color)*
- ¼ cup freeze-dried raspberries, ground into a powder**
- ¾ teaspoon pure vanilla flavoring or extract
- ½ teaspoon maple flavoring
- To make the filling, place the powdered sugar, shortening, and salt in a medium bowl and mix until smooth (a hand mixer helps). It will be dry at first, but should come together.
- Stir in the add-ins for your desired flavor (using the color ingredients as needed to get the shade you desire). The mixture should be quite thick, like an Oreo icing. But if too thick, you can add a little more shortening - it will still be quite sweet!
- Mint Chocolate Chocolate Chip - I use Enjoy Life Soft Baked Double Chocolate Brownie Cookies or Handcrafted Crunchy Double Chocolate Cookies
- Lemon-Iced Gingerbread - I use Enjoy Life Soft Baked Gingerbread Spice Cookies
- Raspberry Sugars - I use Enjoy Life Handcrafted Crunchy Sugar Crisp Cookies
- Maple-Doodles - I use Enjoy Life Soft Baked Snickerdoodles
**I use a spice grinder to quickly grind the freeze-dried raspberries into a powder. Can't find raspberries? Sub in your favorite freeze-dried berries!
146 Comments
We love snickerdoodles in our house!
Will have to try for my pn, tn, egg and milk protein anaphylactic son. He loves any cookie that is safe for him!
These are so fun and so easy! What a fantastic idea!
These look so delicious, Alisa!! 🙂 I can’t even decide what filling I like best, I just want all of them!!!
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my favorite would have to be chocolate and mint for the holidays… and I do this often with the Enjoy Life cookies – make my own frostings for them! 🙂
That’s awesome! I bet you have some on your blog, too 🙂
My favorite holiday cookie is Gingerbread Spice! Yummy yummy!
YUM YUM and more YUM! I need to make these yummy dairy free treats!
gingerbread men with lots of icing and candy accessories are my fave
I like 7 layer cookies.
Hm… have to say that my favourite traditional holiday cookies are gingersnaps. But I have a new recipe for a chocolate chip cookie with toffee and pretzels that I’m dying to try out! 😀
Ooh, that does sound divine!
I Would love to make these. My daughter would love having the chance to make and eat them, our favorite cookie would have to be our homemade traditional sugar cookies! Yummy
Tough question! When it comes to favorite crowd-pleasing cookie for gift giving, I would have to go with millionaire’s shortbread bars, but for me personally, I would go with peppermint matcha pizzelle cookies. Of course, those preferences tend to change every year!
Those sound crazy good and so unique!
I only made them once, and my husband keeps asking me to make them again, but we both loved the Carrot Cookie Sandwich cookie that I made. It was so moist and had a cream cheese filling inbetween. I would need to make them gluten free now, so I would have to try and see what I could come up with, but they are sooooo good!! Thank you for the giveaway!! Love these cookies too! <3
Oh yum, I bet those are phenomenal Lori!
I love pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and candy-cane cookies. I think a gingersnap/eggnog sandwich cookie would be amazing!
I was thinking about an eggnog filling, too – could be good but tricky!
Without a doubt my favorite cookie would have to be gingerbread. 🙂 I love spices.
customizable and sweet- These are my kind of sandwich cookies! 🙂
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OMG, I want to eat them all! I LOVE Enjoy Life cookies. In fact, I just bought two more boxes today. My son is in a tree nut free classroom and they are perfect for sending him for a snack. My favorite holiday cookie would have to be gingerbread, but snickerdoodles are a close second because we always had them with my Dad’s family at every holiday!
I have been wanting to try these, I will have to get a box soon.
My favorite cookie recipe is Russian Tea Cakes, also known as Mexican Wedding Cookies. I substitute butter with Earth Balance Spread.
Good to know those types of cookies work well with Earth Balance – thanks Jordan!