Grain free paleo gingerbread cookies are so easy to make and are even healthy for you! Only a few ingredients are needed for these refined sugar-free, vegan, and gluten-free holiday treats!
The major benefit to writing a cookbook on kale during the holidays is yinning the Christmas cookie yang. Kale salad affords you things like cookies and booze. Between detoxing and re-toxing, we’ve got to end up somewhere, and that somewhere is right where we should be: smack dab in the middle of an equation that is reconciled by kale and cookies.
But hold the phone. We can do this holiday thing without kale, detoxing, OR New Years Resolutions if we want to. We can find healthful alternatives to the bane of our ass’s existence (in this context, the bane of our ass’s existence is sugar and wheat. Just to be clear).
A couple of weeks ago, I showed you 50 Gluten Free Christmas Cookie Recipes and figured it would be wise to actually test a couple of the recipes I told you to make. Call it my civic duty. I was intrigued by the idea of gluten free gingerbread cookies. So I poked around my own post.
One of the recipes I settled on was for these Paleo Gingerbread Cookies from The Iron You < – – – cool blog! – – – > and I was amazed by how they turned out. The recipe is not only paleo (no grains, dairy or sugar), but it’s also vegan. So I was skeptical. I figured the cookies would crumble or turn out rock solid.
Neither one of those things happened. These are perfect. They have a nice little crunch on the outside and are soft on the inside. And they’re PACKED with gingerbread flavor. There’s nothing toxifying about them, which means you can save your re-toxing cookies in your cookie bank to be redeemed later following a high-octane kale dish.
Between these cookies, vegan eggnog, and eggnog bread with boozy maple glaze, we’re set to have a decadent Christmas without the need for post-holiday psychosis. We can eat amazing things without having to compensate with kale. But we should still eat kale. Because that’s how kale cookbooks sell.
Note: this recipe was updated 12/11/14. This was the original photo:
Eat them healthy cookies!
Ingredients
- 1-1/4 cup tightly packed blanched almond flour
- 2 tablespoons tapioca flour
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
- 1-1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1 tablespoon fresh ginger peeled and grated
- 1/4 cup unsulphured molasses
- 5 tablespoons coconut oil melted and cooled*
Instructions
-
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
-
Add the first eight ingredients (dry) to a bowl and mix together.
-
Pour in the molasses and oil and mix well.
-
Use a spoon to scoop out mounds of cookie dough. Form the dough into cookie shapes (they will bake to the same size and shape you form them into) and place them on a baking sheet.
-
Bake for 9 to 14 minutes or until browned around the edges (bake 9 for chewier soft cookies and 12-14 for snappy cookies).
-
Allow cookies to cool at least 10 minutes before removing from the cookie sheet and enjoying
Recipe Notes
If you don't have nutmeg and cloves on hand, you can omit them and use 1/2 teaspoon of allspice
Aubs
Sunday 6th of December 2015
Hello, can you use brown rice flour in place of almond flour/meal?
Thanks!
Arabella
Wednesday 21st of October 2015
I just made these cookies this morning. They were very easy to make and delicious! The smell coming out of the oven was divine.
After mixing them up, the batter was crumbly and didn't stick together, so I added one egg, which did the trick. I also added about 1/4 teaspoon of salt to bring out all the wonderful fall flavors. I pinched off very small balls of dough and rolled them in my hands and then gently pressed the backs of them with my palm to make a bunch of mini cookies instead of 6 large ones. YUM!
Betse
Tuesday 13th of October 2015
Can I swap out the almond flour for coconut flour?
Julia
Wednesday 14th of October 2015
Hi Betse, coconut flour absorbs much more liquid than almond flour, so you'd need to adjust the liquid portions in the recipe as well. Probably the easiest thing to do would be to find a gingersnap/gingerbread cookie that calls for coconut flour :) Hope that helps!
Michelle
Tuesday 23rd of December 2014
The dough was too dry to bind. Thoughts? Everything was carefully measured.
Lauren
Wednesday 24th of December 2014
Same thing happened to me!!!!
Julia
Tuesday 23rd of December 2014
Honestly, I have no idea what could have happened...I've made the recipe 3 times and never had that issue. Sounds like the dough just needed more coconut oil (or more molasses if you wanted the cookies to be sweeter). Let me know if you try another go at the cookies and what changes you make :)
Kristen
Thursday 18th of December 2014
Yes, had to say these were not for me - too bland and not something yummy I would want to give others - nice idea but less than happy final product :(
Julia
Saturday 20th of December 2014
Hmm..did you make any changes to the recipe? I thought the cookies were packed with flavor, so I'm surprised you found them bland. Maybe some extra cinnamon and ginger next time around?