Vegan Chai Coconut Oatmeal Cookies are 1 bowl, gluten-free, oil-free and infused with a delicious blend of chai spices, oats, coconut, cashew butter and almond butter! These are incredibly chewy with crispy edges and are also dairy-free and oil-free. Just 8 ingredients and ready in 20 minutes!
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VEGAN CHAI COCONUT OATMEAL COOKIES
People are always surprised to hear that I love spiced desserts more than chocolate. These Vegan Chai Coconut Oatmeal Cookies are the kind that it’s hard to not eat half the batch within minutes. That’s when you know that you got a good recipe on your hands.
Chai spice I have major deep love for. Especially, these Vegan Gluten-free Chai Waffles. I just love the way all the different spices bounce around your tongue and linger in the back of your throat. Add them with a hot drink like tea or coffee and oh my, pure heaven.
These Vegan Chai Coconut Oatmeal Cookies were inspired by my super popular Grain-Free Chocolate Coconut Cookies. Using coconut in those gave them a delicious, extra layer of chewiness, without them tasting like coconut. Just as I mentioned in that post that even coconut-haters would love them, all the feedback flooding in said the same thing.
HOW TO MAKE VEGAN CHAI COCONUT OATMEAL COOKIES
For this easy 1 bowl cookie recipe, you will need:
- Old-fashioned rolled oats and oat flour
- shredded coconut
- baking soda
- raw cashew butter (I make my own here since store-bought tends to be roasted and with added oil, which will not work well)
- roasted almond butter
- pure maple syrup
- chai spice blend
Step 1: Make the chai cookie batter. Chill the batter for 30 minutes in the fridge before baking. This will help the cookies to hold their shape better and puff up more.
Step 2: Add about 2 tablespoons worth of batter to the cookie sheet using a cookie scoop, spaced 2 inches apart, as they will spread a ton.
Step 3: Fill a small bowl with water and dip your fingertips in the water to press down each cookie to 1/2 inch thick. Don’t press them down to flat or they will over-bake, they will flatten out as they cook. Repeatedly dip your fingertips as needed, shaking excess water off and form the edges of the cookies into a round shape. Remember, the better you shape them, the more uniformed they will bake up.
Step 4: Bake at 350 for 10-11 minutes until puffed up and spread into nice giant cookies and have a warm golden color. Be careful about over-baking these or they will dry out from the coconut!
WHY I USE CASHEW BUTTER AND ALMOND BUTTER
As you’ll notice, there is 2 nut butters used in this recipe. I made an amazing discovery while creating this recipe. Typically when I create cookie recipes or baked goods, I use 1 nut butter and it’s usually either cashew butter or almond butter. This time though I decided to use mostly cashew butter and then a small amount of roasted almond butter. Using all almond butter is way too strong of a flavor competing with the chai spices. But adding a small amount lets them shine and deepens the flavor of the spices, without overpowering them.
Other Delicious Vegan Cookies to try:
If you make this recipe, be sure to leave feedback below and share your pic on Instagram or Facebook and tag me @thevegan8 #thevegan8!
Vegan Chai Coconut Oatmeal Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups (125g) old-fashioned rolled oats (not instant!)
- 1/2 cup (64g) superfine oat flour (up to 2 tablespoons (16g) more if needed)
- 1/2 cup (40g) shredded unsweetened coconut
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1 1/2 tablespoons chai spice blend (store-bought or use my blend below)
- 3/4 cup (240g) pure maple syrup
- 1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons (160g) raw cashew butter (with no added oil, I make my own here)
- 2 tablespoons (32g) super creamy roasted almond butter
CHAI SPICE BLEND (use all of this for the recipe above)
- 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground cardamom
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
NOTE
- Always use a scale for accuracy when baking, following MY gram weights listed. You never need cups, just the scale and bowl and make sure to zero out in between each ingredient.
- I use this scale.
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F and line 2 sheet pans with parchment paper.
- To a large bowl, add the oats, oat flour, coconut, baking soda, salt and chai spice blend and whisk very well until thoroughly blended.
- To the same bowl, add the syrup, cashew butter and almond butter and mix for a good couple of minutes until the batter becomes very thick and sticky. If your batter seems to be a tad loose after mixing a couple of minutes, add the extra 2 tablespoons of flour. Your batter will be determined by the thickness of your nut butters. Warning: the batter is addictive.
- Chill the batter for a minimum of 30 minutes in the fridge before baking. This will help the cookies to hold their shape better and puff up more.
- After chilling, add about 2 tablespoons worth of batter to the cookie sheet using a cookie scoop, spaced 2 inches apart, as they will spread a ton. 10 for each sheet.
- Fill a small bowl with water and dip your fingertips in the water to press down each cookie to 1/2 INCH (no less) thick. The batter will be way too sticky to do without dipping your fingers in water. Don't press them down too flat or they will over-bake and spread out too much-they will flatten out as they cook. Repeatedly dip your fingertips as needed, shaking excess water off and press and form the edges of the cookies into a round shape. Remember, the better you shape them, the more uniformed they will bake up, as they will bake up in the shape your form them in.
- Bake for 12-13 minutes. They should have puffed up and spread beautifully and have a nice warm, golden color. Remove and leave to cool on the pan for 10-15 minutes, so the bottoms firm up. Transfer them using a thin metal SPATULA to cool on a wire rack. Don't remove them with your hands or they will tear on the bottoms. It's important to let them cool for the first 10 minutes, as they firm up a lot as they cool, otherwise they are too crumbly while warm.
- You may need to bake them the first time to see if you would like them baked another minute or two, as this will greatly vary depending on the climate, your oven and nut butters used. I like to leave mine stored on the cookie rack with a towel covering them. Since these do soften after several hours, I find they store better NOT in a sealed container but on a plate or rack.
I love these cookies. I had thought the Cardamon Pecan Sandies of yours was my fav, but after trying these we have a new winner. So good, chai flavor in a creamy oatmeal cookie. Thank you!
Thank you so much Michelle for the awesome review! So glad you love these!
Hi! Lovely recipe ! Do you think I could sub all maple syrup or part of it with mashed banana?
Many thanks
That would definitely change the texture too more dense and less sweet. I really don’t know since I’ve never tried it!
I absolutely love these cookies! Thank you Brandi, AGAIN, for another amazing recipe! I do use all almond butter, because I love it and always have on hand, and they’re delicious! Even my grandkids love them and that’s another win in my book! 😋
Brandi, Brandi, Brandi…thanks for another great recipe! You are the one that brought me to the “chai side-via your cookbook” and my taste buds thank you! I love almond butter and used only that in the recipe and the fact that they’re GF (which I am trying to transition to) makes me feel less guilty as I indulge. 😋
So thrilled these were such a hit Mary!
BTW…I just made your lemon cream sauce from your cookbook and WOW, another delightfully scrumptious recipe! Made my taco salad taste even better. I’ll be dipping my veggie sticks (and fingers) into it today. 😋
These are our new favorite cookie here!! So so good and very easy to make! Was able to clean up while they refrigerated 🤣
Yay, that is wonderful Kelly!
We loved these! Flavor was outstanding. I flash froze them then kept them in the fridge. I’d love to replace all or most of the maple syrup with coconut sugar. Do you think that would work out well?
Hi Linda, so happy to hear that! You could sub with agave but not sugar. The recipe ratios have a balance of liquid to dry so eliminating all the liquid from the syrup won’t work. Also syrup and coconut sugar bake up differently, so changing the ingredients, based on the other ingredients working together would cause a different result by changing it. So, another liquid sweetener would be the best option.
Instead of the coconut, might vegan chocolate chips work in this recipe?
I love the flavor combo of chai and dark chocolate/cocoa.
I suppose so! The coconut does add to thicken the batter, so you might need to add a touch more oats maybe, but not too much.
Hi Brandi, ýou have mentioned no quick or instant oats, just curious about how this will affect the cookies in case quick oats is used? I want to try this recipe but just wanted to know before I try. Thanks for your recipe.
Since quick oats are so much smaller, they will fill up more of the dough batter, making the cookies more dry. So I would suggest using less then!
L LOVE these! I will certainly make them again and again. One thing, that cashew butter business….um no. I will just buy some next time. Maybe it’s my food processor but after 20 minutes and switching to the VitaMix even though you warned me, I still ended up with a Play-Doh like consistency. I made it work.
For the second batch, I added raisins.
So glad I found you.
Thanks.
Delicious! I subbed the cashew and almond butter for Nutzo brand nut and seed butter (first ingredient listed is cashews). They turned out great!
So happy you loved these, thank you Rebecca!