Vegan cowboy cookies are loaded with coconut, pecans, chocolate chips and oats to create a seriously delicious cookie with an amazing texture.
These vegan cowboy cookies are so divine! They’re very similar to vegan oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, with added pecans. So basically, you just can’t go wrong with that.
The idea behind the name is that they’re meant to be hearty enough for a cowboy to fuel up on when they’re out on the trail.
And I can certainly attest to the heartiness of these cookies. They also have a wholesome factor with the oats and the coconut and the brown sugar, so honestly, you could even grab one of these for breakfast if you were so inclined.
And of course if you love a hearty cookie recipe, then you’ll love our vegan oatmeal cookies, vegan pumpkin oatmeal cookies and our vegan peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.
Ingredients For Cowboy Cookies:
Ingredient Notes
- Rolled oats – also known as old fashioned oats. Don’t swap these for instant oats or quick cooking oats as they just won’t come out the same.
- Dessicated coconut – also known as finely shredded coconut or unsweetened shredded coconut.
- Soy milk – can be switched for a different non-dairy milk.
- Chopped pecans – you can do a rough chop of the pecans but keep in mind that you don’t want any of the pieces to be too large or they will make it difficult to roll your cookies into balls.
How To Make Vegan Cowboy Cookies – Step By Step
You will find full instructions and measurements in the recipe card at the bottom of the post. This is a summary of the process to go along with the process photos.
- Add rolled oats, all purpose flour, coconut, baking soda, salt and cinnamon to a mixing bowl and mix them together.
- Add vegan butter and light brown sugar to the bowl of your stand mixer and cream them together until smooth.
- Add maple syrup and vanilla extract and mix in.
- Add dry ingredients in with the wet and mix together with a spoon into a crumbly dough.
- Add soy milk and mix in.
- Add vegan chocolate chips and chopped pecans and mix them in.
- Break off pieces of the dough and roll them into balls. Try to make sure you get a roughly even amount of vegan chocolate chips and pecan pieces into each cookie.
- Place the cookies evenly onto large parchment lined baking sheets. Aim to get around 28 cookies, over two baking sheets (14 on each baking sheet).
- Place into the oven and bake at 350°F for 12 minutes. The edges should be firm and the tops lightly browned. If they are still a bit puffy, no problem.
- Press a few more chocolate chips and chopped pecan pieces into the tops of the warm and soft freshly baked cookies.
- Leave them to firm up and cool down directly on the tray.
- Your cookies are ready to serve.
Baker’s Tips
Measure the flour properly. To make sure your cookies are not dry and crumbly you need to correctly measure the flour. Either weigh it out on a food scale (ideal) or use the spoon and level method: spoon the flour into your measuring cup and level off the top with the back of a knife. Don’t scoop it and don’t pack the flour into the cup.
Spread the cookies over two trays. It’s ideal to use two large baking sheets for these cookies so that you don’t have to crowd them onto the tray.
Bake each tray separately. Bake each tray of cookies one at a time. If you stack the trays in the oven it will result in uneven baking. So just bake one tray and when that’s done, bake the second tray of cookies.
Add extra chocolate chips and chopped pecans directly to the tops of the cookies. When the cookies come out of the oven all warm and soft, press a few more chocolate chips and chopped pecans into the tops of the cookies. It looks gorgeous and brings it all together.
Cowboy Cookies FAQ
They’re called cowboy cookies because they’re hearty enough to keep a cowboy fuelled up when out on the trail, and they can also hold up super well to days of travel.
Yes you can! Just swap the regular flour for a gluten free all purpose baking blend.
Storing and Freezing
Vegan cowboy cookies store very well at room temperature for a week.
They also freeze very well for up to 3 months. You can freeze the baked cookies OR the unbaked cookie dough balls. If you freeze the unbaked cookies then you can bake them directly from frozen, just allow an extra couple of minutes baking time to account for them being frozen to begin with.
More Hearty Vegan Cookies
Did you make this recipe? Be sure to leave a comment and rating below!
Vegan Cowboy Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups Rolled Oats (150g)
- 1 cup All Purpose Flour (125g)
- 1 cup Dessicated Coconut (80g) or Unsweetened Shredded Coconut
- 1 teaspoon Baking Soda
- ½ teaspoon Salt
- 1 teaspoon Cinnamon
- ½ cup Vegan Butter (112g)
- 1 cup Light Brown Sugar (200g)
- 3 Tablespoons Maple Syrup or Golden Syrup
- 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
- 3 Tablespoons Soy Milk or other non-dairy milk
- 1 cup Vegan Chocolate Chips (175g) plus more to place directly into the tops of the freshly baked cookies
- 1 cup Chopped Pecans (110g) plus more to add directly to the tops of the freshly baked cookies
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C) and line two large cookie sheets with parchment paper.
- Add rolled oats, all purpose flour, coconut, baking soda, salt and cinnamon to a mixing bowl and mix them together.
- Add vegan butter and light brown sugar to the bowl of your stand mixer and cream them together until smooth.
- Add maple syrup and vanilla extract and mix in.
- Add dry ingredients in with the wet and mix together with a spoon into a crumbly dough.
- Add soy milk and mix in.
- Add vegan chocolate chips and chopped pecans and mix them in.
- Break off pieces of the dough and roll them into balls. Try to get a roughly even amount of vegan chocolate chips and pecan pieces into each cookie (no precision required here, just eyeball it).
- Place the cookies evenly onto your two large parchment lined baking sheets. Aim to get around 28 cookies, over two baking sheets (14 on each baking sheet).
- Place into the oven and bake for 12 minutes. The edges should be firm and the tops lightly browned. If they are still a bit puffy, no problem.
- Press a few more chocolate chips and chopped pecan pieces into the tops of the warm and soft freshly baked cookies.
- Leave them to firm up and cool down directly on the tray.
Notes
- Rolled oats – also known as old fashioned oats. Don’t swap these for instant oats or quick cooking oats as they just won’t come out the same.
- All purpose flour – must be measured properly. Either weigh it out on a food scale (ideal) or use the spoon and level method: spoon the flour into your measuring cup and level off the top with the back of a knife. Don’t scoop it and don’t pack the flour into the cup.
- Dessicated coconut – also known as finely shredded coconut or unsweetened shredded coconut.
- Chopped pecans – you can do a rough chop of the pecans but keep in mind that you don’t want any of the pieces to be too large or they will make it difficult to roll your cookies into balls.
- Spread the cookies over two trays. It’s ideal to use two large baking sheets for these cookies so that you don’t have to crowd them onto the tray.
- Bake each tray separately. Bake each tray of cookies one at a time. If you stack the trays in the oven it will result in uneven baking. So just bake one tray and when that’s done, bake the second tray of cookies.
- Gluten free: Just swap the regular flour for a gluten free all purpose baking blend.
- Storing and freezing: These cookies store very well at room temperature for a week. They also freeze very well for up to 3 months. You can freeze the baked cookies OR the unbaked cookie dough balls. If you freeze the unbaked cookies then you can bake them directly from frozen, just allow an extra couple of minutes baking time to account for them being frozen to begin with.
Another recipe I’ve been making for years.
These have NEVER failed me. You can even make them a bit bigger than the recipe calls for, just cook them a bit longer and they will not flop or crack when picked up.
For folks on the east coast familiar with Flour bakery, these remind me of the “Chunky Lola” cookie.
I personally think that going for golden syrup instead of maple syrup makes a huge difference in flavor.
This is a very forgiving recipe that pleases even non vegans.
That’s amazing Roz! Thanks so much for your lovely review!
Delicious! Made as directed, using Country Crock Plant Butter, JOI Almond milk, and mostly organic ingredients (flour, sugar, oats, coconut). I packed my cookie scoop (about 2T each) and the cookies came out 2.5″ (60mm); perfect for us! Plus, I baked two sheets, ate the equivalent of a couple cookies raw, and have dough left over for another dozen or so balls to stash in the freezer! They were slightly puffy after baking, but topping with the extra pecans and a chocolate chip deflated them perfectly. Hooray and thank you for an easy and delicious way to treat my family and friends!
Awesome Dianne! Thank you so much for sharing and thanks for your great review!
These Cowboy Cookies might be The Best vegan cookies I’ve ever made for my vegan family. (I can’t tell you how many disappointments I’ve had, over the years, with egg substitutes in other recipes.). So I was a little skeptical that this recipe would really work. But it does! I may not use as much brown sugar next time. The mixture was a little on the dry side, but I flattened them and took a chance. Perfect—they were practically inhaled, by both vegans and carnivores! Thank you.
PS I always weigh my flour, no matter what. (That makes all the difference in my baked
goods.)
Awesome! Thanks so much for sharing and for your great review!
These are my favorite cookies EVER!!!! I just made 2 batches that will not be eaten until Saturday…today is tuesday. What is the best ‘container’ to store them in until then.
Thank you!
They just are so delicious! The best way to store your cookies is to put them in a sealed container. Hope you enjoyed them once again!
The flavor is good. I did have to add double of the soy milk. I couldn’t form mine in a ball without adding more (I did measure the flour right). The first batch came out looking more like a “puck”, so the second batch I flattened a bit and they came out more cracked. I do like how these cookies have less butter then most cookies. I used slice almonds instead of the pecans because that’s what I had on hand and I also threw in some dried cranberries. Like I said, the flavor is good but I don’t know if I would make them again. Thanks for the recipe:)
Thanks for sharing Debbie! 🙂
These are incredible. Go for golden syrup instead of maple syrup if you have it. Delicious, easy, hearty cookies.
Glad you enjoyed the recipe and thanks for your review!
Do you think sunflower seeds would be a good substitute for those with nut allergies? And also, have you tried this recipe with gluten-free flour?
You can leave out the nuts altogether and no need to substitute them, but sunflower seeds should also work great. Gluten free all purpose blend works great.
Is a stand mixer required for this recipe?
It’s needed to cream the vegan butter and sugar together.
Very tasty baba ganoush. Recipe calls for 3 medium or 2 large eggplants (1.5 lbs). At the market I weighed 1 large and it alone was 1.5 lbs. Is the recipe really calling for 1.5 lbs of eggplant or is it two 1.5 lb eggplants?
I updated the recipe card to make it more clear. It’s 1.5 pounds total and it’s better to go by weight, since ‘large’ is subjective and also may differ from place to place!
Unfortunately mine came out flattened, maybe my avocado oil plant butter just wasnt the right type of plant butter for this cookie, or it might have been too warm in my kitchen before baking?
But even though mine dont look as pretty as yours, omg the flavor is so good, these cookies taste so delicious!! I hadn’t tried cowboy cookies before now and they might be my new favorite cookie, haha. I’ll definitely have to make a few more batches to troubleshoot! 😊💗
Thanks so much for your wonderful review Angel! The butter could have possibly been the culprit for the cookies being flat, hop they turn out better next time!
what is the texture of these after baking and cooling? soft? chewy? bit crunchy?
Chewy with a bit of crunch.
This looks like a vegan cookie they sell at Trader Joe’s but they are so so sweet. On my list to bake soon. Thanks.
What changes would need to be made if coconut were left out?
You could try it without making any changes, you may be able to add less than 3 tablespoons of soy milk, so maybe just add those one at a time and only as much as needed as your cookie dough won’t be as dry without the coconut.