Making these vegan gingerbread cookies signals my first foray into the world of molasses.
And…I found it weird! This is probably no surprise to you if you’re familiar with this ingredient – it is weird right?
Like really weird.
It looks a lot like date syrup, which is a syrup I use a lot, as it’s awesome, and made from dates and nothing but dates. But aside from looks, there is no other similarity. Date syrup is very sweet, whereas molasses…. is not.
It’s not just that it’s not very sweet, it’s that it’s got the weirdest taste to it.
The good thing is that molasses in gingerbread cookie batter does the job amazingly well. Going in as an ingredient molasses is quite weird, but once baked into something, it adds something pretty great to the flavor!
These gingerbread cookies came out fabulously well and were so easy too.
I adapted a recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction in order to make it vegan and I took a few other shortcuts to make sure that I didn’t have to take too much time in making these.
I am always looking for shortcuts. In this case I didn’t want to chill the dough for a couple of hours before baking, I just wanted to mix the dough and then bake the cookies!
So I took some shortcuts and they worked! Yay!
So these gingerbread cookies are super quick. Just 20 minutes to prepare and 15 minutes to bake.
Some say you can bake them in 10 minutes, but I’m a fan of the crispier cookie.
If you want yours to be more on the soft side, then you can take them out the oven after 10 minutes.
The main time consuming factor in these cookies is rolling out the dough and cutting out the gingerbread men.
It doesn’t take long, but that’s really the only reason the prep takes 20 minutes rather than 10 or 15.
And then there’s decorating them.
Of course this step is completely optional. This was my first attempt at decorating cookies and I have to admit to not being very successful. I had to hand the job over to Jaye who is much more steady-handed when it comes to the ‘fine arts’ of putting eyes and mouths onto cookies. 
Even so, some of these guys look a bit psycho!
I hope you’ll love these vegan gingerbread cookies! They are:
- Festive and fun
- Perfectly crispy on the outside
- Soft and deliciously chewy on the inside
- Infused with ginger goodness
- Easy to make!
If you have a few kiddos around, make these with them. My niece was not into the flavor too much (I think I probably wasn’t big on ginger either when I was 6), but she LOVED the look of these guys!
So whaddaya think of these vegan gingerbread cookies? Let me know in the comments! Rate the recipe and let me know how it turned out if you made them!
Tag me #lovingitvegan on instagram if you take any photos, I’d love to see them!
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Vegan Gingerbread Cookies
- Prep Time: 20 mins
- Cook Time: 15 mins
- Total Time: 35 mins
- Yield: 16
Print Recipe
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Festive and fun vegan gingerbread cookies. These gingerbread men are crisp on the outside, soft and chewy on the inside and packed with ginger, cinnamon and brown sugar flavor.
Ingredients
For the Gingerbread Men:
- 1/4 cup (56g) Vegan Butter
- 1/2 cup (100g) Brown Sugar
- 1/3 cup (100g) Unsulphured Molasses*
- 1 Flax Egg
- 1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 2 cups (250g) All Purpose Flour
- 1 tsp Baking Soda
- 1/4 tsp Salt
- 2 tsp Ground Ginger
- 2 tsp Ground Cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp Allspice
- 1/4 tsp Ground Cloves
For the Decorating Frosting:
- 1 cup (120g) Powdered (Icing) Sugar
- 1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1 Tbsp Soy Milk
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C)
- Add the vegan butter and brown sugar to an electric mixing bowl and cream together.
- Prepare your flax egg by mixing 1 Tbsp Flaxseed Meal with 3 Tbsp Hot Water and allowing to sit for a minute.
- Add the molasses, vanilla and flax egg to the electric mixer and beat together with the vegan butter and brown sugar.
- Sift the flour into a bowl and add the baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon, allspice and cloves and mix together.
- Add all the dry ingredients into the mixing bowl containing the wet ingredients and mix into a thick batter.
- Flour a surface and your hands very generously and transfer the cookie dough onto the baking surface. Roll it into a ball, adding flour as needed so it doesn’t stick.
- Roll out with a rolling pin to around a 1/4 inch thick and cut out some gingerbread men. Dip your cookie cutter in flour each time so it doesn’t stick. Move the gingerbread men to a parchment lined baking tray.
- Gather the scraps of dough, form into a ball and roll out again, cutting out more men.
- Don’t be shy to add more flour each time, this dough can be quite sticky and you need it not to be as you roll it, so add flour as needed. Any excess flour on the gingerbread cookies will bake off.
- Repeat this process until you have used all the dough.
- Place into the oven and bake for 15 minutes.
- After 15 minutes remove from the oven and allow to cool completely before decorating.
- When you’re ready to decorate, mix the decorating frosting ingredients together. It should be quite thick, but when you stir it into a peak, it should hold it’s shape for a bit before melting back down and should be quite sticky.
Notes
*I used Grandma’s Molasses brand.
*Nutritional information is for 1 cookie of 16, without frosting decoration.
*The number of gingerbread men you’ll get from this recipe depends largely on the size of your cookie cutter.
*Weigh your flour for accurate results.
*If you have accidentally used too much flour and/or the brand of vegan butter you have used has a lower water content, you may end up with a dough that is too crumbly – in this instance, add in a small amount of non-dairy milk until you get the right consistency of dough that you see in the pictures/video.
*Adapted from Sally’s Baking Addiction
- Category: Dessert, Cookies, Baking
- Cuisine: Vegan
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 Cookie (of 16)
- Calories: 117
- Sugar: 10.8g
- Sodium: 142mg
- Fat: 1.9g
- Saturated Fat: 0.3g
- Carbohydrates: 23.3g
- Fiber: 0.8g
- Protein: 1.7g
Keywords: vegan gingerbread cookies
These sound amazing! How can I make these cookies to come out as crunchy as gingersnap cookies?
★★★★★
Hi Erica, you could always try our gingersnap recipe instead. I’m not sure if that would work for cutting out gingerbread men but it’s worth a shot! 🙂
This recipe was good but I did have to add a second flax egg, 1tbsp flax meal + 3 tbsp water. It was too dry and it didn’t come together but otherwise they tasted like regular gingerbread cookies even better! Even after 3 days they were still good. Thank you for this recipe.
★★★★
Hi Cassandra, so glad they worked out. I would guess that perhaps a little too much flour went in, but so glad you found a solution and they tasted good! Thanks for sharing! 🙂
I had made sure I’d put exactly two cups of flour
Hi Cassandra, unless you weigh your flour on a food scale it can be easy to accidentally use a bit too much. If you’re using only cups as a measure then the spoon and level method is the way to measure it accurately. 🙂
The first time I made these, I was baking them for a Christmas card photoshoot and only had whole wheat flour – they didn’t spread or crack and ended up looking like traditional gingergread men. After making them with all-purpose flour, they definitely rise a lot more and have a cracklier crust texture as a result, but they’re so fluffy and delicious! Also tested with coconut oil (the triple-filtered coconut oil from Trader Joe’s doesn’t taste at all of coconut) and they turn out perfectly!
★★★★★
Fantastic! That’s good to know about the effect of whole wheat flour and glad to hear coconut oil worked well for you too. Thanks so much for sharing and the awesome review Daisy! 🙂
I love it but if we had butter it would be better
My friend Emmi made this recipe and it was AMAHZANG! Can I have your autograph Alison? Your recipes are so good! Are you famous? You should be.:)
-The mature samara anashali
★★★★★
Hahaha awesome! So glad you enjoyed the cookies! 😊
mmmmm there SOOOOOOO good if I had a choice to live in a mansion or meet you and bake them with you I would defiantly choose to meet you and bake the cookies with you your just the BEST a million times to the moon and back
★★★★★
Hahaha, that’s so sweet! Thanks so much and so glad you love the cookies! 🙂
Amazing! I think these gingerbread men were absolutely DELICIOUS and so amazingly adorable! We used a vitamix scale to measure out all of the ingredients easier. I LOVE these more than anything sweet I have ever tried. I wish I could give this recipe 100 stars! Love this whole website!
-Emmi Webster
★★★★★
Thank you so much Emmi! That is the best review ever! 🙂
Thanks so much for writing this. This is my first Christmas making gingerbread men vegan for my mum, sister and brother in law and I was excited to see that it was such a recent review! Can’t wait to try them. ☺️
Hope you love the recipe Ally! All the best! 🙂
Hi! I regularly use this site for recipes and it is amazing, just wondering if I can use a hand mixer instead? Or maybe a plain old wooden spoon? Thanks.
Hi Maria, a hand mixer should work just fine! Even a wooden spoon would probably work, but with a lot more arm power needed. 🙂
Hi! I am going to make this bread for a school feast with my mom. I am so excited! Yay! Hi Mom!
-EiZnEk Oh
Awesome! Hope you love them! 🙂
You mentioned the brand of molasses but not the butter. What brand did you use? Also I mix half molasses and half light Karo syrup to my wet bottom shoofly pie, it cuts down on the molasses flavor a bit.
Hi Mary, I have used various brands of vegan butter and it will differ depending on where you are. If you’re in the USA then Earth Balance is a good brand, if you’re in Australia then Nuttelex is a good brand. Waitrose has some options if you’re in the UK. Otherwise just look for any brand of dairy free margarine that works in baking.
If you’re in Australia (and the UK i believe) we have a black butter block called “vegan block” by Naturli and it doesn’t have its own flavour it’s just really close to butter. I’m not even vegan and I love it
Thanks for sharing Ally! 🙂
Hi Alison,
I’m struggling to find molasses and to be fair never baked with it before. Do you think I could use maple syrup instead? I don’t mind it affecting the taste but just want to make sure the texture stays good. Want to try making these today. Thanks.
Hi Aleksandra, yes, if you don’t mind it affecting the taste (it will definitely do that) then it would be fine in terms of texture! You could use any syrup really to replace the molasses. All the best! 🙂
Thank you, Alison for such a quick response. I went and bought some molasses. Did one batch as per your recipe and they came out really good! I added some orange zest to my second batch and I think I found my new favourite 🙂 very pleased with the recipe
★★★★★
Wonderful! So glad they came out well! Orange zest is a great addition too. Thanks so much for sharing. 🙂
I just made these and they are so so good! I mixed it all by hand (without an electric mixer, just a fork and spoon) and it turned out perfectly! Thank you so much 🙂
★★★★★
Awesome! And well done on doing it all without a mixer. 🙂 Thanks so much for sharing! 🙂
Great recipe! I love how simple it is! I added a bit more molasses to mine as well as some black pepper for an extra spice kick!
Oooh I like that idea! Thanks for sharing! 🙂
I’m new to the flax egg ingredient, would it be ok to not add that to the ingredients?
I’m not vegan and I love to bake; And, ever since we found out my 4 yrs old daughter is highly allergic to eggs, I’ve been looking up vegan recipes-and my family and I love them! (My family doesn’t even know the goodies are eggless!)
Hi Ana, you could ‘try’ leaving it out and then adding a few tablespoons of soy milk to the batter at the end before you roll it out, probably 3 Tablespoons of soy milk. This is what I would try if I wasn’t going to use a flax egg, however, I have not tested this so I really don’t know if it will work or what impact it may have. The safer option would be to use the flax egg. 🙂
Can you make them with almond flour instead?
Hi Lex, I don’t think so! If you want to make them gluten-free, I would try a gluten-free all purpose flour blend. 🙂
Hey there, just made this tonight! It was good. One thing I did have to add more, if it helps anyone, of was ~20g more of flour to properly roll and cut (and if it helps anyone be sure to flour your rolling pin too!). Thanks for posting metric recipes, by the way! I don’t trust recipes that don’t have it.
Hi Neal, thanks so much for adding your tips! And you’re welcome, metric measurements make it so much more accurate. 🙂
I want to make these, but I live about 5000 ft above sea level . Do you have any recommendations on what I can change for higher elevation baking ?
Hi Jennifer, I have never baked at high altitude so I don’t have personal experience, but I did find an article detailing the adjustments you need to make, some won’t be relevant to this recipe but some of the tips will be. Hope it helps! 🙂
Really enjoyed the taste of the cookie, had to cut the cooking time down to 11 mins as my first batch came out too hard at 15 mins
Thanks for sharing Paula! 🙂
I’m an inexperienced baker… made these with my 5-yr old and the whole family loved them. Great tasting (loved the spice mixture) and texture (somewhat crispy outside, soft inside). Excellent!
★★★★★
Wonderful to hear that David! Thanks so much for the excellent review. 🙂
This looks great! Do you know how long they would store if I wanted to make them ahead of time? Have you tried freezing the cookies once made?
Hi Stacey, you can either freeze the cookie dough (and then thaw it and bake as usual) or you can freeze the baked cookies, for up to 3 months.
Planning on making these tonight with my daughter!
★★★★★
I made these yesterday, recipe was great but they have turned out a lot darker than your pictures. I used dark muscavado sugar. I’m wondering if that was the wrong choice? Maybe a lighter brown sugar would have been better?
Hi Vicky, I think the muscavado sugar would definitely account for the darker color, I used a regular brown sugar, which is quite light in color.