These vegan oatmeal raisin cookies are crisp on the outside, soft and chewy on the inside, rich and delicious with a hint of molasses.
There is always time for another vegan oatmeal cookie recipe. These vegan oatmeal raisin cookies are so good, you’ll love them even if you don’t love raisins. Seriously.
I’m not a massive fan of raisins, in that you won’t generally find me eating a handful of raisins ever, but I’ll eat them when they come mixed up with salted peanuts or when they’re in a dessert (like this vegan tiffin, then they’re awesome!).
And in these cookies, they are so good and mix in so well with the other flavors, it will pretty much make a raisin convert out of anyone. They are just ultimately good.
We’ve already done a bunch of oatmeal cookie recipes on this blog but there is always space for more. Have you tried our simple vegan oatmeal cookies, vegan oatmeal chocolate chip cookies or vegan peanut butter oatmeal cookies yet?
If you have, then you know how good they are and how good this one is going to be too!
What sets these oatmeal cookies apart from other oatmeal cookie recipes is well, raisins of course, but also the addition of molasses.
You just use a small amount but nonetheless you will notice the difference in flavor, and that blends so well with the cinnamon and brown sugar, and raisins of course.
You’ll also love our vegan anzac biscuits, vegan cowboy cookies and vegan oatmeal cranberry cookies.
Ingredients For Oatmeal Raisin Cookies:
Ingredient Notes
- Raisins – should be small and seedless. When I first tested these cookies, I could only find jumbo raisins in the store, and they did not work out well at all. They are just too big to go easily into the cookie dough and even when the cookies were baking, it was like these giant raisins were just falling out of the cookies onto the baking tray! So don’t use jumbo raisins! You want the nice and small seedless variety.
- Dessicated coconut – is also called finely shredded coconut.
- Walnuts – these are optional but highly recommended.
- Maple syrup – can be switched for golden syrup or agave nectar or any syrup you may have on hand.
- Molasses – you can really use any molasses here since it’s only a small amount. Our favorite brand is Grandma’s.
- Soy milk – can be replaced with any non-dairy milk.
How To Make Vegan Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
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 vegan butter and light brown sugar to the bowl of your stand mixer and cream them together until smooth.
- Add maple syrup, molasses and vanilla extract and mix in.
- In a separate bowl add rolled oats, all purpose flour, dessicated coconut, baking soda, salt and cinnamon and mix together.
- Add the dry ingredients in with the wet and mix with a spoon into a crumbly cookie dough.
- Add soy milk and mix again. Your dough should be very thick but you should be able to roll it into a ball and have it stick together perfectly at this stage. If not, add a little more soy milk.
- Add raisins and chopped walnuts and mix in.
- Roll the cookie dough into balls and place them evenly onto a parchment lined baking tray. Aim to get 20 cookies from the batch.
- Place into the oven and bake at 350°F for 12 minutes. The tops will be golden brown and the edges will be firm, but the cookies will still be very soft in the middle.
- Let the cookies cool and firm up directly on the tray.
Quick and Easy
These vegan oatmeal raisin cookies are super quick and easy. There’s no chilling of the dough or any delays in this recipe.
If you have a serious oatmeal cookie craving and have the ingredients on hand then in 30 minutes time you could have a batch of freshly baked cookies coming out of the oven!
You’ll have to wait for them to cool down, but you’ll be enjoying some of this cookie goodness in a very short amount of time.
When they come out of the oven, the cookies are quite soft in the middle. You might even wonder if they’re cooked. As long as they’re nicely browned on top, they’re good. Let them cool directly on the tray and they’ll firm up beautifully.
Recipe Tips
Try and get an even amount of raisins and walnuts into each cookie. There’s no need to be too precise of course, but you just want to keep a general eye on it as you’re rolling the cookie dough into balls. You don’t want some cookies to have a ton of raisins/walnuts and others to have none.
Baking time. For a softer cookie bake for 12 minutes. If you’d like them to have more crunch then you can increase the baking time to 15 minutes.
If your cookies don’t flatten. These cookies will usually flatten on their own in the oven. But if they don’t, you can increase the baking time by a couple of minutes. If they still haven’t flattened then just flatten them gently with a fork as soon as they come out the oven still warm and soft.
Make them gluten-free. These cookies work really well as gluten-free. All you have to do is switch the regular flour for a gluten-free all purpose baking blend. Also make sure your rolled oats are gluten-free.
Storing and Freezing
Keep them stored in an airtight container at room temperature and they’ll stay good for up to a week. You can also store them in an airtight container in the fridge.
You can freeze the baked cookies for up to 3 months.
You can even freeze the unbaked cookie balls for up to 3 months and then bake them directly from frozen (allow an extra couple of minutes baking time).
More Delicious Vegan Cookie Recipes
- Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Vegan Peanut Butter Cookies
- Vegan Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Vegan Chocolate Cookies
- Vegan Sugar Cookies
- Vegan Snickerdoodles
Did you make this recipe? Be sure to leave a comment and rating below!
Vegan Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
Ingredients
- ½ cup Vegan Butter (112g)
- 1 cup Light Brown Sugar (200g)
- 1 Tablespoon Maple Syrup or Golden Syrup
- 1 Tablespoon Molasses
- 1 Tablespoon Vanilla Extract
- 1 ½ cups Rolled Oats (150g)
- 1 cup All Purpose Flour (125g)
- 1 cup Dessicated Coconut (80g) Finely Shredded Coconut
- 1 teaspoon Baking Soda
- ½ teaspoon Salt
- 1 teaspoon Cinnamon
- 2 Tablespoons Soy Milk or other non-dairy milk
- ¾ cup Raisins (105g) small and seedless
- ½ cup Chopped Walnuts (64g) Optional
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C).
- Add vegan butter and light brown sugar to the bowl of your stand mixer and cream them together until smooth.
- Add maple syrup, molasses and vanilla extract and mix in.
- In a separate bowl add rolled oats, all purpose flour, dessicated coconut, baking soda, salt and cinnamon and mix together.
- Add the dry ingredients in with the wet and mix with a spoon into a crumbly cookie dough.
- Add in the soy milk and mix again. Your dough should be very thick, but you should be able to roll it into a ball and have it stick together perfectly at this stage. If not, add a tiny bit more soy milk.
- Add in the raisins and chopped walnuts and mix in.
- Roll the dough into balls and place them evenly onto a parchment lined baking tray. Aim to get around 20 cookies. Try to ensure the raisins are spread out in the cookie dough so that you don't end up with some cookies having no raisins and some cookies having a lot of raisins.
- Place into the oven and bake for 12 minutes. The tops will be golden brown and the edges will be firm, but the cookies will still be very soft in the middle.
- Let the cookies cool and firm up directly on the tray.
Video
Notes
- Baking time. For a softer cookie bake for 12 minutes. If you’d like them to have more crunch then you can increase the baking time to 15 minutes.
- If your cookies don’t flatten. These cookies will usually flatten on their own in the oven. But if they don’t, you can increase the baking time by a couple of minutes. If they still haven’t flattened then just flatten them gently with a fork as soon as they come out the oven still warm and soft.
- Make them gluten-free. These cookies work really well as gluten-free. All you have to do is switch the regular flour for a gluten-free all purpose baking blend. Also make sure your rolled oats are gluten-free.
- Storing: Keep them stored in an airtight container at room temperature and they’ll stay good for up to a week. You can also store them in an airtight container in the fridge.
- Freezing: You can freeze the baked cookies for up to 3 months. You can even freeze the unbaked cookie balls for up to 3 months and then bake them directly from frozen (allow an extra couple of minutes baking time).
- This recipe has been updated with new photos and extra tips but the recipe itself is the same.
Adam Moore says
Hi Alison,
Love these cookies! I made a big batch of these cookies last week and ended up having too much so I froze some dough! Can you please tell me how long these cookies will take to bake from frozen! Once again I love these cookies!
Alison Andrews says
Hi Adam, it should be just a couple of minutes extra baking time to account for them being frozen. Just keep an eye out, they should be lightly golden on top and should have spread a bit.
Salina says
Hi there! I’m eager to try to recipe, but need to know what to replace the coconut with as I currently don’t have any. Just omit? Add some banana? More oats? Please let me know 🙂
Thank you!
Alison Andrews says
Hi Salina, you can try just omitting it as others have done so successfully in our cookies, you may not need the soy milk in that case.
Nory says
All I can say is WOW!!! I used sugarless syrup and coconut sugar. They were super chewy and absolutely delicious. Thank you for this recipe. This was my first time making oatmeal cookies, actually any cookies from scratch and it was a huge success.
Alison Andrews says
Fantastic! Thanks so much Nory. 🙂
Noel Brown says
It is amazing. We used roasted rapieded (grated/shredded fresh coconut) to golden brown to your recipe.
It is over the top fabulous. We learned to roast the white fresh coconut meat in Africa. It gives a whole different texture and flavor to the cookie and worth the extra work. You can buy a scrapper on-line or maybe buy unsweetened fresh frozen coconut meat also on-line, if it is available.
Alison Andrews says
Sounds awesome! Thanks for sharing and the wonderful review! 🙂
Jake says
Great recipe, the only thing I found was the dough balls didn’t collapse into cookie shapes, had to flatten them out with a wooden spoon. Did I mess up something?
Alison Andrews says
Hi Jake, if the cookie dough is too cold when they go into the oven then this can happen. Usually if you cream the vegan butter/sugar combo longer then this can solve the issue, alternatively flatten with a fork before baking. 🙂
Laura says
Can you freeze them please? And like all the comments I read here yes they are delicious x thanks for the recipe
Alison Andrews says
So glad you enjoyed the cookies Laura, and yes they are freezer friendly!
Joanne says
I don’t have molasses. Can I substitute with maple syrup?
Alison Andrews says
Yes sure, or any syrup. 🙂
Genie says
My 15 year old grandson baked these with/for me.
They are delicious. As a diabetic I love that they are not overloaded with sugar!
I would just say watch the baking time and if needed bake at increments of 2 minutes. We baked the second batch for 5 minutes longer…a tad too much but we are still loving them.
Alison Andrews says
So glad you’re enjoying them! Thanks for the awesome review. 🙂
EM COX says
Very tasty, I didn’t have any molasses so just left it out and not that keen on walnuts either. I added too much milk so the dough was a bit wet so I just just used a scoop and it worked great.
Alison Andrews says
Awesome! Thanks for sharing Em!
Holly says
Have made twice now. Don’t have coconut so add 40g more flour and 40g more oats also leave out the walnuts as I don’t like them and use black treacle instead of molasses.They taste great and I couldn’t be happier, will definitely make again for 3rd time !
Alison Andrews says
Thanks Holly!
Lindsey M says
Ok I’ll be honest… haven’t even tried the finished product yet (it looks beautiful in the oven), but if the cookie is even half as good as the dough is, this baby is a winner! (Update) alright they are 10x better than the dough!
Alison Andrews says
Okay awesome! So glad the finished product is even better! But yes the cookie dough is delish! Thanks for the amazing review. 🙂
J. Renee says
The recipe was very easy to follow. These cookies are amazingly delicious. I was asked if I could bake a vegan oatmeal raisin cookie. I’ll look no more, this one is it. They are now regulars for me. Everyone was extremely pleased and so am I. The desiccated coconut gives them an enchanting taste leaving one guessing as to what that flavor is. The molasses and golden syrup is brilliant. They are just what the author says, Moist, Chewy, Crisp on the outside soft in the center. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
.
Alison Andrews says
So happy to hear! Thank you so much for the wonderful review! 🙂
TNG says
These came out incredible. I tweaked the spices, added coconut and it was mind-blowing. well done!
Alison Andrews says
Yay! Thanks for the wonderful review! 🙂
Paula..Bermuda says
Thank you for the very easy instructions,I am not much of a cook or baker so most helpful. However the dough remained balls after baking for 15minuits at 350. What do you think I did wrong?
Alison Andrews says
Hi Paula, you can try and flatten with a fork next time, this sometimes happens if the dough is quite cold when going into the oven, the more ‘room temperature’ the dough is the more they tend to spread. 🙂
Mac says
These cookies were absolutely perfect. Had the taste and texture of classic oatmeal raisin cookies! Sweet, oat-y, a little spicy, and full of plumped up raisins. I omitted the walnuts this time, and used date syrup instead of molasses as unfortunately it isn’t sold where I live, but that didn’t seem to make a difference. Thank you so much for this fabulous recipe, I’m saving it forever!
Alison Andrews says
Hi Mac! So glad to hear they were good! Date syrup is the perfect substitute, I can’t get that anymore where I live now but I used to love that stuff! Thanks for the awesome review. 🙂
Lucy says
Delicious! Might do sliiiightly less raisins next time, but seriously not too sweet! I just did almost 2 tbs of maple syrup instead of molasses, but I can imagine what that would add!
Alison Andrews says
So glad you enjoyed them! Thanks for sharing and the awesome review. 🙂
Larissa says
Another home run cookie recipe from this website. This is a really old school cookie recipe with the molasses in the batter. The results are incredible. Made them for my family and everyone has since made them on their own. Delish!
Alison Andrews says
Fantastic! So pleased to hear that! Thanks a million for the great review. 🙂
Tae says
I love the cookies but mine are not spreading out. The dough is moist, but not moist that it will hold perfectly. Also I’ve use a 3tbsp cookie scooper.
Do you think making them smaller & adding milk will help them flatten out?
Alison Andrews says
Hi Tae, usually if they are not spreading it’s because the cookie dough is too cold when the cookies go into the oven. You can try creaming your vegan butter and sugar for longer, or you can also just flatten your cookies with a fork before they go into the oven if you are running into this issue.