These vegan and gluten-free walnut chocolate chip cookies are soft, chewy and made with a healthy amount of walnut butter. They’re also made with oats and oat flour, making them 100% whole grain!
I’m a terribly forgetful and disorganized person. After 3 1/2 years of blogging, I thought it was time to go through my post drafts folder and clean things up.
I found this recipe from March 2011, which was before I even started posting anything. I wanted it to be one of my first posts but here we are in 2015. Whoops.
These walnut chocolate chip cookies are adapted from Vegetarian Times’ Heart Healthiest Chocolate Chip Cookies in the World, but after tweaking it for the past few years, only the amount of walnuts and oat flour remains the same.
The original recipe is great as is but somehow I just found myself changing things here and there. I also made it easier by omitting a step where you boil 1/2 cup water and the sugar.
I assume it has a purpose but I couldn’t taste any difference between doing that and just adding the sugar to the batter and adding 1/2 cup milk. I’m all for easier so that’s what I went with.
Something important to note is that other nuts don’t seem to work in these cookies. I’ve tried using the same amount of peanut butter and almond butter and they came out pretty terribly. Stick with walnuts!
Even if you don’t even like walnuts, I bet you’ll love these cookies – just leave out the chopped walnuts!
The recipe calls for processing walnuts in a food processor until you have nut butter. Out of all the nut butters I’ve made, I think walnut butter is the quickest.
It takes about 2 minutes in my food processor. I guess you could also use store-bought walnut butter but this way is so much cheaper!
If you were hoping for a more Easter-y post today, here’s an awesome 100% whole wheat carrot cake and here’s a grain-free carrot cake recipe. I hope you all have a lovely Easter! :)
Vegan Gluten-free Walnut Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Prep Time:
- Cook Time:
- Ready in:
- Yield: 32 cookies
Ingredients
- 2 cups (220 grams) walnuts (not any other type of nut)
- 1 1/2 cups (138 grams) oat flour (use certified gluten-free oat flour, if necessary)1
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 cup (56 grams) coconut oil, room temperature2
- 3/4 cup + 2 tablespoons (175 grams) raw sugar or coconut sugar
- 1/2 cup (120 milliliters) milk of choice (but not canned coconut milk, as it's too thick)
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1 3/4 cups (161 grams) rolled oats (use certified gluten-free oats, if necessary)
- 1/2 cup (55 grams) chopped walnuts
- 3/4 cup (128 grams) semi-sweet chocolate chips (use dairy-free / vegan chocolate, if necessary)
Directions
- Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C). Line a baking sheet with a piece of parchment paper.
- In the bowl of a food processor fitted with an S-blade, grind the walnuts until they have the consistency of natural peanut butter. Meanwhile, in a medium mixing bowl, stir together the oat flour, baking powder, and salt. When the walnut butter is ready, transfer it to a large mixing bowl.
- To the large bowl, add the coconut oil, sugar, milk and vanilla and beat with a large spoon or with an electric hand or stand mixer until well combined. Slowly add in the dry ingredient mixture and stir just until combined.
- Fold in the oats, walnuts and chocolate chips. Form into 1" balls and place 3" apart on the prepared baking sheet. Do not press the balls down.
- Bake for 10 minutes or until the centers of the cookies no longer appear wet (they should not brown – if they do, they're overbaked and will be cakey instead of chewy). They should have formed a light crust.
- Let cool on the cookie sheet for 5 minutes and then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.
- Store in an airtight container for up to 4 days.
Notes
- If you don't have oat flour on hand, use a coffee grinder or small food processor to grind rolled or quick oats until powdery.
- I used refined coconut oil, which doesn't have any coconut flavor. If you use unrefined coconut oil, these will likely have some coconut taste to them.
Adapted from Vegetarian Times
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56 comments on “Walnut Chocolate Chip Cookies (vegan, gluten-free, whole grain)” — Add one!
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These are now my favorite cookie!!!!!!
I love how there is so much walnuts!
I’m so glad to hear that! Thanks for your feedback. :)
Are these cookies soft and chewy or crunchy?
I plan on making these soon once i get a response.
Thanks in advance
Soft and chewy. :)
I LOVE these cookies. I have made them several times and they come out perfectly even at altitude (almost 10,000 feet). The only adjustment I make is cut the baking powder in half and increase cooking time by 3 extra minutes. Thank you for the recipe!
You’re welcome for the recipe! I’m really glad that you enjoyed them and that they came out well at altitude. Thanks for sharing your adjustments and your comment!
Hi Erin! I had trouble making these cookies! For some reason they did not come out of the oven correctly, instead they didn’t bake very well! when the dough was ready, it would not form in a ball – it was way too sticky and hard to mold. then in the oven the did not rise or spread out, but stayed the same.
any tips? Maybe less coconut oil?
please let me know!
Hi Natalie! I’m sorry that you had problems! You processed the walnuts until it formed a runny nut butter, like natural peanut butter, right? If you didn’t process it long enough, that could explain the problem. Or did you make any subs or changes at all to the recipe?
That is so helpful! Now that I think of it, I did not process the walnuts enough to form a butter. I am retrying the recipe tonight!
Thank you!
You’re welcome! Good luck. :)
hi! awesome recipe both vegan and gf!!
is there anything i can substitute for rolled oats? I just don’t like the taste… sorry.
I was thinking maybe cooked quinoa (I love IT in cookies) but maybe the rolled oats are there to soak the liquids and cooked quinoa doesn’t do it.
maybe ground almonds? cornmeal? ground flax or chia seeds?
thanks for sharing!
Hi! Thanks. :) You’re right in that cooked quinoa doesn’t work as a sub for oat flour. I’ve never found a good sub for it but have read that millet flour, rice flour, or sorghum flour could work. I wouldn’t recommend it, though, since I haven’t tried it. The 1 1/2 cups of oat flour are the base of the recipe so I’d recommend finding a different recipe without oats. :( Sorry about that!
Hi! I made them this morning! I put less sugar but it is still much enjoyable! Thank you for the recipe!!
You’re welcome! I’m happy to hear that they work well with less sugar. :) Thanks for the tip!
Are these cookies supposed to flatten when
Baking? Mine stayed in a ball
They do! I tried flattening the dough balls a little with my hand when I first made them but they flattened too much then. Did you make any subs?
So did mine😞
Hi Rachel! You processed the walnuts until it formed a runny nut butter, like natural peanut butter, right? If you didn’t process it long enough, that could explain the problem. Or did you make any subs or changes at all to the recipe?
These were SO yummy! So much flavour with the walnut butter, I’ve never used/made walnut butter before so I was pleasantly surprised! I think I’ll add a bit more salt next time as I think it would give them a ‘salted caramel’ type taste, which I am crazy about!
Yum! I like the idea of adding extra salt. I’m so happy you liked the cookies! Thanks for your comment. :)
I’m confused by the ingredients: 1/2 cup (120 milliliters) milk of choice … is this not a vegan recipe?
Almond milk, soy milk, oat milk, and rice milk are examples of vegan milk. :)
I would just like to know why you say this is made with walnut butter when there is no walnut butter in the ingredient list. Yes, there are walnuts in these cookies but no walnut butter from what I can tell.
Because you make walnut butter in Step 2. It’s much cheaper than buying pre-ground walnut butter. :)
Outstanding, delicious cookies – but I, too, somehow always have to tweak a recipe: for my second batch I toasted the 1/2 C. of chopped walnuts lightly before I added them, and also included a pinch of instant coffee (I use Medaglia d’Oro instant espresso powder, but any fine-textured brand should work okay). Couldn’t have done it without you, thanks so much!
I usually toast nuts before baking with them so I’m not sure why I didn’t do that here. Thanks for the tip! And espresso powder sounds great, too. :) I’m happy that they came out well! Thanks a bunch for your feedback.
Best vegan cookies I’ve tried yet! My friends, vegan and non-vegan all loved them!
Wow, thanks! I’m super happy to hear that. :) Thanks a bunch for your comment!
Can I substitute something for the sugar? Do you think applesauce would work?
I think that’d make the cookies super cakey and would possibly make them fall apart. If you wanted to sub in a liquid sweetener like honey or maple syrup, you’d have to adjust the other ingredients. Since I haven’t tried that, I don’t really know how you’d adjust the other ingredients. Sorry about that!
I made these with applesauce in place of coconut oil. I just flattened them and baked them longer to get them crispy. Tasted great!
Thanks for the tip! I’m so glad that you enjoyed them and that it worked out well. :) Thanks for your comment!
Just made these cookies and they turned out perfect!! I did use brow sugar instead so they have a caramel flavour to them which compliments the walnuts really well. Thanks so much for this healthy recipe :)
Brown sugar sounds great and I’m happy to hear that you liked the cookies! Thanks for your feedback. :)
These look great! What food processor do you use and do you recommend it? Thanks!
Thanks! Unfortunately, I live in Germany and the one I use isn’t available in the US (and it’s also been discontinued). But I did find this discussion about the best options for making nut butters! I hope that’ll help. :)
Thank you this was great. I made a couple tweeks… brazil nuts for the extra 1/2 c walnuts, carob for chocolate and only added 1/4c of sugar with 1 tbsp of stevia and they turned out perfect for the kiddos.
I’m so happy you enjoyed them! Your changes sound yummy. :) I’ll have to try them with brazil nuts next time! Thanks a bunch for your feedback.
Erin, these cookies look as though they are soft and chewy. That’s good! But, I also want crispy! I always like the outside brownies rather than the middle ones. Do you have any suggestions on how to make these crispy? Thx in advance!
I have to admit that that is something I’ve never tried doing! A few people posted some tips for making cookies crisper here. I hope that’ll give you some good ideas! I normally have to experiment a few times when I adapt a recipe to get what I want so it may make more sense just to find another recipe. Sorry I couldn’t be more of a help! Let me know how it goes it you try it out. :)
Mmm! Cannot wait to make this clever cookie recipe, Erin! LOVE that you used both coconut oil and coconut milk. There’s such a balance when replacing butter (both the oil and milk in it) when developing baking recipes. These chocolate chip cookies look perfect and I love the walnut addition! Pinning these babies to my new Vegan board!
Thanks so much for pinning and for your thoughtful comment! :)
I’m sorry,but in my country there is no such a thing like coconut oil..May I use any other oil or..
I think butter would be fine but they’ll be a little less moist as butter is only 80% fat instead of 100% like coconut oil. I suggest using 4.5 tbsp of butter to make up for that. I hope that you’ll love the cookies as much as I do! :)
This is a great tip! If you’re ever updating this page, it’d be super helpful to have this up top in the notes. I was totally going to try a 1:1 substitution butter for coconut oil and then I thought, this post is 9 years old, surely someone has posted about subbing butter. And they did! And I learned a new thing about the difference between coconut oil and butter! Double win :-) Maybe I’ll try making these with ghee or play around with some cocoa butter? Hmmmm… Yummy expirinentation lies ahead.
Whoa you found this awesome post just hiding out in your files? Go you! I love the idea of making a walnut butter. I’m not sure I have even seen it available in the store so making it homemade is a must. Plus (like you) I’m not a massive fan of walnuts but I have a feeling I might just love it if it’s in cookie form :)
I don’t normally care for plain walnuts but I LOVE them in cookies! Oh and I totally love how your brain works! I would totally do the same thing, cookies + walnuts = healthy right? haha
Wow, those are looking really delicious! I love nuts + chocolate and I happen to have a whole basket full of walnuts… :D
But could I also use butter instead of the coconut oil?
Thanks! I think butter would be fine but they’ll be a little less moist as butter is only 80% fat instead of 100% like coconut oil. I suggest using 4.5 tbsp of butter to make up for that. Hope you’ll love them! :)
Thank you!!
You and I have been blogging about the same length of time, 31/2 years. We must be related because I too and terribly disorganized! But how nice to find a recipe you never posted about that look this delicious!
Oh dear Lord these look like the best cookies ever. And hey, better late than never right? – from a fellow disorganized person :)
healthy and delicious!
These cookies look incredible, Erin! I don’t usually like walnuts in my cookies, but I could go for a couple of these!
Yummy!! These look wonderful. The one I make GF recipes for can’t eat chocolate. I might try these with cranberries and add orange zest.
This is another one of those times where I wish I could reach into my computer monitor and grab one of these cookies! Fantastic!