Gluten-free Cinnamon Roll Cookies {vegan and low-carb options}
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These Gluten-free Cinnamon Roll Cookies are sure to please all cinnamon roll lovers with their cinnamon swirl filling and light vanilla icing drizzle. They're vegan and refined sugar-free with grain-free, paleo, and low-carb options so basically everyone can enjoy cinnamon roll goodness in cookie form.
If you love regular cinnamon rolls, but don't have time to make the real thing, these cookies are going to knock your socks off. They are so good you'll for sure want to enjoy them not only during the holiday season, but all year round.
This cookie recipe is super fun to make and fills your house with the great scent of cinnamon rolls.
The base is similar to sugar cookie flavor, but I've made it healthier by making these cookies gluten-free and there is also a grain free option using almond flour. Plus by using a low-carb sweetener, there's no added sugar.
I also like to use healthy fats like grass-fed butter or organic coconut oil. You can also make these into vegan cinnamon roll cookies by simply substituting coconut oil or a vegan butter for the butter. Either way they taste great, but I prefer grass-fed butter for a buttery flavor. Mmmmmm….. Let's make some cookies.
Ingredients
almond flour, oat flour, or gluten-free flour blend
butter (or vegan butter or coconut oil)
low-carb sweetener
flax egg (or other egg substitute)
baking powder
salt
ground cinnamon
low-carb powdered sweetener
coconut milk
vanilla extract
Directions
Combine water and flax meal (to make a flax egg) and let sit for about 10 minutes
Beat sweetener and the butter / other fat until fluffy and light in large bowl (Photos 1 & 2)
Add flax egg to sweetener and butter mixture (Photo 3)
Combine remaining base cookie dry ingredients and gradually add to the mix (Photo 4)
Mix well to form a ball (Photo 5)
Divide dough in half (Photo 6)
Combine cinnamon and remaining sweetener in a small mixing bowl or use this Sugar-free Cinnamon Sugar Blend.
Flatten one half into a 1/4″ thick rectangle shape using hands or floured rolling pin.
Spread melted butter on flattened dough (if desired). Sprinkle cinnamon sugar mixture over the surface of the flattened dough (Photo 7)
Roll the flattened dough (Photo 8)
Cut the cookies using a sharp knife into 1/2 thick wheels and place on cookie sheet (Photos 9 & 10)
Repeat with the other half of the cookie dough.
Preheat your oven to 350F or 180C.
Bake for about 12-15 minutes or until slightly brown.
Remove from oven and cool.
Combine powdered sweetener with coconut milk.
Drizzle the icing over the cookies and let set.
Recipe Notes and Tips
Filling Notes: The melted butter / coconut oil spread on the dough rectangle is optional but adds a really nice moistness to the cookies.
Chilling: Chilling helps the roll to form for easier cutting, but you likely won't need to chill the oat based dough.
Special Diet and Substitution Notes
Flour Options: I've had success with both the almond flour and oat flour options. Any gluten-free flour blend could work, but the one time that I tried it, the dough was pretty hard to work with. A gluten flour version should work, but you will want to change the recipe for that by following information in this post about gluten-free baking tips (and reversing the instructions).
Oat flour has a nutty flavor that is truly delicious, while the almond flour is a bit richer. Either way yields a truly delicious cookie.
Egg Alternatives: Any egg alternative or real egg should work fine for this recipe.
Sweeteners: Regular sweeteners or coconut sugar would work as well.
Keto / Low-carb: The Grain-free cookie base and low-carb sweeteners make this a keto cookie.
Paleo: To make these cookies paleo, use coconut sugar or other on plan sweetener.
How to Store
Store the cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for 4-5 days, in the fridge for up to 1 week, or in the freezer for up to 2 months.
To defrost, set the cookies out at room temperature for about 1 hour before serving.
Gluten-free Cinnamon Roll Cookies
Ingredients
Low-carb / Keto Cookie Base
Grain-based Gluten-free Cookie Base Alternative
- 3 1/4 cups oat flour
- 3/4 cup butter, vegan butter, or coconut oil, softened
- 3/4 cup low carb sweetener
- 1 tablespoon ground flax
- 3 tablespoons water (water and flax make a flax egg–see Recipe Notes for other egg alternatives)
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
Cinnamon Sugar Filling
- 1/2 cup low carb sweetener
- 2 tablespoons cinnamon
- 3 tablespoons melted butter, coconut oil, or vegan butter (optional)
Vanilla Glaze
- 1/2 cup powdered low-carb sweetener
- 3-4 teaspoons coconut milk
- dash vanilla extract
- dash salt
Instructions
- Combine water and flax meal to make flax egg. Let sit for about 10 minutes.
- Beat sweetener and the butter or alternative until fluffy and light in large bowl.
- Add the flax egg to the sweetener and butter mixture. Beat briefly to combine.
- Combine remaining cookie base dry ingredients and add to the mix, mixing well but being careful not to over-mix.
- Divide the dough in half, flattening one half into a 1/4 inch thick rectangle shape using hands or a dusted rolling pin. Alternatively, you can make one large rectangle.
- Combine Cinnamon Filling ingredients in a small mixing bowl.
- Spread melted butter or alternative, if using, on dough rectangle.
- Sprinkle cinnamon sugar mixture over the surface of the flattened dough.
- Using parchment or wax paper, roll the flattened dough into a tight roll using your hands.
- Chill dough in freezer for 10-15 minutes, if desired.
- Cut the cookies using a sharp knife into 1/2 inch thick wheels and place on cookie sheet.
- Repeat with the other half of dough.
- Preheat your oven to 350F / 180C.
- Bake for 12-15 minutes or until slightly brown.
- Remove from oven and place cookies on wire rack to cool.
- Mix powdered sweetener with coconut milk in small bowl until thick but pourable.
- Drizzle icing over the cookies. Let set until hardened.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional information is provided as a courtesy and is an estimate only. It may vary depending on ingredient brands, substitutions, and preparation methods. Optional ingredients are not included. Net carbs are typically calculated by subtracting fiber and sugar alcohols (such as erythritol) from total carbohydrates. This information should not be relied upon for medical or nutritional purposes.
I know this is an older post and I admit I haven’t made these yet but they sound delicious so a 5⭐️ for the recipe alone as it’s the second comfort food I miss (Mac n cheese was the first) I just stumbled upon your website binging as one page leads me to another page, lol, sooo many good things here! I am WFPB SOSS-free so wondering if the sweeteners can be subbed out with dates?
Appreciate your time and effort and sharing 💙
Hi Michelle – It’s not that old really or maybe time is just going faster than I know. Likely the latter. I hope you like them! Some of my recipes are better than others but I do like this one! I am trying to get to the ones that need some revisions, but I do need a clone or three! Thanks for the kind words. Blogging has gotten very tough in recent years so it’s more appreciated now than ever.
Hi again! What is SOSS, please? Just making sure I know what all the S’s are. Thanks in advance.
SOSS—Salt, Sugar, Oil, Soy.
We have major heart disease in our family—-widowmakers, etc. I am the only one out of 6 who isn’t on any meds at 64 and would like to keep it that way which is why I went WFPB plus God thought He would nudge me that way by allowing me to get Alpha-Gal. So, the transition was natural. I do still eat nuts tho, I struggle with this one, but try to keep it sparingly. Blessings Adrienne!
Got it. When you say off oil are you saying all fats? Good for you on the no meds but Alpha-Gal is terrible! I’m so sorry!!
AG could be worse, could be Lyme too or RMSF ( Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever). Yes, ALL fats ( coconut oil is pure saturated fat, seed oils have no nutritional value but calories which I don’t want/need) I will use avocado oil-sparingly but, transitioning off it too. This is why I appreciate what you’re doing bc it seems most WFPB recipes all use the same spices and I’m tired of that. Learning to tweek recipes omitting salt, oil, etc. There is much scientific evidence out there supporting the sugar, oils, salt causing ♥️ disease. The soy free came about due to AG. Wasn’t allergic to it prior to AG, but am now so I make Pumfu instead.Soy also caused my son to become sterile from being raised on Isomil formula ( I was young, didn’t know better). I have a chicken “allergy and chicken albumin allergy “ among other things per my DNA from being vaxed in utero when my Mom was 6 months pregnant with me so another reason to go WFPB. My DNA shows all the dangers of what the vaccines do to you. Like an allergy to eagle eggs! Who the heck has ever eaten eagle eggs!! But, they used them in the vaccines back then. I like learning from you to make my own spices, etc.
One thing I would mention is that I used to be low/no fat and I totally reversed that and I’m MUCH healthier now. The brain needs fat. Your whole body does. I don’t really worry about calories any longer. I don’t go overboard but I eat a lot of fat! Every meal and typically every snack as well. I hope you will read this. https://wholenewmom.com/high-fat-diet-healthy-fats/
I think it’s possible that some of your allergies could go away. They did for us. Here’s a short bit of our story. https://wholenewmom.com/about-me/
You’re saying that your DNA showed the allergy to the eagle eggs or it was some other test?
Yes, allergies are in my DNA. I got into genetics over 10 years ago. I appreciate the links but I will remain no fat. Yes the brain requires fat, people don’t realize there is even fat in an apple. The body and brain will get what it requires from Whole Foods plant based w/o additional fats or sugars or salts of which research highly supports them as risk factors for CVD. As I mentioned we have widowmakers in our genetics so it would be stupid of me not to eat the way I do. Keeping my cholesterol (LDL) under 70 will only happen with a WFPBD. Nothing will change my DNA, it was damaged at 6 months in utero, it’s done. It’s only whether my genes are expressing or not and those that are DNA damaged are. You genetics are the smoking gun, your diet is what pulls the trigger ( or not). Since having been dx’d in 2000 with MCS, MCAD ( no longer having them) and having a medical background (20+ yrs), decoding patients DNA, etc I am pretty well established in my health profession ( having learned from a pretty famous Naturopath) and still loving research!! Greatly appreciate your thoughts. Be well!
I totally appreciate your experience and don’t at all mean to insinuate that you don’t have a lot of knowledge. I’m just saying that I care and I think there’s info out there and has been for many years that really demonized fat. I haven’t myself dug into everything by any means, however, from what I’ve read, you need about 45 grams of fat (average person) a day to have a healthy brain (according to multiple sources online), and that would be really hard to get, I’m thinking, if eating no fat. Yes, there is fat in an apple, but only about .3 grams which is of course very little. If you’re eating avocados and nuts and seeds, I guess one could get there, however.
I agree w/ you 100% on the smoking gun and diet (and other things) pulling the trigger. I have heart issues and cancer in my family and also diabetes so I’m watching all 3 of those and actually need to get back on some supplements I wanted to take for heart health. I am taking one but would like more. There’s a very interesting supplement that I heard about recently that might be of interest to you. There’s some data on it re: heart health that seems to be truly fascinating.
Anyhow with all of these articles on cholesterol and LDL and fats, it can get really confusing to sort out what’s real data and what is confounding what, but this article talks about increased mortality despite lowing LDL. https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/51/15/1111
In the certification courses I’m in, they have been talking about inflammatory foods and stress being the primary drivers of heart disease and the latter is hard to address in today’s world for sure! Would be interested in hearing your thoughts on that article. That’s great you are over the MCS and MCAD!
I totally agree with you on stress being the largest risk factor. My entire life from inside the womb on has been filled with stress! 🙄 Had adrenal issues ( Cortef at one period of time-CYP11B1) my entire life, high cortisol due to my environment which helped raise the low cortisol from genetics. Didn’t help being Aspie and HSP together. I didn’t go looking for the stress but it sure has found me 😡.
In addition to widowmakers we have several other heart disease issues on maternal and paternal, paternal is the widowmakers, cancer both sides (I’m fighting thyroid), we are carriers of hemochromatosis which makes a vegan diet challenging as it’s high iron but I have an awesome hack for that. We have diabetes on both sides, current family members with insulin resistance (I’m sure you know insulin resistance is the precursor to diabetes which stress itself brings on insulin resistance which when your stressed you crave carbs which raises your cortisol even higher, lose-lose situation). So, I totally get it.
Re: “The re-review study”, I did a “quick look”, did you go look at the citations it listed in the review? This one is just from #7: “Conclusions Available evidence from randomized controlled trials shows that replacement of saturated fat in the diet with linoleic acid effectively lowers serum cholesterol but does not support the hypothesis that this translates to a lower risk of death from coronary heart disease or all causes. Findings from the Minnesota Coronary Experiment add to growing evidence that incomplete publication has contributed to overestimation of the benefits of replacing saturated fat with vegetable oils rich in linoleic acid.”
(source – added by Adrienne at reader’s request – https://www.bmj.com/content/353/bmj.i1246)
So……..
As I stated before I am the only one in my family (of 6) who is not on any big PHARMA meds, I just don’t believe in them. The definition of pharmacy if one looks it up is witchcraft. Why take a med that profits someone else that’s usually compounded from a plant material/isolate that is free when for me at least supplements/herbs the original source works just as well? Example: Hawthorn works just as well for hearts as heart meds PLUS it’s full of antioxidants. Besides due to various factors my body doesn’t do well with meds.
I think the biggest thing we lack is antioxidants (stress depletes significantly) and a WFPBD gives you that. I have proven this by drinking a specific tea when I was at my worst with my throat and with just one sip it brought my voice back. Yes, I had to keep drinking it and still do but it restored my lost voice immediately. What I didn’t know was the proverbial “WHY” question that my brain has always asked. Researching it I found it is loaded with antioxidants. Hence leading me to discover that I acquired cancer due to the STRESS in my life depleting all my antioxidants. Lack of antioxidants was also “why” I had MCS.
I have been going through a “trial by fire” the last 5 years and my stress has been off the charts due to what was done to me (think Job). Yet, by Gods grace my thyroid biopsy (which never should have had I knew better but had given up at that point and didn’t really care) came back middle road. My choice of diet is a testament to the positive changes and Gods not done with me and is doing something. 🤔
Besides being the “different one” in my family which naturally increases my stress, I’m also the only vegan. Albeit not very long, but I have eaten better than the rest since 2000 as that was a wake up call having been pronounced dead. My love for roasted turkey or chicken skin and chitlins growing up wasn’t the best for me. Boy, I miss it! Which is why I settle for my next love-Mac and cheese.
I’m not aware of exactly which heart issue I have but I am 💯 sure I do have one or more, I have bilateral earlobe creases. Yes, it’s scientifically proven earlobe creases are indicative of heart disease unfortunately. Having bilateral isn’t good.
You must do what you feel is best for you. I understand your struggles more than you know. I’m just many years further down the road than you are.
Hi again. Sorry for the delay. I just have a lot going on here right now.
I’m not understanding your concern about the source that I cited. Could you explain please? Also would love to know the tea you used. Yes, antioxidants are great but also you can do too much. I’m aware of the root of the word pharmacy / pharmaceutical. I’ve shared that w/ others as well.
BTW, you might like this recipe. I think I need to rework it but it’s an option for you :).
ADRIENNE!! PLEASE delete the reference in my comment or my entire comments I do NOT have permission to reprint it!!!
Hi again – thanks for this comment and your note. Just to clarify, I’ve reviewed the legal concerns that you expressed and quoting brief excerpts from published studies for purposes of discussion or critique is generally / always / almost always considered acceptable use.
U.S. copyright law allows limited quotation without permission when used for:
-Commentary
-Criticism
-Discussion
-Education
-Analysis
Your use qualifies on multiple fronts. You were:
-Quoting a small portion (not the whole article)
-Responding to my discussion
-Expressing disagreement (criticism/commentary)
-Not reproducing the study commercially or in full
I’ve added a link to the study so readers can review the full context if they’d like. I do appreciate your engagement with the topic!
Adrienne. Add this link to the quote please. Thanks.
https://www.bmj.com/content/353/bmj.i1246
Hi again. It’s not a problem for you to type out a quote from something w/o permission or a link in a comment. Do you have information about why that would be a problem?
Hey Adrienne!
https://youtu.be/sKvmAww6eaU
I would be happy to email you, I don’t know any other way to reach you other than this way. This is for you only. I’m sure you know Dr. Esselstyn took the absolute sickest people with heart disease and put them on his no fat WFPB diet and not one of them died but did improve. This guy does a good job of disclosing the “research”.
Be discerning and well!
Thanks! I can watch later but I did skim the comments and looked up some more things. I’m concerned about this – while no one is perfect (he mentions in another post that the average life expectancy in 1945 was 50, which it was not, and I don’t like statins….), this MD does point out some things that I think are very valid. https://theskepticalcardiologist.com/2015/08/the-incredibly-bad-science-behind-dr-esselstyns-plant-based-diet/
Also did you see that Esselstyn died of cancer at 72? That’s really pretty young.
Lots to consider!
Also, as stated prior, the brain can get enough fat in a WFPBD bc the brains main source of fuel is *not* fat but glucose.
The brain primarily relies on glucose as its main energy source. However, recent research indicates that fat can also play a significant role in brain metabolism.
Glucose as the Primary Fuel
The brain consumes about 20% of the body’s energy, primarily from glucose.
Glucose is essential for various cognitive functions, including memory and attention.
The brain requires a continuous supply of glucose, as it cannot store energy like other organs.
Not quite sure who taught you fat was it’s requirement? Hope this helps!!
I’ve read about fat being a must in numerous places. Here are a few: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/diagnosis-diet/201903/the-brain-needs-animal-fat
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/neurons-can-tap-into-fat-fuel
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20329590/#:~:text=The%20human%20brain%20is%20nearly,integrity%20and%20ability%20to%20perform.
I found it impossible to roll the dough into a log using the almond flour version. It crumbled rather than roll up. I ended up piling the whole mess up and scooping into cookies with my ice cream scoop. I flattened the rounds and baked about 15-17 minutes. They tasted good but were not pretty. Do you have any tips?
Hi Trish. I’m so sorry you had a hard time with it. Did you chill the dough?
These were really good! Would give them 4.5 stars, just because the dough was a little challenging for me to work with. I used Bob’s Red Mill gf 1-to-1 baking flour and struggled with keeping the dough together as I was rolling it. Could have also been the Rumiano butter I used which seemed to leave the dough too dry at first, so I did end up adding a bit more. I used xylitol in the dough, coconut sugar in the filling, and regular powdered sugar. These were absolutely delicious and had a great texture. They were a hit, and I will make them again. Hopefully, I can figure out the dough a little bit better next time. I made the dough Christmas Eve, baked half of them Christmas morning, and the other half the following day. The last batch turned out the best.
Hi Kelly! I’m so sorry for not responding to this for such a long time. Were you ever able to try them again? I am pretty sure when I first put the recipe up that it said any gluten-free flour when in fact I tested it with oat flour and they were really great using that.
Sounds like I need your final recipe to make a non all oat flour gluten free version :).
I love that you made these for Christmas morning. I used to make gluten free cinnamon rolls (actually I think I regularly made whole wheat ones until we went gluten-free) and I miss them!
Thanks for sharing the details…I wish I had a 1/2 star option, but alas……it’s not something that is possible. If someone else leaves a 5 star then the overall rating will be 4.5, however :).