Soft Pumpkin Cookies – gluten free & vegan with grain-free options
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These gluten-free soft pumpkin cookies are soft, tasty, and not too sweet. Made with nutritious, whole-food ingredients, they are the perfect snack to keep on hand all year round.
Although pumpkin is typically a fall food, I personally think it should be eaten year round. We love these Pumpkin Snickerdoodles and this Pumpkin Spiced Creamer, but today I am sharing a favorite recipe for pumpkin cookies that we've been making for years.
These Gluten-Free Pumpkin Cookies are amazingly low in sugar (which is great if you are on a candida diet) and yet they still taste great. The pumpkin adds a natural sweetness and the orange flavor adds a nice hint of orange.
Often when you add flavors or extracts you can get away with less sweetener.
These cookies are soft and moist and my whole family loves them. When I first made them, our oldest was walking around the kitchen, nibbling on them and saying, “Now these really remind me of something.” And then he remembered what it was, and my youngest agreed. They reminded them of Enjoy Life's Gingerbread Spice cookies.
Even in my sugar-aholic days, I never really bought those, mainly because they're expensive. We'd sample them at gluten-free fairs and then feel plenty sick afterward.
Not that there is anything technically wrong with Enjoy Life. We just couldn't handle all of the sugar and white flour.
Well, he was sure right. These soft little Pumpkin Cookies are like Enjoy Life's yummy treats, minus the white flour and all the sugar. Healthy. Yum.
Gluten-Free Pumpkin Cookies – 4 Ways
We made these Gluten-Free Pumpkin Cookies four different ways – with and without nuts and with and without rolling them in this Low-Carb Cinnamon Sugar. Hubby likes nuts in his cookies and oldest son does not like crunchies in his cookies. In my opinion, the rolled-in sweetener option, either with or without nuts, is the best option.
When you roll them in sugar, you get a nice punch of sweetness without a bunch of added sweeteners to the whole recipe.
The top photo shows the plain version and here is a photo of the nut-filled version with walnuts.
If you end up using stevia for this recipe, you will for sure want these mini measuring spoons since you'll be measuring out such teensy amounts. The 2nd smallest size is the one that you will use, but I am finding that stevia powders are now greatly vary in their strengths, so sweeten to taste.
Either way, you will find these spoons to be a huge help.
I think you are just going to love these and love how good they are for you. It's a great way to have healthy sweets around to help you avoid eating junk.
Particularly if it's around the fall and winter Holiday season when those kinds of sugar-laden treats are everywhere.
Here Are More Pumpkin Treats to Enjoy:
Pumpkin Snickerdoodles
Pumpkin Pie Spiced Creamer (DF & SF)
Pumpkin Custard
Pumpkin Chia Pudding
Pumpkin Pie Spice – DIY for use in your own recipes!
Recipe Notes and Substitutions
- Sweetener: You could substitute any healthy sweetener for the xylitol, although if you use a liquid sweetener you may need to use a different amount, so read this post for tips on substituting sweeteners. Although xylitol is a good low-carb option, vegetable glycerin and stevia (use 2-4 scoops) are as well. So is erythritol, but you will need about 25% more sweetener if using erythritol. If using a granulated sweetener, use coconut sugar, sucanat, or this Bocha Sweet sugar substitute for AIP, and if using a liquid, use honey, maple syrup (read Choosing Maple Syrup), or yacon for AIP. Omit the water if using a liquid.
- Stevia: Stevia is much stronger than other sweeteners. Read What Stevia Is and How to Use it for more tips. Here is a great brand of stevia scoops. If using pourable stevia, use 3-5 teaspoons, to taste. You can substitute approximately 4-8 tablespoons additional sweetener, to taste, for the stevia. If using stevia, add it to either wets or dries.
- Nuts: For nuts, we used walnuts. Almonds, macadamias, or even pumpkin or sunflower seeds would be great. Please use soaked and dried nuts if possible.
Both the nut-filled and plain versions were great, but my boys and I much preferred the plain version (my husband simply loves nuts in just about anything.) - Flour: Try whatever gluten-free flour blend, or individual gluten-free flour, that you have on hand. Each will give the final cookies a bit of a different result, but they should still be delicious! I do recommend combining flours when baking gluten-free, however, as noted in this post about gluten-free baking tips.
If you make them with a nut or seed flour, they will have to bake longer. Add on at least an additional 5 minutes but keep an eye on them.
For almond flour or any other nut or seed flour, increase the baking soda by 50%, using 3 cups almond flour, and 1/4 cup coconut oil. - THM: For those on the Trim Healthy Mama plan, this recipe will be a crossover.
Soft Gluten-free Pumpkin Cookies (vegan w/ gluten and sugar-free options)
Ingredients
Wet Ingredients
- 1 cup unsweetened pumpkin
- 1/2 cup coconut oil (or other healthy fat, melted)
- 1/4 cup low-carb sweetener (see Recipe Notes for sweetener alternatives)
- 1 tablespoon orange flavoring or extract (try Nielsen-Massey or Frontier Flavor)
- 1 tablespoon water
Dry Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups gluten-free flour (use almond flour for low-carb, tiger nut flour for AIP – see notes above)
- 3-4 scoops stevia extract (each scoop is 1/32 teaspoon)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup chopped or ground nuts (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375. Combine pumpkin, oil, sweetener, and orange flavoring in a medium bowl.
- Add flour, baking soda, & seasonings. Mix just 'til combined.
- Fold in nuts if using.
- Make spoonfuls or scoops with a 2 tablespoon muffin scoop. If desired, roll in a bit of granulated sweetener before baking. You get a really nice "punch" of sweetness without adding a lot of sweetener when you coat cookies rather than adding more to the batter. :-P.
- Place spoonfuls or scoops on a baking sheet (the scoops result in a cookie that really resembles the Enjoy Life ones :-)).
- Bake 8-10 minutes or until lightly browned. They will harden a bit as they cool, but will still be nice and soft.
Notes
-
- Sweetener: You could substitute any healthy sweetener for the xylitol, although if you use a liquid sweetener you may need to use a different amount, so read this post for tips on substituting sweeteners. Although xylitol is a good low-carb option, vegetable glycerin and stevia (use 2-4 scoops) are as well. So is erythritol, but you will need about 25% more sweetener if using erythritol. If using a granulated sweetener, use coconut sugar, sucanat, or this Bocha Sweet sugar substitute for AIP, and if using a liquid, use honey, maple syrup (read Choosing Maple Syrup), or yacon for AIP. Omit the water if using a liquid.
-
- Stevia: Stevia is much stronger than other sweeteners. Read What Stevia Is and How to Use it for more tips. Here is a great brand of stevia scoops. If using pourable stevia, use 3-5 teaspoons, to taste. You can substitute approximately 4-8 tablespoons additional sweetener, to taste, for the stevia. If using stevia, add it to either wets or dries.
-
- Nuts: For nuts, we used walnuts. Almonds, macadamias, or even pumpkin or sunflower seeds would be great. Please use soaked and dried nuts if possible.
Both the nut-filled and plain versions were great, but my boys and I much preferred the plain version (my husband simply loves nuts in just about anything.)
- Nuts: For nuts, we used walnuts. Almonds, macadamias, or even pumpkin or sunflower seeds would be great. Please use soaked and dried nuts if possible.
-
- Flour: Try whatever gluten-free flour blend, or individual gluten-free flour, that you have on hand. Each will give the final cookies a bit of a different result, but they should still be delicious! I do recommend combining flours when baking gluten-free, however, as noted in this post about gluten-free baking tips.
If you make them with a nut or seed flour, they will have to bake longer. Add on at least an additional 5 minutes but keep an eye on them.
For almond flour or any other nut or seed flour, increase the baking soda by 50%, using 3 cups almond flour, and 1/4 cup coconut oil.
- Flour: Try whatever gluten-free flour blend, or individual gluten-free flour, that you have on hand. Each will give the final cookies a bit of a different result, but they should still be delicious! I do recommend combining flours when baking gluten-free, however, as noted in this post about gluten-free baking tips.
-
- THM: For those on the Trim Healthy Mama plan, this recipe will be a crossover.
Nutrition
Nutritional information is provided as a courtesy and is merely an approximation. Optional ingredients are not included and when there is an alternative, the primary ingredient is typically used. We cannot guarantee the accuracy of the nutritional information given for any recipe on this site. Erythritol carbs are not included in carb counts since they have been shown not to impact blood sugar. Net carbs are the total carbs minus fiber.
This recipe was adapted from one on Whole Approach, a candida forum. Sadly the form is gone now.
What is YOUR favorite pumpkin recipe?
Also, I don’t use stevia. What should I replace it with? Liquid allulose maybe? How much?
Depends on what sweeteners you have. 1/8 teaspoon stevia is about as sweet as 1/2 cup of sugar. Hopefully that helps! I haven’t used liquid allulose. Are they all the same?
I thought liquid allulose as stevia extract is liquid. But now I see it is the dry ingredients. So what does 3-4 scoops of stevia extract equate to other granular or powdered sweeteners?
I’m just trying to make these without using stevia
Hi again. Stevia extract is typically referring to the powdered extract while there are 2 types of liquid stevia: liquid stevia dnd stevia glycerite. The info in this post is super helpful but basically 1/32 of a teaspoon of the powder equals 2 tablespoons of a 1:1 sweetener that’s granulated but allulose is not as sweet as sugar so you need to take that into account and stevias will vary. Hope that helps!
OK, this recipe for ‘almond’ flour is very confusing. “”For almond flour or any other nut or seed flour, increase the baking soda by 50%, using 3 cups almond flour, and 1/4 cup coconut oil.””
But the recipe calls for 1-1/2 cups flour…so DOUBLE the flour??? and REDUCE the coconut oil by HALF???
Could you please clarify?
Thank you
Yes, you’re correct! Sorry for the delay. I wasn’t getting notifications of comments that came in. Hope you like them!
I made these with coconut flour and they were a complete ? BOMB! They never stayed together and just crumbled. I decided to add an egg to the left over dough. Nope. Didn’t work. Threw out the extras and the crumbled mess of cookies. Bummed.
Hi there, Tina. So sorry about that. Coconut flour is a very unusual flour and doesn’t behave like others. It soaks up a ton more liquid and never really works without eggs. Perhaps you haven’t used that before?
I have never used it exclusively b/c our son has a life threatening allergy to eggs — I only use it in conjunction with other flours like in this recipe. Hopefully the next go around will work better. https://wholenewmom.com/egg-nog-cookies/ and hope that helps!
They are delicious! I used 3 cups almond flour, 1.5 tsp baking soda, 1 tsp orange zest, 3-4 drops of sweet orange essential oil, and 1/8 cup of maple syrup and 2 full droppers of stevia.
Soooo glad you liked them! I need to get the photos redone. You made my day literally! If you ever are so inclined and would like to leave a 5 star review, that would be lovely but not mandatory at all. It just helps us bloggers at least a little bit for others and google to see that it’s a good recipe. Thanks again!! 🙂
These are delish. I made them for the first time today. I was wondering if they freeze well
So glad you liked them! Yes, they should! Have you found that some kinds of cookies don’t freeze well?
I’m using Tigernuts flour. Do I understand correctly that when using nut flours I should double the flour from 1-1/2 cups to 3 cups? And increase the Baking Soda from 1 tsp to 1-1/2 tsp and decrease the coconut oil from 1/2 cup to 1/4 cup? And the spices stay the same as the original recipe? Seems like these cookies would be pretty dry by increasing the flour that much and reducing the oil.
Hi there. Tiger nut is really not a nut. Interestingly. You can sub it in 1:1. I haven’t baked with it yet so I would try 1 batch and see how it goes! Please let me know!
These are mind-blowing! I used Bob’s Red Mill 1:1 GF flour, swapped the orange for vanilla because that’s what I had, sweetened with 1/4 c coconut sugar and 1/8 tsp pure stevia, added chopped pecans and a 1/4 tsp ginger powder, and fresh ground nutmeg. Rolled in coconut sugar and cinnamon before baking. At 8 minutes they are still moist. If I didn’t know better I wouldn’t think these were refined sugar and gluten free. By far the best gluten free cookies I’ve ever had. Even better than Aldi’s GF brand and I truly LOVE those.
Wow – this made my day – thank you and soooo glad you liked them. LOVE the rolling in sweetener idea!
Could you add protien powder to this? And if so, how would one go about doing it?
How much are you thinking you would like to add? Of course it you add a lot you will affect the texture. You can typically add substitute in about 1/3 of the amount of flour with protein powder.
Hope that helps!