Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar: 100 Dairy-Free Recipes for Everyone's Favorite Treats (21 page)

⅓ cup nondairy milk
¾ cup sugar
½ cup canola oil
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
A scant 1 teaspoon finely grated orange
zest
2 cups flour
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
6 ounces bittersweet or semisweet
chocolate, chopped (or use
chocolate chips)

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease two large cookie sheets.

2. In a large mixing bowl, use a strong fork to mix together the nondairy milk, sugar, oil, vanilla, and zest. Add half the flour, along with the cornstarch, baking powder, and salt; mix well. Add the remaining flour and mix until you have a soft, pliable dough.

3. Make sure your hands are very clean and dry and dust them with flour. Stuff’s about to get messy. Sort of.

4. Grab about 1 tablespoon’s worth of dough and roll it into a ball, and then roll it into a log that’s about 1½ inches long. Flatten it with the palms of your hands to create an oval that is 2 inches long and 1 inch across, then straighten the edges out with your fingers. Basically, if you know what a Milano looks like, that’s the shape you’re going for. But this is homemade, so don’t try to be perfect. You aren’t a machine (or are you?).

5. Continue with the rest of the dough, flouring your hands before you form each cookie, until you have 16 cookies placed about 1 inch apart (they don’t spread much.)

6. Bake the cookies for 14 to 16 minutes, until the tops are firm and the edges are ever-so-slightly browned. Remove the cookies from the oven and let them rest for 2 minutes. Use a thin, flexible spatula to transfer them to wire racks. Meanwhile, bake your next batch and melt your chocolate (page 24).

7. Once cookies are cool enough to handle (only about 10 minutes), take a cookie and dip the bottom into the chocolate. Then take another cookie and dip it, and place the dipped sides together to form a sandwich. Don’t press them hard lest the chocolate smoosh out. Place the cookies on a tray or plate that will fit in your fridge. Continue with the remaining cookies until you have 16 sandwiches. Have a wet rag at the ready to wipe your fingers between putting the cookies together, to avoid chocolate fingerprints on the cookies. Or just lick the chocolate off. Or just decide that who cares about chocolate fingerprints.

8. Chill the cookies in the fridge to set for at least an hour. Bring them back to room temperature before serving (about ½ hour). Call it a day.

Cranberry Walnut Thumbprints

½ cup canola oil
¾ cup sugar
⅓ cup brown sugar
¼ cup nondairy milk
1½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract
½ teaspoon maple extract
1⅔ cups all-purpose flour
¼ cup cornstarch
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon salt
1¼ cups finely chopped walnuts
1 cup jellied cranberry sauce, stirred till
smooth

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

2. In a large bowl, beat together the oil, sugar, brown sugar, nondairy milk, and vanilla and maple extracts. Sift in the flour, cornstarch, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. Stir to form a thick, stiff dough. If the dough seems too dry, add a tablespoon or so of nondairy milk.

3. Pour the chopped walnuts into a shallow bowl. Scoop the dough with a tablespoon and roll into balls, then roll the balls in the chopped walnuts and place them on the baking sheets, about 1 inch apart. Using the opposite end of a wooden spoon (the stick end), gently shape a hole into the center of each ball. (Hold the ball as you do this, as the dough may be fragile.) Pour a generous teaspoon of cranberry sauce or jam into each center. Bake for 16 to 18 minutes until the cranberry sauce seems mostly dry and cookies are firm. Allow the cookies to cool at least 5 minutes before carefully moving them to wire racks to complete cooling.

Morsels

 

Whole cranberry sauce makes these cookies even more three-dimensional. Cranberry sauce also contains more water than regular fruit preserves, hence the slightly longer baking time. Canned cranberry sauce works just fine here. If you don’t like cranberries and would rather use your favorite red fruit preserve, cut the baking time down a minute or two.

¼ cup nondairy milk
½ cup sugar
½ cup dark brown sugar
1 tablespoon ground flax seeds
¼ cup Irish whiskey
⅓ cup canola oil
4 teaspoons espresso powder
1½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract
¼ teaspoon almond extract
1½ cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons cornstarch
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
1 cup finely chopped walnuts

2 tablespoons nonhydrogenated
margarine, softened
1½ cups powdered sugar, sifted
1 tablespoon nondairy milk
2 to 3 teaspoons Irish whiskey
½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 ounce dark semisweet chocolate, in
bar form, at room temperature.

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

2. In a large mixing bowl, stir together the nondairy milk, sugar, brown sugar, and flax seeds until smooth. Mix in the whiskey, oil, espresso powder, and vanilla and almond extracts. Sift in the all-purpose flour, cornstarch, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Mix to form a moist and somewhat sticky dough, then fold in the chopped walnuts.

3. Drop generously rounded tablespoons of dough 2 inches apart onto lined baking sheets. Bake for 12 to 14 minutes or until firm when pressed.

4. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes, then transfer them to wire racks to cool completely.

5. Make the frosting: In a large bowl, use a fork to combine the marga - rine with the powdered sugar until the mixture is crumbly. Stir in the nondairy milk, 2 teaspoons of the whiskey, and the vanilla and continue to stir to form a creamy, smooth frosting. If the mixture is too dry, add another teaspoon or more of whiskey; if too runny, sift in a tablespoon of powdered sugar. The frosting should be thick yet easy to spread.

6. Make the chocolate curls: Use a vegetable peeler and run it along the narrow edge of the bar to form small curls or flakes of chocolate. The chocolate should be soft enough so that curls form smoothly. You won’t need very much, less than half a teaspoon per cookie should suffice.

7. Decorate the cookies by spreading a generous teaspoon of frosting onto the centers of the completely cooled cookies. Concentrate the frosting in the middle; do not spread to the edges. Sprinkle the chocolate curls onto the moist frosting and allow the cookies to set for about 30 minutes. If desired, chill the cookies to speed up the process. Store in a tightly covered container in a cool place.

1½ to 2 cups powdered sugar
½ cup nonhydrogenated margarine
½ cup nonhydrogenated vegetable
shortening
⅔ cup powdered sugar
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
¼ teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon nondairy milk
1¾ cups all-purpose flour
1 cup finely ground pecans (about 4
ounces pecan halves; pulse with a
food processor until finely ground)

1. Preheat oven to 325°F. Line two medium-size baking sheets with parchment paper.

2. Sift the powdered sugar that will be used for coating cookies onto a large plate, preferably one with a raised edge. Set aside.

3. In a large bowl, with a hand mixer, beat together the margarine and shortening until light and creamy. Beat in the powdered sugar until smooth. Add the vanilla, salt, nondairy milk, and half the flour and beat until ingredients are moistened. Add the remaining flour and the pecans. Beat on high speed for 3 to 5 minutes to form a soft and fluffy dough. If the dough appears crumbly, don’t fret, just keep beating the dough until it becomes moist enough to stick together when pressed into a ball.

Nutty Wedding Cookies