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5 from 10 votes
by Marly
18
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This soft and chewy Vegan Snickerdoodles recipe makes amazing cinnamon sugar-spiced cookies. Vegan or not, this is the best snickerdoodle recipe and makes tender, buttery, and puffy cookies rolled in sugar and cinnamon. You’ll love the easy-to-follow instructions too — ready in around 30 minutes from start to finish.
For a fun change of pace, try these chocolate-dipped snickerdoodles.
I was in high school when I tried my first snickerdoodle cookie. A friend’s mother made them, and I thought they were divine. If I was alone with that tray of delicious cookies, I might have eaten them all. I had very little self-control around sweets in those days.
Today, I love making vegan snickerdoodles because they’re a treat everyone loves.
Table of Contents show
What Makes This Recipe Shine?
- Applesauce is a great egg replacer and adds tenderness to these tasty cookies
- Cream of tartar adds both a tangy flavor and soft, chewy consistency
- Apple cider vinegar reacts with the baking soda to create a chemical reaction, making the cookies extra soft and pillowy.
Ingredients for Vegan Snickerdoodles
You can find the full printable recipe, including ingredient quantities, below. But first, here are some explanations of ingredients and steps to help you make this recipe perfect every time.
- Vegan butter — You can use your storebought, or use this dairy-free butter
- Granulated sugar
- Applesauce — You’ll need some unsweetened applesauce for this recipe.
- Plant-based milk — You can use soy milk, almond milk, oat milk, etc.
- Apple cider vinegar
- Vanilla extract — Combining the cream of tartar and baking soda provides some lift, but the vinegar makes extra soft cookies
- All-purpose flour — I have used whole wheat pastry flour (not the same as whole wheat flour), and it works with this recipe too
- Cream of tartar
- Baking soda
- Salt
- Ground cinnamon — I use ground cinnamon that’s most easily available in the baking section of most grocery stores.
Ingredient Spotlight
What Cinnamon is Best for Snickerdoodles?
There are two different categories of cinnamon: Cassia and Ceylon. Cassia cinnamonis a ground reddish powder with a bold, intense flavor. It’s most often used in baking. Most cinnamon, unless otherwise noted, is Cassia. Ceylon cinnamonhas a more delicate flavor and is more expensive as a result of its rarity. You might use it for things like puddings or sauces. For the purpose of these cookies, I recommend using standard ground cinnamon (Cassia) because we’ll want the bold flavor it offers.
How to Make Vegan Snickerdoodles Cookies
- Cream vegan butter with sugar using a mixer until fluffy, around 2 minutes.
- Add the applesauce, milk, vinegar, and vanilla and mix until combined.
- Stir together the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt,
- Mix dry ingredients with the wet ingredients. Mix well.
- Shape the dough into balls slightly smaller than a golf ball and roll in cinnamon sugar mixture.
- Place on cookie sheets approximately 2 inches apart.
- Bake for 8 to 10 minutes.
- Cool cookies for 1 to 2 minutes on the cookie sheet, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
Here are more detailed step-by-step instructions.
Interestingly enough, the cookie part of snickerdoodles is more like a puffy sugar cookie. However, rolling them in the cinnamon-sugar mixture makes all the difference. I think you’ll be pleased that vegan snickerdoodles are so easy to make — you can make them in around 30 minutes.
Step One: Cream Butter and Sugar
We begin this recipe for vegan snickerdoodles by mixing the vegan butter with granulated sugar.
You can use either a hand-held mixer or a stand mixer. Beat the butter and sugar on medium speed until nice and fluffy. This creates a light base for the cookie dough.
Step Two: Add Wet Ingredients
Next, we’ll add some of the wet ingredients, like applesauce, milk, apple cider vinegar, and vanilla. Beat this all together on medium speed until combined.
Step Three: Mix Dry Ingredients
Next, whisk together the dry ingredients in a separate bowl, including the flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt.
Make the batter by adding the flour to the butter mixture and either mix together with the mixer or stir it with a spatula or spoon.
Step Four: Cookie Dough Balls
Roll the dough into roughly 2-inch cookie dough balls. I use a cookie dough scoop to keep the sizes consistent. Roll each cookie dough ball in the cinnamon-sugar mixture. Place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper about 2 inches apart.
Step Five: Bake
Place the pan in the oven and bake the cookies for 8–10 minutes. I recommend removing them from the oven around the 8-minute mark. Because of residual baking, the cookies will continue to bake on the pan as they cool. Leave them on the pan for 1–2 minutes, and then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
Marly’s Tips
- You can refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes up to 24 hours before rolling into balls.
- I stick to the 8-minute side of being these cookies. They are tender when you pull them out of the oven, but they firm up as they cool.
- I use a whole cup of vegan butter in this recipe. However, you can substitute 1/2 cup peanut butter. My taste testers couldn’t detect the peanut butter.
- Substitute 1/2 cup pumpkin puree for the applesauce to create pumpkin snickerdoodles.
- You can freeze the cookie dough balls. Roll them into balls and place them in a freezer bag and freeze for up to 2 months. Note, frozen cookie dough balls take longer to bake.
- Transform these into vegan, gluten-free snickerdoodles by using gluten-free baking flour.
What is A Snickerdoodle?
A snickerdoodle is a soft cookie rolled in cinnamon sugar. What makes this simple, puffy cookie worthy of such a silly name? They’ve also been lovingly referred to as kinkawoodles and tangle breeches. The recipe itself has been dated as far back as 1889. New England cooks were known for giving odd names to their dishes and so there is speculation that the snickerdoodle comes from this whimsical style of naming. One recipe from 1901 says that “Snickerdoodles is the somewhat fantastic name of quickly-made little cakes especially dear to the children’s heart.”
What is the difference between a sugar cookie and a snickerdoodle?
There are a lot of similarities between snickerdoodles and sugar cookies. However, sugar cookies are rolled in sugar before baking, and snickerdoodles are rolled in a mixture of sugar and cinnamon.
Egg-Free Snickerdoodles
You have lots of options for egg replacers when making vegan snickerdoodles. These include:
- applesauce
- flax egg
- chia egg
- mashed bananas (which will add flavor to the cookies).
Eggs can play many roles in baked goods; providing texture, richness, leavening, and binding. The key is knowing what role the eggs play in your recipe.
I chose unsweetened applesauce for these vegan snickerdoodles. It may seem like an unusual egg replacer for a cookie, but it works really well.
According to my taste testers, the end result was really yummy. I hope you enjoy these soft and easy, healthy vegan snickerdoodles!
Reader Reviews
★★★★★
Stephie
This is my favorite snickerdoodles cookie. Make them for my family all the time!
More Vegan Cookies
If you love these vegan snickerdoodles, be sure to try these tasty vegan cinnamon cookies too:
Vegan Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
22 mins total
Soft Molasses Cookies
85 mins total
Molasses Chocolate Chip Cookies
25 mins total
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Vegan Snickerdoodles
This Vegan Snickerdoodles recipe is the best! You'll love these soft, fluffy cookies rolled in sugar and cinnamon. See instructions for making these cookies fast and easy.
5 from 10 votes
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Course: Dessert
Cuisine: American
Prep Time: 30 minutes minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes minutes
Total Time: 40 minutes minutes
Servings: 36
Calories: 94kcal
Author: Marly McMillen
Ingredients
- 1 cup vegan butter , softened
- 1 cup granulated sugar (see note)
- ½ cup applesauce
- ¼ cup plant-based milk
- 1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 ¾ cups all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons cream of tartar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
Instructions
Place the vegan butter and sugar in a mixing bowl. Using a stand mixer or regular mixer, mix on medium speed until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add the applesauce, milk, vinegar, and vanilla and mix until combined.
In a separate bowl, add the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt. Stir until combined.
Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients. Mix well. Here you can choose to refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes or go straight to baking.
Heat your oven to 350°F/175°C. Get out a cookie sheet and line it with parchment paper or a silicone mat.
Shape the dough into balls slightly smaller than a golf ball. Pour the sugar and cinnamon together in a bowl.
Roll cookie dough balls in cinnamon sugar until well-coated. Place on cookie sheet approximately 2 inches apart.
Bake for 8 to 10 minutes. Remove from oven and cool for 1 to 2 minutes on the cookie sheet before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Recommended Equipment
Electric Mixer
Spatula
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Notes
Baking Time: It’s tempting to leave these cookies in the oven a little longer, but they firm up as they cool.
Butter: If you want, you can substitute 1 cup of vegan butter with 1/2 cup vegan butter + 1/2 cup peanut butter (I’ve done this and the PB taste does not overshadow the cookie) or you can use 1/2 cup vegan butter + 1/2 cup refined coconut oil.
Measure: If you want equally-sized cookies, measure the entire ball of dough and then divide by 36 to determine the size of each cookie dough ball. For me, the entire ball of dough weighed 32.25 ounces, so divided by 36, my individual cookie dough balls weighted .90 each.
Sugar: I used organic sugar, but coconut sugar would work well in this recipe too. If you don’t have either, granulated sugar works fine.
Resting the Dough: I recommend chilling the dough in the fridge for 30 minutes. However, if you’re in a hurry, cut the dough ball in half and wrap both in plastic wrap. Place both dough balls in the freezer. Wait ten minutes, remove one of the dough balls, and begin rolling into individual cookie dough balls. Bake those and then remove the second dough ball and begin rolling it into individual dough balls.
Calories: 94kcal | Carbohydrates: 12g | Fat: 5g | Saturated Fat: 3g | Sodium: 67mg | Potassium: 42mg | Sugar: 9g | Vitamin A: 120IU | Calcium: 4mg | Iron: 0.1mg
The nutrition information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator and should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
Did you make this recipe?
Leave a rating below then tag @namelymarly on Instagram and hashtag it #namelymarly. I love seeing your creations!
Enjoy!
This post was originally published in 2009 and was updated to include new photos, new text, and an updated recipe in 2020.
