Chewy Vegan Cookies topped with a homemade vegan caramel sauce, salted popcorn and mini pink and white marshmallows. These cookies are decadent, fun and a little bit "extra"!
Whip up a batch of these cookies hand them around and just wait for the look on people's faces when you tell them they're vegan.
It's priceless!
These vegan cookies are everything you want from a cookie and a whole lot more.
Why are you going to love these?
✔︎ Chewy middle crisp edges
✔︎ Piled high with caramel, popcorn and marshmallows
✔︎ Super cute and fun cookies
✔︎ No weird ingredients!
Perfect to impress your non-vegan friends. These cookies won't hand around for long, let me tell ya!
What you need
- Vegan Butter: I used Stork (block) but you can use any vegan butter such as Naturli or Earth Balance.
- Brown Sugar: Light Brown Soft Sugar lends the perfect texture to cookies.
- Vanilla Bean Paste: I prefer to use the paste in cookies because the flavour is better. You can substitute with vanilla extract if that's all you have.
- Cornstarch: Adding cornstarch makes cookies nice and chewy.
- Plain Flour: Plain flour or all-purpose flour.
- Baking Powder: For even well-baked cookies.
- Salt: To balance the flavour.
- Coconut Milk: To make the caramel sauce.
- Popcorn: Salted popcorn to balance the sweetness of the caramel.
- Mini Marshmallows: Easy to find in health food stores or on Amazon. I used Freedom pink and white vegan marshmallows.
How to make Vegan Cookies
Step One: Preheat the oven to 180ºC / 160ºC Fan / Gas 4 / 350ºC F Melt the butter in the microwave and add it to a large mixing bowl with the brown sugar and vanilla bean paste. Beat together using an electric handheld whisk or a wooden spoon.
Step Two: Mix the cornstarch with the cold water until it's dissolved and pour it into the bowl, mixing everything together until it's combined.
Step Three: Sieve the flour, baking powder and salt into the bowl and beat you can no longer see streaks of flour. The cookie dough will be soft and pliable.
Step Four: Using your hands take pieces of cookie dough (I use an ice cream scoop to measure the dough) Roll the dough in your hands into a ball and then use your fingers to make it flatter on the bottom and more dome-like at the top.
Step Five: Arrange the cookie dough balls on two baking trays. There will be six to a tray. Leave plenty of space for when they spread and become cookie-shaped in the oven.
Step Six: Bake in the centre of the oven for 12 mins. You'll need to do this in two batches unless you have a double oven. The cookies are baked when they feel firm on top. Once baked remove from the oven and transfer to a cooling rack.
How to make vegan caramel
Step One: To make the caramel, put the coconut milk, brown sugar and vanilla bean paste into a medium-sized saucepan. Bring it to the boil stirring continuously over a high heat. I use a small handheld whisk to stir caramel.
When the contents of the pan come to a boil turn the heat right down and let it simmer until it's reduced by about half. This will take around 20 minutes. You must watch the pan like a hawk otherwise it will boil over! You may need to periodically remove the pan from the heat if the sauce is bubbling too close to the top of the pan.
Once the caramel has reduced and is very dark brown in colour, set the pan aside to cool. The sauce will thicken as it cools.
Step Two: When the caramel has cooled pour three tablespoons of the sauce over the popcorn and marshmallows and mix together. Top the cookies with piles of popcorn and marshmallows then pour the caramel sauce on top of the cookies to glue the topping on. Put the cookies aside for around 30 minutes until the caramel has set.
Variations
- Add 100g of vegan chocolate chips to the cookie dough for chocolate chip cookies
- Swap the marshmallows for 100g nuts if you prefer a cookie that's less sweet with more crunch
This recipe was adapted from The Vegan Society
More Tempting Vegan Recipes
Vegan Cookies with caramel, popcorn and marshmallows
Chewy vegan cookies topped with homemade caramel sauce, salted popcorn and pink and white marshmallows.
Ingredients
For the cookies
- 125 g vegan butter
- 100 g light brown soft sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla bean paste
- 2 tbsp cornstarch
- 3 tbsp cold water
- 225 g plain flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 0.5 tsp salt
For the caramel
- 400 ml coconut milk
- 300 g light brown soft sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla bean paste
For the topping
- 2 handfuls salted popcorn
- 75 g vegan marshmallows
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180ºC / 160ºC Fan / Gas 4 / 350ºC F Melt the butter in the microwave and add it to a large mixing bowl with the brown sugar and vanilla bean paste. Beat together using an electric handheld whisk or a wooden spoon.
- Mix the cornstarch with the cold water until it's dissolved and pour it into the bowl, mixing everything together until it's combined.
- Sieve the flour, baking powder and salt into the bowl and beat until you can no longer see streaks of flour. The cookie dough will be soft and pliable.
- Using your hands take pieces of cookie dough (I use an ice cream scoop to measure the dough) Roll the dough in your hands into a ball and then use your fingers to make it flatter on the bottom and more dome-like at the top.
- Arrange the cookie dough balls on two baking trays. There will be six to a tray. Leave plenty of space for when they spread and become cookie-shaped in the oven.
- Bake in the centre of the oven for 12 mins. You'll need to do this in two batches unless you have a double oven. The cookies are baked when they feel firm on top. Once baked remove from the oven and transfer to a cooling rack.
- To make the caramel, put the coconut milk, brown sugar and vanilla bean paste into a medium-sized saucepan. Bring it to the boil stirring continuously over a high heat. I use a small handheld whisk to stir caramel.
- When the contents of the pan come to a boil turn the heat right down and let it simmer until it's reduced by about half. This will take around 20 minutes. You must watch the pan like a hawk otherwise it will boil over! You may need to periodically remove the pan from the heat if the sauce is bubbling too close to the top of the pan.
- Once the caramel has reduced and is very dark brown in colour, set the pan aside to cool. The sauce will thicken as it cools.
- When the caramel has cooled pour three tablespoons of the sauce over the popcorn and marshmallows and mix together. Top the cookies with piles of popcorn and marshmallows then pour the caramel sauce on top of the cookies to glue the topping on. Put the cookies aside for around 30 minutes until the caramel has set.
Notes
When the caramel is cooking it will be extremely hot. Please use caution.
Storage: The cookies will keep for at least 7 days if stored in an airtight container. Cookie dough can be frozen for up to 3 months.
Recipe adapted from The Vegan Society
Nutrition Information:
Yield: 12 Serving Size: 1 gramsAmount Per Serving: Calories: 352Total Fat: 14gSaturated Fat: 8gUnsaturated Fat: 0gSodium: 180mgCarbohydrates: 50gFiber: 1gSugar: 33gProtein: 3g
Mary Brice
This looks beautiful, and I’m sure my kids would love it, too. I’ve always thought vegan cookies would be very complicated to make, but this sound like something I could do. Definitely trying it soon!