Hello lovelies,
isn't it crazy how fast time flies? Christmas is getting closer again, and wasn't it just summer a few days ago?! I really love Christmas and the whole spirit around it, and I am looking forward to cozy time with the family, the decorations, candlelight and the whole Advent season with lots of yummy cookies. Every year I love trying new kinds, and my crunchy ginger cantuccini with aquafaba are one of those experiments that stayed in the tin for good.
That is a real family tradition for us: we never were the people who bake the same cookies every year, we always tried new recipes, sometimes more and sometimes less successfully, and of course some favorites made it onto the plate again and again. If you want to know which classics are easy to switch, have a look at my guide to baking classic Christmas cookies without eggs.
So Christmas baking can't start early enough for me, and this year my cookie cutters and rolling pin were out earlier than ever. I put on some Christmas music and started baking, and 3 different cookie recipes came out of it, all vegan of course, which I am happy to share with you today.
Christmas Tree Cookies with Aquafaba Snow
For the trees you cut stars in several sizes from an almond dough with cinnamon and gingerbread spice, and once they are baked you stack them into little trees with aquafaba snow. It's no big secret that I'm a huge fan of aquafaba as an egg white replacement: it may sound strange to use chickpea water for something sweet, but trust me, it doesn't taste like chickpeas at all and it works wonderfully. With chopped pistachios and powdered sugar they look like snowy firs. You'll find all amounts and steps in the recipe for my vegan Christmas tree cookies with aquafaba snow.
Time: about 1 hr 50 min · Makes: about 16 trees · Special: aquafaba instead of egg whites
Poppy Seed Crescent Cookies
I absolutely love poppy seeds, and since I also love traditional Vanillekipferl, I thought this would be the perfect twist. You shape the crescents by hand without any cutter, bake them briefly and roll them in poppy seed sugar while they are still hot; if you like, dip some of them in dark chocolate too. They turned out really yummy and were the girls' favorite. The full recipe is on the page for my vegan poppy seed crescent cookies.
Time: about 1 hr 20 min · Makes: about 50 crescents · Special: no cookie cutter needed
Chocolate Cookies with Date Caramel
The chocolate caramel cookies are a bit more work, but totally worth it: a cocoa spelt cookie gets a layer of date caramel and a small tablet of dark chocolate on top. They remind me a little of a well-known candy bar with chocolate and caramel, only with a caramel made from dates instead of sugar. The caramel makes more than you need, and the leftovers are wonderful with bread, fruit or granola. Find the complete recipe on the page for my vegan chocolate date caramel cookies.
Time: about 1 hr 35 min · Makes: about 20 cookies · Special: no-cook caramel made from dates
Recipes in this post
These are my 3 recipes for slightly different Christmas cookies this year. They are all vegan, and instead of white sugar and wheat flour I used raw cane sugar and spelt flour, so they are a bit healthier as well, but the most important thing is that they are really delicious. If you want one dough that turns into three more kinds, try my vegan cookies from 1 dough in 3 kinds.
Which of the 3 would be your favorite? I would love to know in the comments. And if you want to fill a whole gift box, my gifts from the kitchen show how nicely cookies work as edible presents. Have fun baking and get ready for the cozy Christmas time ahead!
