These vegan pumpkin chocolate chip cookies are soft and gooey and full of fall flavors that'll have you wanting to reach for more. And all of that without eggs and without butter!
If you're looking to get baking this fall season, these cookies are perfect along with my pumpkin muffins, snickerdoodles, and pumpkin bread.
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💭 What To Expect From This Recipe
- Crinkly, soft, and flavorsome. These cookies have been tested at least 15+ times to get the perfect vegan cookie consistency. They are loaded with pumpkin pie spices for that ultimate fall flavor.
- Great for special occasions. Perfect for Halloween, Thanksgiving, or fall coffee dates or brunch with friends and family.
- Easy to make
🎃 Ingredients needed
Here's everything you need to make these vegan pumpkin chocolate chip cookies:
Notes about the ingredients
- Pumpkin puree/squash puree: You'll need canned pumpkin puree not pumpkin pie filling for these cookies. I've also included an option for making them with homemade squash puree in the expert tips section further down this post. If you don't want to use pumpkin but love pumpkin spice flavors you can use also use apple sauce in place of pumpkin puree. The cookies will be lighter/not as bright in color and very slightly sweeter.
- Pumpkin spice mix: I use ready-made pumpkin spice mix. You can, however, very easily make it at home with just a few ingredients! I've included the ingredients to make at home in the recipe notes.
- All-purpose flour: Regular all-purpose flour works best for this cookie recipe.
- Vegan butter: Adds flavor, and moisture and helps to make the cookies tender.
- Baking soda: This is the leavening agent for this recipe, as it releases carbon dioxide when baked creating a soft cookie.
- Caster sugar: Also known as superfine sugar if you're in the states. This helps to give the cookies a slightly crisp edge.
- Soft brown sugar: This in my opinion adds the best flavor and consistency to cookie recipes. It also adds a slightly caramelized flavor when baked, yum! Coconut sugar will give these pumpkin spice chocolate chip cookies a more caramelized flavor and color, and they will be slightly softer.
- Aquafaba: This is the egg substitute for this cookie recipe and helps to make them slightly chewy.
- Vanilla extract: This is essential for adding flavor and a must for anything pumpkin spice in my books!
- Salt: Enhances the background flavors and balances the sweetness.
- Dairy-free chocolate: I like to use dark chocolate for this recipe as it really compliments the pumpkin flavor, feel free to use a dairy-free "milk" chocolate if preferred.
🥣 How To Make Vegan Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
(Full ingredient quantities and instructions are in the recipe card at the end of this post)
- First cream together the caster sugar, soft brown sugar, pumpkin puree, aquafaba, and vanilla extract. I usually just use a handheld electric whisk to beat the ingredients until creamed together, but you can also use a stand mixer.
- In a separate bowl, combine all the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, salt, and pumpkin spice). Stir the dry ingredients so that they are mixed evenly.
- Now add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and fold them together using a spatula until they form a dough consistency.
- Fold the chocolate chunks through the dough as evenly as possible. Cover the bowl with the cookie dough with some clingfilm or a plate and chill in the fridge for 20 minutes - this will make it much easier to shape your cookies!
- Roll the cookie dough into golf ball-sized balls. Be careful to leave at least 2.5" of space between each ball of dough as they will spread whilst baking!
- Bake them for 5 minutes, then take them out of the oven and tap the tray on your work surface to help the cookies spread and crinkle on top. Bake for the remaining 7-8 minutes and remove from the oven. Bang the trays on your work surface again and then let the cookies sit on the baking trays for 2-3 minutes. Next, carefully slide the sheet of parchment paper with the cookies off of the tray and onto a cooling rack. Once they have cooled for 10-15 minutes, also remove the parchment paper and allow them to continue to rest until cool.
👩🍳 Expert Tips
If you can't find canned pumpkin puree, you can use butternut squash, which is usually readily available in supermarkets. Butternut squash and pumpkin have a very similar flavor, although butternut squash is actually much sweeter.
How to make butternut squash puree
- Pre-heat your own to 190°C (375°F).
- Cut the butternut squash in half lengthways and scoop out the seeds.
- Roast for 40-45 minutes until soft.
- Allow the squash to cool to room temperature and scoop the flesh out.
- Add the flesh to your high-speed blender or food processor and blitz until smooth.
- The recipe calls for 3 tbsps of puree, but you can store the rest in an airtight container in the fridge and use it within 3 days or you can also freeze it.
💬 FAQs
These pumpkin cookies will store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days.
Feel free to add in extra chocolate chunks. You can also pop some more chocolate chips on the surface of the cookie about 5 minutes into baking. This will give you those dreamy chocolate pools.
You can also add some nuts to the cookie dough for additional flavor and crunch. Walnuts, pecans, almond flakes, or peanuts will take these cookies to another level.
Make your own pumpkin spices by whisking together 2½ tsp ground cinnamon, ½ tsp ground ginger, ½ tsp allspice, ½ tsp nutmeg, and ¼ tsp ground cloves.
I know it sounds strange but this method of cookie-making has become viral on the net for a reason. Having tested these cookies relentlessly over the past few weeks I was frustrated that they weren't turning out nice and flat as I had hoped.
Finally, the pan-banging technique which I adapted from Sarah's post, did the trick! Here's the full blog post about her pan-banging chocolate chip cookies.
🍂 More pumpkin recipes
Love this recipe? Please leave a 5-star ★★★★★ rating in the recipe card below and consider leaving a comment as well, thanks!
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Description
Ingredients
- ¾ cup (170 g) vegan butter, room temperature
- ½ cup (100 g) caster sugar
- ½ cup (110 g) soft brown sugar
- ¼ cup (35 g) pumpkin puree or butternut squash puree, see instructions for homemade puree in blog post
- 1 tablespoon (15 g) aquafaba, *see notes
- 2 teaspoons (8 g) vanilla extract
- 2 cups (250 g) all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon (4 g) baking soda
- ½ teaspoon (3 g) salt
- 1 ½ tablespoon (9 g) pumpkin spice mix, *see notes
- 5.3 oz (150 g) dark chocolate
- Maldon flakes or sea salt, for garnish
Instructions
- Cut the softened vegan butter into 1" cubes and add them to a large bowl. Add the caster sugar, soft brown sugar, pumpkin puree, aquafaba, and vanilla extract to the bowl with the butter. Use a handheld electric whisk or stand mixer to beat the ingredients until creamed together. You can use a regular whisk as well, it will just take a little longer to mix the ingredients!
- In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, salt, and pumpkin spice. Stir the dry ingredients so that they are mixed evenly.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and fold them together using a spatula until they form a dough consistency.
- Chop the chocolate into small chunks and them to the cookie dough. Fold them through the dough as evenly as possible. Cover the bowl with the cookie dough with some clingfilm or a plate and chill in the fridge for 20 minutes.
- Preheat your oven to 180°C (356°F) while the cookie dough is chilling. Line 2 large baking trays with some parchment paper.
- Roll the cookie dough into golf ball-sized balls. Be careful to leave at least 2.5" of space between each ball of dough as they will spread whilst baking!
- Bake the cookies for 11-12 minutes. After the first 5 minutes of baking, take them out of the oven and tap the tray on your work surface to help the cookies spread and crinkle on top.
- Bake for the remaining 6-7 minutes and remove from the oven. Bang the trays on your work surface again and then let the cookies sit on the baking trays for 2-3 minutes. Next, carefully slide the sheet of parchment paper with the cookies off of the tray and onto a cooling rack. Once they have cooled for 10-15 minutes, also remove the parchment paper and allow them to continue to rest until cool.
- Garnish with Maldon flakes or sea salt.
- Store in an airtight container at room temperature and consume within 5 days.
Notes
- Aquafaba: the liquid part from tinned chickpeas.
- Pumpkin spice mix (homemade): Mix together 2 tsp ground cinnamon, ½ tsp ground ginger, ½ tsp mixed spice, and ¼ tsp ground cloves.
- Apple puree: If you don't want to use pumpkin but love pumpkin spice flavors you can use apple sauce in place of pumpkin puree. The cookies will be lighter/not as bright in color and very slightly sweeter.
- Butternut squash puree: Use in place of canned pumpkin puree (instructions above on how to make it at home) - it works very similar to pumpkin puree.
- Coconut sugar: This can be used in place of soft brown sugar. Using coconut sugar will give these pumpkin spice chocolate chip cookies a more caramelized flavor and color, and they will be slightly softer.
Nutrition
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