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Incredibly fudgy, rich chocolate black bean cookies have absolutely no flour of any kind. They’ll never know about the beans if you don’t tell them!
If you had told me a couple of years ago that I’d be baking with black beans, I’d almost certainly be rolling my eyes at you. I have been on a crusade since my son went gluten free in 2004 to kill the phrase “good, for gluten free”—for good.
So believe me when I tell you that these amazingly fudgy black bean cookies taste nothing like black beans. It all started when I made perfect black bean brownies and found out that they’re good for more than, say, burritos and black bean burgers.
These cookies are not overly sweet at all, but you can increase the sugar to 3/4 of a cup from 1/2 if you’d like a sweeter cookie. I like them just like this—and why bake with beans if you’re just going to load it up with sugar, right?
You just can’t believe how intensely chocolatey they are until you try them. And what are the chances you don’t have these basic ingredients already in your pantry? If you don’t have unsweetened chocolate, just use the darkest chocolate you have and don’t sweat the small stuff.
Why Black Beans?
If you’re wondering why we’re using black beans, in particular, I blame it on the Internet. I don’t know who the first person was to start this experiment, but suddenly black bean brownies were everywhere.
When you drain and rinse a can of black beans really really well, the beans taste very neutral. And I first decided to give black bean brownies a try when the quality of a beloved brand of black beans went downhill and every can was suddenly mushy and pitiful.
I haven’t tried these cookies (or my black bean brownies) with another type of bean, but I have to imagine that most beans would work. Speaking of other ingredients that I haven’t tried…
Ingredients and Substitutions
If you’re dying to make this recipe, but wondering (you know you are!) how to make it suit your family’s particular dietary needs, here’s what I can offer you:
Dairy-Free: Easy peasy. Just use softened Earth Balance buttery sticks in place of the unsalted butter, and omit the salt from the ingredient list. Those sticks are plenty salty!
Egg-Free: Eggs are always a little tricky to replace in baking, but since there is only one egg in this recipe, a “chia egg” (1 tablespoon ground chia seeds + 1 tablespoon lukewarm water, mixed and allowed to gel) should work. The only problem here is that, since there’s no flour, the egg provides most of the structure. You’ll have to experiment!
Sugar: You definitely cannot replace the granulated sugar with a liquid sugar (I seem to get that question a lot these days), but you might be able to replace it with coconut palm sugar. But since granulated coconut sugar is quite coarsely ground, I’d recommend pulsing it alone in a food processor before adding it to the cookie dough.
Fudgy Flourless Black Bean Cookies
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Equipment
- food processor
Ingredients
- 1 15 oz can black beans, rinsed and drained
- 4 tablespoons (56 g) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 1 (50 g (weighed out of shell)) egg, at room temperature, beaten
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- ½ cup (100 g) granulated sugar
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled briefly
- 6 tablespoons (30 g) unsweetened cocoa powder
- 4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 375°F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with unbleached parchment paper and set it aside.
- In the bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade, place the black beans, butter and egg and pulse until mostly smooth.
- Add the vanilla, sugar, baking soda, salt and melted chocolate, and pulse again until smooth.
- The cookie dough at this point should be the consistency of hummus.
- Add the cocoa powder and pulse until the mixture is well-combined. The consistency should be more like fudge.
- Add most of the chocolate chips (about 3 ounces) and mix by hand until the chips are evenly distributed throughout the cookie dough.
- Using a spring-loaded cookie scoop or two spoons, scoop portions of the dough about 2 tablespoons each and place about 2 inches apart from one another on the prepared baking sheet.
- Using the back of a moistened spoon, spread each portion of cookie dough into a round about 1/2-inch thick.
- Sprinkle the top of each piece of dough with a few more chocolate chips.
- Place the baking sheet in the refrigerator to chill for about 10 minutes or until mostly firm to the touch.
- Place the baking sheet in the center of the preheated oven and bake until the cookies have taken on a crackled appearance and are mostly firm to the touch, about 18 minutes.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely on the baking sheet. They’ll be quite fragile when they’re warm.
Video
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I found 2 baking pans that would fit in my fridge so I could chill the cookies because my rimmed baking sheet didn’t fit in the fridge.
I didn’t preheat the oven until the cookies were chilling.
I used Country Crock unsalted “Plant Butter” as my non-dairy substitute for the butter.
I transferred the dough into a bowl before adding the chocolate chips (Bake Believe Dark Chocolate).
I weighed all the dough, and divided by 12, and weighed out each cookie’s amount. That was easier for me than using two spoons.
Tasty cookies, but they had more texture than I expected. Perhaps I should have pulsed longer.
The black bean brownie recipe suggests using a blender rather than a food processor.
Would a blender work for this dough?
Hi, Lois, I prefer a food processor here because I’ve found that using a blender gives less control and tends to process some of this thick mixture too much (the part near the blade) and some too little. It sounds like you didn’t process the dough enough at the first stage, though, if your comment about texture refers to having pieces of beans?
so good! creamy. easy to make and very little mess.
So glad you loved these, Laurel!
I loved these! I added one cup of GF oatmeal and some flax to my batch. I also added 2 chia eggs instead of the chicken egg, used 1/2 of the sugar, ( organic, unrefined) and added in 6 diced cherries and walnuts!
I had a can of black beans intended for brownies. When this recipe was sent recently in an email, I had to try it instead.
The flavor is oh, so chocolatey!
I made them dairy free by using Country Crock brand “Plant Butter”.
I forgot to add chocolate chips to the tops of the cookies – will do that next time.
The cookies were a little dry and crumbly, perhaps because they must have been a little smaller, as I got 15.
Next time I’ll add a teaspoon of water to see if that helps, or invest in a cookie scoop to be sure they are the right size..
A friend said her two year old would enjoy the softness of the cookie.
Amazing
So yummy. I didn’t have unsweetened chocolate so I melted Lily’s chips and reduced sugar by 1/4 c also didn’t have unsalted butter so I halved the salt as well. My 3 year old and I loved them!
I made these today with the boiled black beans that my sister in law gifted me. My cookies turned out soft & chocolatey (hopefully it’s the right texture?). It’s really delicious! My kiddo loves it. I also just found out that I need to reduce my gluten intake, so will definitely keep this recipe for future use. Thank you!
Just made these and have popped them back in the oven for a bit longer cooking as wasn’t sure if they were done. What texture should the cooled cookie have?
Flavour is great. I definitely made them too big as only got 9 !
If you only got 9 cookies, Kate, as you said you made them too big. That’s why they took longer to cook! I’ve already done all I can think of to explain the proper size and texture of the cookie at every stage right in the post and recipe, I’m afraid!
I always seem to be in a hurry when I need to bake something to take with me. I picked this recipe. I had no butter out, so used virgin coconut oil. I didn’t have time to refrigerate SO I used muffin cups and put the same amount as I would for a cookie. No time to cool before we left home, so put them in a container to cool off as we travelled. Arrived, presented and they loved them. I did not tell our friends there was black beans in the cookies until it was time to go. They hate black beans!
I will make them again … and freeze a batch. One a day? Hummmmm…. great recipe!
That’s awesome, Caroline! This is such a fun recipe, and perfect to make last minute since it has such basic pantry ingredients. Glad to know it worked out so well for you. :)
Would these cookies freeze ok? I’m thinking of making a large batch to send with my daughter when she goes away to school in the fall.
They freeze amazingly well, Vicki! I made so, so many batches in recipe testing, photographing and making the video that I have a freezer full of them. In fact, I almost prefer them straight from the freezer.