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This recipe for soft and chewy gluten free ginger cookies is the perfect addition to a holiday cookie plate or any time you want something sweet with warm winter spices that's perfectly chewy and so simple to make. You only need some basic baking ingredients, one bowl, and a sharp knife to slice and bake.
What makes these soft gluten free ginger cookies so special?
These soft gluten free ginger cookies just smell like the holiday season. With these on your cookie plate or gift box, no one will doubt what time of year it is!
Similar to our gluten free snickerdoodles in texture, these peppery ginger cookies are covered in crispy, sparkly coarse sugar for a really beautiful presentation. They never really lose their texture, since, well, they have such a mix of textures: super chewy inside, lightly crisp outside, with those beautiful sugar crystals all over!
They're also easy enough to make in one bowl that you won't hesitate to make just one more type of gf cookie for that holiday plate (or any time!). You can't beat a slice and bake cookie, since there's no rolling and cutting out shapes, but you still get beautiful rounds!
Tips for making the best soft gluten free ginger cookies every time
Make sure your butter is at room temperature
Unless you're baking pastry where you want your butter to be cold, baking ingredients like butter and eggs should typically be at room temperature (as directed in the recipe). For butter, that means that a finger pressed into the center of the butter will make a dent but not come away feeling greasy. If your butter is too warm, even melted, the dough won't hold its shape properly.
If your egg is cold, place it in a bowl of very warm water (not hot) and let it sit for about 15 minutes before breaking the shell.
Use a sharp knife to slice the chilled dough in a smooth motion
After chilling this raw cookie dough, the slice-and-bake log should be firm enough to slice cleanly as long as you use a sharp knife and slice in a single motion, without sawing back and forth. Using a sharp knife is more important than using a larger knife, so I would choose even a very sharp paring knife over a dull chef's knife.
Choose your gluten free flour blend carefully
I make this recipe with my favorite all purpose gluten free flour blend, Better Batter's classic blend. It has the right balance of finely ground ingredients to make cookie dough with the right consistency when raw, and cookies that are chewy and soft when baked.
Chill the raw cookie dough first
The raw cookie dough begins as quite a soft, smooth dough. Chilling it in the refrigerator for 45 minutes makes it easy to slice with a sharp knife, but the bottom of the cookies will still become compressed and flat. This shape doesn't affect the way the cookies bake or taste.
How to get perfectly round soft gf ginger cookies
If you want perfectly round cookies, just press the cookie slices a little here and there with your fingers to coax the raw dough into a more perfect round. Then, continue to shape the dough as you press it gently but firmly into the coarse sugar on all sides.
Substitution suggestions for gf ginger cookies ingredients
Gluten free dairy free soft ginger cookies
To make these soft lightly spiced cookies dairy free, you'll need to replace the butter. It should work fine if you use a coconut oil-based vegan butter like Melt or Miyoko's Kitchen brands. Avoid using Earth Balance buttery sticks, since they have a lot of moisture and your cookies will probably spread way too much.
Gluten free egg free soft ginger cookies
There's only one egg in this recipe, so you should be able to replace it successfully with my favorite egg-replacement, a “chia egg.” To make a chia egg, place 1 tablespoon ground white chia seeds in a small bowl, add 1 tablespoon lukewarm water, mix and allow to sit until it gels.
How to make gf soft ginger cookies without ground cloves
If you were happy enough to make this recipe until you saw that it calls for ground cloves and you don't have those on hand, try replacing that ingredient with half freshly grated nutmeg, half ground cinnamon. You can also replace the cloves with an equal amount of pumpkin pie spice.
Can I make these soft gf ginger cookies without ginger?
You can make these cookies with whatever warm spices you like, but if you leave out the ginger, they're really much more like our gluten free molasses cookies. Maybe you'd prefer those! Those are softer, more pillowy drop cookies, though, more like our gluten free pumpkin cookies, though, in texture.
Can I make this recipe without molasses?
If you don't have unsulphured molasses, and you absolutely can't pop over to a shop to pick some up (it's so useful in holiday cookie baking!), you can replace the granulated sugar with dark brown sugar and replace the 2 tablespoons (42 grams) of molasses with 1 tablespoon extra brown sugar and 1 tablespoon of honey. The cookies won't have quite as much flavor, but the recipe should still work!
FAQs
Do you have to chill this soft ginger cookie dough?
Yes! When you first make the cookie dough, it's too soft to slice into disks with even the sharpest knife. Chilling it in the refrigerator while it's wrapped in parchment paper for between 30 minutes and one hour makes it possible to slice the dough properly.
Can you freeze these ginger cookies?
Yes! These chewy, fragrant cookies freeze really beautifully and rarely break as long as you let them cool completely before you try to move them. They don't even really freeze solid, so you can enjoy them right out of the freezer.
Are these gf cookies suitable for shipping?
Yes! These cookies are thin, but they're quite sturdy as long as you pack them closely together in the proper container. Please see our notes on how to ship gluten free cookies for full information!
What kind of coarse sugar is best for these gf ginger cookies?
You don't have to roll the cookie slices in coarse sugar before baking them, but it creates a beautiful crisp crust and adds some extra sweetness, too. Sometimes, I use Sugar In The Raw, which is a brand of turbinado sugar. Other times, I use a mixture of about half clear sugar crystals and regular granulated sugar.
How are these soft ginger cookies different from gingersnap cookies?
These cookies are thin and chewy, lightly-sweet, and packed with warm spices and an ever so slightly crisp edge. What they are not is crispy and crunchy. We'll leave that to our gluten free gingersnaps cookies, which actually snap when you break them open!
Can you make this recipe into gf gingerbread men?
No, these cookies are made to spread in the oven into lovely rounds. If you want to make gingery cookies in the shape of gingerbread men and women, you're in luck! Our wildly popular recipe for gluten free gingerbread men is waiting for you.
Why does this ginger cookie recipe call for black pepper?
The 1/8 teaspoon, or just a dash, of freshly ground black pepper gives these soft ginger cookies a tiny bit of a bite, to go along with the warmth of the ginger and cloves. It doesn't make them taste “peppery,” though. If you'd rather not have that flavor, or you can't have pepper, just leave it out.
Soft and Chewy Gluten Free Ginger Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups (210 g) all purpose gluten free flour blend, (I used Better Batter; please click thru for full info on appropriate blends)
- ¾ teaspoon xanthan gum, omit if your blend already contains it)
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- ¾ teaspoon ground ginger
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- ⅛ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ¾ cup (150 g) granulated sugar
- 6 tablespoons (84 g) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 2 tablespoons (42 g) unsulphured molasses
- 1 (50 g (weighed out of shell)) egg, at room temperature, beaten
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- Coarse sugar, for coating
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350°F. Line rimmed baking sheets with unbleached parchment paper and set them aside.
- In a large bowl, place the flour, xanthan gum, salt, ginger, cloves, pepper, baking soda, baking powder, and sugar, and whisk to combine well.
- Create a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add the butter, molasses, egg, and vanilla, and mix to combine. It can be helpful to press the wet ingredients into the dry using the back of the mixing spoon.
- The dough will be very soft but should hold together well and be smooth. Transfer the dough to a large piece of parchment paper and shape into a cylinder about 1 1/2-inches in diameter. Roll the cylinder tightly in the parchment, rocking it back and forth to create a proper cylinder shape, then twist the ends to seal.
- Place the shaped dough on a flat surface and place in the refrigerator to chill for about 45 minutes or until firm enough to slice.
- Once the dough is chilled, place it on a cutting surface, rock it back and forth to round the bottom edge again, and unwrap the dough.
- Using a sharp knife and a smooth motion, slice the dough by cross-section into 24 equal pieces, each about 1 cm wide.
- Place the coarse sugar in a small bowl, and, working with each slice of cookie dough at a time, press each into the coarse sugar firmly enough for the sugar to adhere to the cookie dough on all sides.
- Place about 2 1/2-inches apart from one another on the prepared baking sheets.
- Place the baking sheets, one at a time, in the center of the preheated oven. Bake until lightly golden brown all over and set in the center, about 10 minutes.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes or until firm.
Video
Notes
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
These are tasty! I actually will likely increase the spices a bit the next time I try this recipe just to give it extra kick. Worked fine with room temp coconut oil in place of butter. I don’t know why the first direction is to preheat the oven when the dough needs to be mixed and then chill for 45 minutes. Should preheat oven part way through chilling dough.
Delicious and easy to make!!
This recipe looks great. Is there any way to reduce and or substitute for some or all of the sugar with honey or applesauce or ???
No, Cindy, I know that people often say that they do things like that in recipes and that it works great. But that is a different recipe entirely with changes like that, and it won’t taste the same or have the same texture, and I don’t know if it would spread too little or too much. You can’t replace a granulated sugar with a liquid one, and applesauce is not a replacement for sugar. Sugar is also a tenderizer, not just a sweetener.
Great flavor, but the cookies spread into one big mass. Disaster! I had to cut them out with cookie cutters while warm, just to make them (it) presentable. I followed the recipe exactly, the dough/batter cut nicely after about 50 minutes in the refrigerator. Everything seemed ok until . . . it wasn’t. Not sure what I did wrong, but I’d be willing to try again if I can figure it out.
I’m afraid there’s no way for me to know where you deviated from the recipe as written. I’d always look first to ingredient substitutions, whether you used one of my recommended flour blends, and whether you measured by weight, not volume. Ingredient temperature is also very important, especially with respect to butter. If yours was too warm, or even melted, cookies will not hold a shape.
5 plus actually. I picked up your recipe last week ,saved it and realised I proceeded to make this one from a while back. I wanted something tasty to give to a friend who is GF. I always use cup4cup mixture which I have in pantry. Apart from a bit of practice to get them round, I’m very happy. I put finely chopped crystallised ginger and so pleased. They are truly a success . Only one downsize we are “testing” them, so how many go into a gift jar remains to be seen. Thank you Nicola from New Zealand
That’s so lovely of you to say, Sandra. You’re such a good friend to make something special for her. I remember when someone would go out of their way to have something for my son, it meant the world.
Absolutely delicious, and after making this recipe I certainly would not forego the pepper. It provided a lovely spiciness without actually tasting ‘hot’ or like pepper. I couldn’t believe how much these spread and the different textures were so pleasant. Will be adding this to my favourites. Thank you!
I’m so glad, Ance!
Very yummy and everyone in my family loves it.
Excellent, Talia!
This is a great cookie recipe I used fresh ginger used 3 tbsp they were just delicious 😋