Two weekends ago, my mom started craving carrot cake. She talked about it at lunch, mentioned it at dinner, and finally caved at 9 pm and drove to Safeway to pick up a slice. When she arrived home, she grabbed a fork, plopped down in her favorite armchair, and slowly savored every bite, stopping with enough left to finish the following day.
Although Mom bought me a slice of my favorite 6-layer chocolate cake at the same time, I couldn’t help but stare and hope with all of my fingers crossed behind my back that she’d offer me a taste. That cream cheese frosting… Those soft streaks of carrot… The tender cinnamon cake… It looked mesmerizing!
Despite enjoying every last morsel of my chocolate dessert, I couldn’t get carrot cake off of my mind. I pictured that square during every run (since my path went past the same grocery store) and whenever I stuck my head into the fridge for fresh fruit and veggie snacks.
I seriously contemplated baking my own again, but knowing that my self-control sometimes flies straight out the window with any type of cake, I went with the next best thing…
Cookies! These Healthy Carrot Cake Oatmeal Cookies blew me away, and not just from their built-in portion control. The cozy oats, the comforting cinnamon, the soft carrots… They truly tasted just like carrot cake. Pure bliss in every bite!
Even better? These cookies are really easy to make — and faster than regular carrot cake too!
KEY INGREDIENTS TO MAKE HEALTHY CARROT CAKE OATMEAL COOKIES
Let’s talk about the key ingredients that you’ll need to make these healthy carrot cake oatmeal cookies! I based them off of the most popular recipe on my site: my oatmeal raisin cookies. Have you tried those yet? Hands down, they’re the BEST oatmeal cookies I’ve ever eaten. They’re soft, tender, chewy — everything a cookie should be — and countless readers have said nobody believes that they’re lightened up and made without refined flour or refined sugar!
Oats. Like many of my other healthy oatmeal cookie recipes, you’ll use instant oats to make these. They’re also called “quick cooking” and “one minute” oats. They’re not the ones that come in packets with flavors like maple brown sugar and apple cinnamon!
Just like old-fashioned rolled oats, instant oats contain just one ingredient: oats! However, they differ in one key way. Instant oats are smaller and thinner than old-fashioned rolled oats. This smaller size means they soften faster, and that yields the best soft and chewy texture in your oatmeal cookies.
Tip: If you’d like to make your healthy carrot cake oatmeal cookies gluten-free, then substitute certified gluten-free instant oats. They work perfectly!
Flour. I opted for whole wheat flour to make these oatmeal cookies. I love how it has more fiber and micronutrients!
Tip: If you’d like to make your carrot cake oatmeal cookies gluten-free, then see the Notes section of the recipe. I’ve included how to do so there!
Cinnamon. It’s a carrot cake staple! I love the cozy flavor it adds to both regular carrot cake and these healthy oatmeal cookies. If you’re a big cinnamon fan (like I am!), I highly recommend this variety. It tastes a bit stronger, sweeter, and richer than regular cinnamon. Many stores have started stocking it, but I generally buy it online here. It’s really affordable — and basically the only kind I now use in my baking!
Unsalted butter or coconut oil. Just a bit! Unlike more traditional cookie recipes that call for ½ cup or more, you only need 2 tablespoons. That really helps keep your healthy carrot cake oatmeal cookies low calorie and low fat!
Tip: Both work equally well, so feel free to use whichever one you normally keep on hand. If you use coconut oil, your healthy carrot cake oatmeal cookies will be dairy-free!
Egg. A common oatmeal cookie ingredient! The egg binds everything together, and it also yields a beautifully chewy texture.
Sweetener. For this version, I swapped out the honey from my oatmeal raisin cookie recipe for pure maple syrup. I love its sweet and cozy flavor in my carrot cake recipe, and I had a feeling it’d work well in these cookies too. Spoiler alert: It was perfect!
Pure maple syrup often comes in thin glass bottles or squat plastic jugs (like this). It only contains one ingredient: maple syrup!
Tip: Skip the pancake syrup and sugar-free maple syrup! These contain other ingredients, which can change the way they behave in baking recipes. This is particularly true of sugar-free maple syrup! It’s usually water-based, and that will make your cookies cakey or bready, rather than chewy.
Carrots. Lots and lots of carrots. I love my regular carrot cake positively packed with them — not just a plain spice cake with the occasional fleck of orange — so I took the same approach with these healthy oatmeal cookies. That turned out so well!
For the best taste and texture, use peeled and freshly grated carrots. Don’t substitute store-bought, pre-shredded carrots! They’re also called “matchstick carrots.” They’re thicker and drier, so they don’t soften properly. It only takes a few moments to grate your own, and I promise the results are completely worth it!
HOW TO MAKE HEALTHY CARROT CAKE OATMEAL COOKIES
Let’s quickly go over how to make the best carrot cake oatmeal cookies! This recipe is easy and straightforward — I promise! — and I also have some tips to ensure your cookies turn out beautifully soft, chewy, and flavorful.
Measure correctly. This is one of the most crucial parts of this recipe! It’s extremely important to measure the oats and flour correctly. Do NOT scoop them directly from the container! Instead, use this method or a kitchen scale. (← That’s the one I own!) Scooping or improperly measuring can result in up to 1 ½ times as much of either ingredient. That extra amount of flour or oats will change the texture of your cookies, especially the oats! They act like little sponges by soaking up lots of moisture in the dough. Too much of either will dry out your cookies and make them cakey, bready, or dry — but if you measure them correctly, your cookies will be perfectly soft and chewy!
Chill the dough. Chilling is mandatory! It gives the oats time to soak up some moisture and helps reduce spreading. If you skipped chilling, the cookie dough would flatten thinner than a pancake while in the oven and create one huge cookie blob on the baking sheet. Not good! So avoid cookie blobs and chill your dough. Just 30 minutes — that’s it!
Drop + shape. The cookie dough will still be somewhat soft and sticky after chilling, so use a spoon and spatula to drop it onto the baking sheet. Because it only spreads some — but not a lot — you’ll also flatten it a bit to give your cookies a “head start” on spreading.
Tip: These are the spatulas I use. They’re so handy — and really cute too!
Bake + cool. It’s time! Slide that baking sheet in the oven. To ensure these cookies stay soft and chewy, you’ll underbake them ever so slightly. Just by a hair! Pull them out when the centers still feel a little soft and squidgy. You’ll let the cookies cool for a full 10-15 minutes on the warm baking sheet, and the residual heat will finish cooking those centers all the way through without the outsides turning cakey, bready, or crunchy. This is my #1 tip for the best soft and chewy oatmeal cookies! They’ll stay soft for an entire week… If they last that long!
Reshape (optional). If your cookies look a little lopsided and not completely round when you remove them from the oven, then immediately grab a butter knife and gently nudge any misshapen bits back into place. Their sides are still a bit malleable when they’re hot and fresh from the oven, but since these cookies set and firm up within minutes, work really quickly!
I secretly tried hoarding these healthy carrot cake oatmeal cookies, but that plan didn’t stand a chance around my hungry sweet-toothed family. Every time I walked by the counter, another one had mysteriously disappeared from the jar!
Oh well, at least we’re getting some extra veggies in… Right? 😉 And when you make your own, remember to snap a picture and share it on Instagram using #amyshealthybaking and tagging @amyshealthybaking IN the photo itself! (That guarantees I’ll see your picture! 🙂 ) I’d love to see your healthy carrot cake oatmeal cookies!
Healthy Carrot Cake Oatmeal Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup (100g) instant oats (measured like this and gluten-free if necessary)
- ¾ cup (90g) whole wheat flour or gluten-free* flour (measured like this)
- 1 ½ tsp baking powder
- 1 ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- ⅛ tsp salt
- 2 tbsp (28g) coconut oil or unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
- 1 large egg (room temperature)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- ½ cup (120mL) pure maple syrup (room temperature)
- ¾ cup (68g) freshly grated carrots (about 1 smallish medium, peeled first!)
Instructions
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the oats, flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. In a separate bowl, whisk together the coconut oil or butter, egg, and vanilla. Stir in the maple syrup until thoroughly incorporated. Add in the flour mixture, stirring just until incorporated. Fold in the carrots. Chill the cookie dough for 30 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 325°F, and line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.
- Using a spoon and spatula, drop the cookie dough into 14 rounded scoops on the baking sheet. Flatten slightly using a spatula. (These cookies don't spread very much!) Bake at 325°F for 12-15 minutes. Cool on the baking sheet for at least 15 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack.
Notes
View Nutrition Information + Weight Watchers Points
You may also like Amy’s other recipes…
♡ Ultimate Healthy Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
♡ Healthy Apple Pie Oatmeal Cookies
♡ Healthy Zucchini Oatmeal Cookies
♡ Healthy Banana Oatmeal Cookies
♡ Healthy Flourless Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies
♡ Ultimate Healthy Carrot Cake
♡ Healthy Carrot Cake Cupcakes
…and the rest of Amy’s healthy oatmeal cookie recipes and healthy carrot cake flavored recipes!
So I used measuring cups and spoons, no scale. My dough was very thick. I mixed it all by hand. I did use old fashion oats not instant. I cooked them for about 13 min and cookies were maybe 1/4 inch if that.
Thanks for sharing, Vickie! This is helpful to know. I have a hunch about the culprit, but once I know your answers to the following questions, I’ll know for sure! 🙂
Can you describe how you used your measuring cups to measure the flour and oats? Did you dip them directly into the containers, by any chance?
Did you use a fork to mix the dough by hand, like I did in the recipe video?
If your cookies were ¼” thick, then they must have been really wide! Is that true? And when you pulled them out of the oven after 13 minutes, were the centers firm or still slightly underdone?
Yes I did dip measure cups straight in, I mixed batter by hand with a spoon. As far as how big the cookies were, I think a little less than quarter of a inch and they hardly spread out at all when cooked. After pulling cookies out couldn’t tell you if they were slightly firm or not quite cooked in the middle. I just eyeballed them
Thanks for sharing, Vickie! We found all of the culprits. First, flour and oats aren’t supposed to be measured like that! When you dip the measuring cups straight in, you end up with up to 1 ½ times as much flour and oats as when you lightly spoon and level (aka 1 ½ cups of oats and 1 ⅛ cups of flour), and that extra flour and oats are definitely contributing to the issues that you’ve described!
I’ve actually covered how to properly measure each of these ingredients at the links provided in the Ingredients list (the pink-colored “like this” words are links — I know it can be easy to miss!). If you don’t own a kitchen scale, here’s what I recommend doing for measuring flour (and cocoa powder, oats, etc!): use a fork to “scoop” up flour from the container, and lightly shake the fork back and forth over the top of your measuring cup to transfer the flour into it. Once there’s a small mound of flour extending past the rim of the measuring cup, then place the flat back of a knife against the top of the measuring cup, and gently scrape it across the top to get rid of the excess flour. Never “pat” the flour down with the knife or fork. This fork method acts like a sifter (without dirtying another dish!) and guarantees you’ll add less flour to the batter, so you’ll end up with moist and chewy cookies. Does that make sense?
Second, I recommend pulsing your old-fashioned oats in a food processor (or blender!) before using them, just like I described in the Notes section of the recipe (located directly underneath the Instructions!). The smaller size of your pulsed oats will create a more soft and chewy cookie texture.
Third, I recommend using a whisk where explicitly instructed and a fork for everything else, just like I demonstrated in the video directly above the recipe. The space between the tines of the fork allows for ingredients to mix more efficiently (compared to the flat sides of a spoon, where ingredients can’t pass through!), and that helps prevent overmixing (which then results in a tough or gummy texture).
So to summarize… If you measure the oats and flour as I described, briefly pulse your oats, and use a whisk and fork to make the dough, your cookies should turn out soft, chewy, and much better! 🙂
Thank you so much for your help. I will try these again
It’s my pleasure, Vickie! I’m happy to help. 🙂 Please feel free to let me know if you have any questions, and I’m really excited to hear how your next batch turns out!
Hi Amy! I just made these and they are SO delicious! I had to use white flour as I did not have whole wheat but they still turned out awesome. Thank you for sharing. I know I will be making these again!
I’m so thrilled that you loved these cookies, Mary! That’s the best compliment there is, if you already think you’ll bake them again. Thank you for taking the time to let me know — hearing that made my day! 🙂
Can you use a different flour? Will that change the nutrition information ( calories)
I’ve actually covered my top recommendations for other flours on my Oatmeal Cookie FAQ Page, and there’s a link to that FAQ Page in the Notes section of the recipe (located directly underneath the Instructions!). I know it can be easy to miss! 😉 If the flour you had in mind is listed on my Oatmeal Cookie FAQ Page, then yes — you can use it! Depending on which one of those flours you use, the nutrition information may change slightly. This is the nutrition calculator that I use, if you’d like to know the exact amount. It’s free and really user friendly! 🙂
I can’t wait to hear what you think of these oatmeal cookies if you try making them, Izzy!
Really great cookie recipe 🙂 They are now my favourite cookies to bake and eat. They are easy to make, healthy and delicious.
I played around with the recipe the second time and used 60g of honey (I didn’t have maple syrup) and 60mL whole milk and it was really good 😀
I also added sultanas to the carrot cake cookies as I like them in carrot cake and it turned out great 😀 I’m thinking to try to add a few walnuts to them next time although I’m not sure if it would work or not.
Cheers!
Delicious, moist cookie. I added 1/4 cloves along with the cinnamon and 1/2 of raisins that I soaked in hot water first. Definitely will make again!
They were spongy – almost like cake – and so pretty! But for my family they were very bland. Definitely needed salt and maybe a pinch of nutmeg or something to give them a little depth of flavor. I might try them again with some raisins, too.
Made and with tips they came out perfect. I would like to use almond flour next would that work?
It means a lot that you’d call these perfect, Isau! That’s such a huge compliment — thanks for taking the time to let me know! 🙂 I’ve actually answered this exact question on my Oatmeal Cookie FAQ Page. There’s a link to that FAQ Page in the Notes section (located directly underneath the Instructions!). I know it can be easy to miss! 😉
Would almond flour work as the gluten free flour?
I really appreciate your interest in my recipe, Kayla! I’ve actually answered this exact question on my Oatmeal Cookie FAQ Page, and there’s a link to that FAQ Page in the Notes section of the recipe (located directly underneath the Instructions). I know it can be easy to miss! 😉 I’d love to hear what you think of these oatmeal cookies if you try making them!
Was wondering how to incorporate xylitol instead of maple syrup. Trying to keep glycemic index as low as possible. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance.
I really appreciate your interest in my recipe, Vincent! I don’t have much experience with xylitol, but I think you should be able to substitute it here. My best guess is that ½ cup of xylitol + 5-6 tablespoons of milk (any type will work!) would be a good starting point to replace the maple syrup. (The milk is to compensate for the missing liquid volume!)
I’d love to hear how that turns out if you end up trying to make these oatmeal cookies!
My five year old and I made your tasty carrot cake cookies! He loves them…thanks for this wonderful recipe. They turned out perfect following your tips and I even added some flaxseed and his seeds too! Can’t wait to try more your recipes.
It means so much that you and your son loved these cookies, Michelle! Thank you for taking the time to let me know. That’s the best kind of compliment there is, if you’re already considering trying more of my recipes — I’m honored!! 🙂 I can’t wait to hear which one you pick!