This past weekend while out on a long run, my thoughts began wandering to make the miles pass by a little faster. After flitting around, they eventually landed on memories from one year ago when I traveled all the way across the country to attend the BlogHer Food Conference in Miami.
Although I first started flying as an itty bitty baby and feel entirely comfortable walking through airports all by myself, I still enjoy a good reward (okay, okay—more of a bribe) for traveling solo. A carrot dangling at the end of the stick. Or, with what usually happens in my case, a cookie at the end of the flight.
Since my second connection landed in Miami close to midnight, I knew all of the food stalls and restaurants would be closed for business, so I strolled around the terminal in Houston, scouting out the bakery options.
Fairly close to my gate, I spotted a shop that sold mostly traditional fare: sandwiches, salads, fruit, yogurt parfaits, and cookies. But not just any cookies—those jumbo-sized ones practically bigger than my hand! I strode up to the counter and politely asked the girl behind the counter, “Do you have any chewy chocolate chip cookies? Not the hard, crumbly ones, but the really soft kind?”
A surprised look crept across her face, but she kindly responded that she would check, then gently pressed the centers of each of the humongous treats (all of which were tightly sealed inside plastic wrap!). After finding the softest one, she handed it over with a smile, while I swiped my card through the machine.
After standing in line at the Miami airport taxi stand for over an hour and finally collapsing into my hotel room around 2 am, that enormous chocolate chip cookie completely hit the spot—all 37 bites of it!
But when I’m at home and want a reward for finishing all of my chores or powering through four photo shoots, I’m okay with something a little smaller—and definitely a little healthier. That’s where these Coconut Flour Chocolate Chip Cookies come in! They’re low-carb, {almost} sugar-free, gluten-free, and clean-eating friendly. Not to mention extremely chocolaty and kind of addictive!
Because many of you have asked whether you can substitute it for regular flour in my other recipes, I’ve started to create more treats with coconut flour. (Like these, these, these, these, and ohmygoodness these!) It’s really important to remember that coconut flour behaves very differently than other flours. It’s about 3 times as absorbent as other flours, so we’ll use a lot less and let the cookie dough rest for 10 minutes to allow the coconut flour enough time to do its thing.
To sweeten the cookie dough, I turned to stevia, a plant-based sweetener. From many of your questions and comments, it sounds like stevia one of your favorite no-calorie sweeteners because it’s clean-eating friendly, so I’m trying to create more recipes with it as well! Because stevia often has a minty or bitter aftertaste, I used three different stevia-based sweeteners to reduce those unwanted flavors: Truvia, Swerve, and SweetLeaf. While I’ve been using the former for at least three years now, I’ve recently discovered the latter two and enjoy them just as much!
Because pure refined stevia can be 200-300 times as sweet as table sugar, we’ll use a lot less in these cookies! To compensate for the missing volume, we’ll mix almond milk into the dough to help keep the cookies moist. Feel free to substitute your favorite milk instead!
And of course, chocolate chips. Lots of chocolate chips. I prefer Hershey’s special dark chocolate for the standard-sized ones because many other brands make their dark chocolate chips larger than regular semisweet chips. Then I use Ghirardelli for the minis. Both melt really well into rich, gooey, chocolaty pockets of bliss!
One final thing to remember: you must flatten the cookie dough before baking. These cookies do not spread in the oven, so gently squash down the balls of dough to your desired thickness and width. The thinner the cookies, the faster they’ll bake!
And the sooner you can devour the whole dozen one or two fresh from the oven!
| Coconut Flour Chocolate Chip Cookies | | Print |
- ⅔ cup (75g) coconut flour (measured correctly)
- 1 tsp xanthan gum
- ½ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp salt
- 2 tbsp (28g) unsalted butter or coconut oil, melted and cooled slightly
- 2 large egg whites, room temperature
- 1 tbsp (15mL) vanilla extract
- 1 tbsp (10g) SweetLeaf stevia powder
- 3 tbsp (40g) Truvia
- 2 tbsp (30g) granulated Swerve
- 6 tbsp (90mL) unsweetened vanilla almond milk, room temperature
- 2 tbsp (30g) dark chocolate chips
- 1 ½ tbsp (21g) miniature chocolate chips
- In a small bowl, whisk together the coconut flour, xanthan gum, baking soda, and salt. In a separate bowl, whisk together the butter or coconut oil, egg whites, and vanilla. Stir in the SweetLeaf, Truvia, and Swerve. Mix in the milk. Add in the coconut flour mixture, stirring until just incorporated. Fold in the dark chocolate chips and 1 tablespoon of miniature chocolate chips. Let the cookie dough rest for 10 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F, and line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.
- Drop the cookie dough into 12 scoops onto the prepared baking sheet. Moisten your hands, and gently shape into rounded mounds. Flatten to your desired thickness and width. Gently press the remaining miniature chocolate chips into the tops. Bake at 350°F for 9-10 minutes. Cool on the baking sheet for 10 minutes before transferring onto a wire rack.
Any milk (cow’s, soy, cashew, etc.) may be substituted in place of the unsweetened vanilla almond milk.
I do not recommend substituting anything for the coconut flour, nor omitting the xanthan gum. The xanthan gum imitates gluten, holds together the cookies, and makes them chewy.
In total, the cookie dough requires the equivalent of ⅞ cup of sugar, but you’ll need to tweak the amounts of sweetener and milk if substituting something entirely different that the sweeteners used. The Truvia and Swerve may be substituted for each other. However, the SweetLeaf is a highly concentrated version of stevia, and I cannot vouch for any substitutions for it.
{gluten-free, clean eating, low fat, low calorie, low carb, low sugar}
I’m so glad you are sharing recipes with coconut flour and stevia. That’s what I’m trying to use. I just have Sweetleaf stevia. Would I use more or less than the total amount of stevia listed?
I appreciate your interest in my recipe Yvette! If you have the same SweetLeaf product that I linked to in the Ingredients list, you’ll need an additional 1¾ to 2 teaspoons, and you’ll need to increase the milk as well. I’m excited to hear what you think of the cookies!
These look amazing and finally a cookie and treat I can eat!!
Why are there 3 differet types of stevia? I use the 365 stevia from whole foods. Can I just use that one and if so how many packets would I use?
Thank you!!
Thanks Ellie! I actually go over why I used three different stevia products in the text of my blog post above the recipe. 🙂 If you prefer to use your 365 stevia packets, then you’ll need their equivalent of ⅞ cup (aka 14 tablespoons) of granulated sugar. (I cover more about that in the Notes section of the recipe underneath the Instructions.) I can’t wait to hear what you think of the cookies!
Thank you Amy! I looked at all those stevia brands and it looks to me like the sweetleaf and truvia are the same – stevia and the swerve is different and I researched it and due to my health issues, I am unable to use the swerve
So, I guess I will just stick with my 365 stevia packets and figure out how many packets I will need to equal 7/8 cup or 14 TBSP of sugar.
Thank you so much for your great recipes! Having health issues, with limited foods to eat, you are helping me so much!!!
You’re welcome Ellie! I’m so honored that you’re able to incorporate my recipes into your diet. 🙂 I can’t wait to hear what you think of these cookies!
Thanks Amy! I want to change this around a bit to meet my nutritional needs. I need to have alot of protein, so I thought I would use 1/3 cup coconut flour and 1/3 cup egg white protein powder. I would also love to adds pumpkin, I love baking with pumpkin! I am just not sure how much pumpkin to add.. 1/4 cup?
Thank you Amy!
I haven’t worked with egg white protein powder, so I don’t know how that will affect the taste and texture of the cookies. If it’s as absorbent as coconut flour, then you’ll need about ½ cup of pumpkin purée in place of the almond milk. If the egg white protein powder is closer to the absorbency of regular flour (remember, coconut flour is about 3x as absorbent as any other flour!), then I’d recommend using the ½ cup of pumpkin purée and increasing the egg white protein powder to ¾ to 1 cup instead. Again, I can’t guarantee any of this tweaks will turn out since I haven’t tried them myself… But I’d love to hear what you think if you try any of them! 🙂
If I just have Swerve, how much would I need for the recipe?
You’d need the same amount as granulated sugar, and I included that amount in the Notes section underneath the Instructions. It can be easy to miss! 🙂 I can’t wait to hear what you think of these Summer!
I made these, and they’re the best paleo coconut flour cookies I’ve ever had! I made a few tweaks though.
I added 1/2tsp of Baking Powder, I added 4-6 tbs liquid sweetener (I used applesauce, because I don’t usually use honey), 1 1/2 – 1 3/4tsp stevia (I used the green herb), 4 egg whites (Which is DOUBLE, because otherwise it’s too dry), and I added coconut and pecans to half of them. I also used unsweetened chocolate, added a little coconut oil, and made my own sugar free Stevie sweetened chocolate chips.
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS RECIPE AS I MADE IT! The main difference is adding more liquid. Apple sauce & egg whites for me.
I’m so glad you enjoyed these cookies Adriana! Thanks for sharing your recipe tweaks with me — I always love hearing what modifications work! 🙂
Could I omit the xanthan gum? Would it make that much of a difference?
Yes, you can omit the xanthan gum. Your cookies won’t be quite as chewy, but they’ll have the same flavor. 🙂 I’d love to hear what you think if you try this recipe, Taryn!
Do you mind sharing why just egg whites? My preference is using the whole egg so I don’t land up with a jar or whites or yolks in the fridge, like I have now!
I use the whites and omit the yolks to reduce the total amount of fat and cholesterol. If you prefer, you may use 2 full eggs and reduce the milk by 1 tablespoon for this particular recipe. 🙂 I’d love to hear what you think if you try these cookies Asha!
Thanks! I made them tonight, thumbs up. I replaced the xanthan gum with psyllium husk and used 1/2 tsp. Whole Foods liquid stevia (I like the taste compared to other brands), and used 5 tbsp coconut milk from a can (just coconut and water). I cooked for 10 mins and will cook a little longer next time.
I’m so glad you enjoyed these cookies Asha! Thanks so much for letting me know what modifications you made — I always love to hear what tweaks work! 🙂
Do we need to make any high altitude adjustments for your recipe? We live at 6800 ft. Thanks, Becky
I really appreciate your interest in my recipe Becky! I’ve heard from other readers living at high altitudes that they haven’t needed to make any adjustments for my recipes, so I think you can bake these cookies exactly as written. I can’t wait to hear what you think of them! 🙂
Loved this! Made this the second time just now (though I haven’t baked it yet). I’ve read a post about “chocolate chip cookie hacks” and one of them said you should refrigerate the dough for 48 hours. Would it work for this recipe? I refrigerated this overnight the first time I made it.
I’m so glad you enjoyed these cookies Sue! That means a lot to me! 🙂 If you refrigerate the dough for 48+ hours for most of my cookie recipes, it becomes really hard and won’t spread at all while baking, so the cookies’ texture will be different compared to if you follow my recipes exactly as written. While traditional cookie recipes often include ample amounts of butter and sugar, my recipes don’t, and that difference in the chemical composition will often lead to different results. Does that make sense? 🙂