Flourless AND dairy-free peanut butter cookies, I should say. These cookies are a great option for my gluten-free and dairy-free friends, but I love them just because they’re just so incredibly easy. These peanut butter cookies are rich, soft, and perfectly salty-sweet. And because they’re so easy to make (no mixer required), I bet they’d be a fun weekend project to make with the kids!
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What’s in Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies?
Flourless peanut butter cookies have been around for a while and the concept is simple: peanut butter + egg + sugar bakes into a tasty, sweet, and soft cookie. Most flourless peanut butter cookies use peanut butter-like JIF or Peter Pan, which has a fairly solid texture at room temperature. I prefer natural peanut butter, which is a little runnier, so I had to adjust the formula a bit to help the cookies keep their shape.
To account for the softer, almost liquid-like, texture of natural peanut butter, I substituted some of the regular sugar in the cookie for powdered sugar. Powdered sugar has an incredible thickening property that worked perfectly for helping these cookies hold their shape despite the soft peanut butter.
Can I Use Other Nut and Seed Butters?
While I haven’t tried other nut butters in this recipe, I would expect them to work so long as they have a similar texture to the natural peanut butter used here. Almond butter sounds great, as does sunflower butter. I bet tahini might even be interesting! Just keep in mind that if your nut butter has added sugar, you may want to reduce the sugar in the recipe below.
You may also need to adjust the amount of powdered sugar depending on the viscosity of your nut butter to make sure the dough has the correct texture.
What Else Can I Add?
These peanut butter cookies would be so fun to add some mix-ins or toppings! I originally planned to drizzle a little melted chocolate over my cookies (after they’re cooled), but realized too late that I was out. You could also mix in some chocolate chips, nuts, or crushed pretzels into the dough.
Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies
Servings 12 cookiesIngredients
- 1 cup natural peanut butter ($1.10)
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar ($0.12)
- 2/3 cup powdered sugar ($0.05)
- 1 large egg ($0.23)
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract ($0.14)
- 1/2 tsp baking powder ($0.01)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Add all of the ingredients to a bowl and stir until it forms a cohesive dough. It should be firm enough to pull away from the sides of the bowl. If the dough is still too soft, add a tablespoon or two more of powdered sugar to further firm up the dough.
- Divide the cookie dough into twelve pieces. Roll each piece into a ball then flatten it slightly. Place the cookies on a parchment-lined baking sheet and then use a fork to create a corss hatch pattern on the top of the cookie.
- Bake the cookies for 12 minutes in the preheated oven. After baking, allow them to cool for about five minutes on the baking sheet, or until they're firm enough to lift with a spatula.
- Transfer the cookies to a wire rack to cool completely, then serve and enjoy.
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Equipment
- Enamelware Sheet Pan
- Parchment Paper
- Measuring Cups Spoons
Nutrition
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How to Make Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies – Step by Step Photos
Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Add one cup natural peanut butter, ¾ cup granulated sugar, ⅔ cup powdered sugar, 1 large egg, ½ teaspoon vanilla extract, and ½ teaspoon baking powder to a bowl. The dough will be easier to mix together if the peanut butter is not chilled.
Mix these ingredients together until they form a cohesive dough that is firm enough to pull away from the sides of the bowl.
Divide the dough into twelve pieces, roll each one into a ball, then flatten slightly. Use a fork to make a cross hatch pattern in the top of each cookie.
I like to bake the cookies on a parchment-lined baking sheet to make cleanup super fast and easy. Make sure to space the cookies a couple of inches apart, as they will grow a bit as they bake!
Bake the cookies in a preheated 350ºF oven for 12 minutes. Let the baked cookies cool on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes so they can firm up before using a spatula to transfer to a wire rack (they’ll be super soft when hot).
After allowing the cookies to cool completely, store in an air-tight container at room temperature for about a week, or they can be frozen for a few months!
Great recipe. So simple and rewarding. I will definitely make them again. Thank you
Can you use stevia in place of regular sugar?
We don’t experiment much with alternative sugars so I’m not sure! I do know that stevia can have a sweeter taste so you may not want to use as much if you do try it.
Love the photo instructions! Thank you😊
Do NOT make this with 1 cup of powdered peanut butter (1 cup made I mean), it did not work out lol
No changes to the recipe. These are delicious! So easy! I will make these again! Thanks for sharing!
Delicious, easy, fast, and cheap! I was looking to use up extra powdered sugar and wanted peanut butter cookies and figured someone out there probably done it. Imagine my joy when I found your recipe!! Thanks for sharing it with us. Don’t listen to the whiners that complain because they came to your free site and didn’t feel they got what they wanted. It is exactly as you promised.
Thank you for this gluten free/dairy free recipe! It’s so hard to find edible recipes for my son that has both allergies, so I’m very grateful. We all loved the cookies and he didn’t feel like he was missing out.
Absolutely delicious! Plus they are so easy to make! I have food allergies and these are best cookies I’ve had in such a long time. Thank you, Beth!
Well, this site is called budgetbytes but the cheapest ingredient for cookies is always flour. These are lot really “budget”, are they?
Well, a lot of people can’t eat flour for various reasons, so this is a great budget-friendly option for them. Even for someone who CAN eat flour, these cookies are still way less expensive than buying a package of cookies at the store, so yes, I would say it is a budget recipe in most cases. Budget is always relative!
Love the simplicity of these cookies but they’re just too sweet. I figured if I tried cutting the sugar it will throw off the consistency of the batter. If I make again I might sub some of the powdered sugar for a gf flour, but I get that misses the point of the recipe.