Vegan Brownie Cookies

It’s been a while, but oh man I’m very excited for this recipe. Yeah there’s crinkle cookies and double chocolate cookies on the blog. But what there isn’t, is vegan brownie cookies (and actual brownies, but that’ll come eventually). The chocolatiest of chocolatey cookies. Eggless and dairy-free goodness. Basically a brownie impersonating a cookie.

You’d think a cookie recipe, not to mention one like this that just needs a few basic ingredients, would be pretty easy and straightforward to develop. Well, about a dozen tests later, I can say that it actually wasn’t. Every little tweak caused so many changes that it took a fair few tries to get the ratio of the ingredients just right.

I’ll explain the different tests I made and how certain changes affected the end result. So hopefully that helps you if something goes wrong when you make them yourself!

So many brownie cookie tests

The first tries

I started off by making the recipe for crinkle cookies without rolling them in powdered sugar, and dissolving the sugar and water in a saucepan. Since it’s the dissolved sugar in brownies and brownie cookies that forms the shiny crust, I thought that would be a good start. Safe to say it was a complete fail. They didn’t spread, were cakey and just too dry.

So for test #2, I left out the flax egg to get a looser dough, upped the sugar to 50g with 30g water and added 20g chocolate chips that I melted in the sugar syrup. They came out a bit better, but still no shiny crust. Plus they were thin, still too cakey for my liking, with no fugdiness whatsoever.

After a few other failed tests, I knew I needed to add more chocolate chips to get a fudgy texture, so I doubled it (I was perhaps a bit too ambitious here). I also upped the sugar to 55g with 40g water and went from 10g oil to 13g. The added oil plus the added cocoa butter from the extra chocolate chips made these too thin and crispy to get any fudginess. But there’s that shiny papery skin! These were actually ok, but still not what I was going for.

Perfecting the recipe

This is where I started doing a bit of research into what exactly causes the sugar to form a shiny crust, because the previous batch was sheer luck. And, hands down, the best resource I found was Adam Ragusea’s video on brownie skin. It was incredibly informative and he did every test imaginable to rule out all variables. It’s an amazing watch.

So for test number I’ve-lost-count, I upped the sugar to 60g but with 30g water. Because sugar can dissolve in half its amount in water, by weight. Having too much water inhibits the sugar from drying on the surface fast enough for it to form a shiny crust, which is why I reduced it. I also added 2 tsp of cornstarch to add extra chewiness, reduced the chocolate to 35g and reduced the flour a bit since I added cornstarch.

This batch was by far the closest I’d gotten to what I wanted these vegan brownie cookies to be. But, it still needed just a few tweaks. They were a bit too craggly for me. I was going for crinkles, but with smooth shiny spots.

Here I reduced the cornstarch to 1 tsp because I assumed it was contributing to the dough holding its shape a bit too much. I went for an in-between with the oil at 11g. They came out great, but I mixed the dough in the saucepan to see how that would go, which ended up thickening the dough a bit too much and affecting its spread.

As for the craggly top, it was easily solved in the final batches by just flattening them with my finger after scooping all the dough. So the next ones came out exactly how they should!

How to make vegan brownie cookies

It’s important for this recipe to have everything ready and weighed out before starting. Once the dough is made, it needs to go in the oven quickly to get the shiny exterior. Because there’s a lot of melted chocolate in the recipe, it will set the dough as it hardens and make it very crumbly and dry.

I tried baking it once it had hardened, and what came out could barely be called a cookie honestly. I also tried microwaving the hardened dough to bring it back to the right consistency before baking, and it still didn’t work. So this recipe is perfect for those who hate having to chill or rest dough and want cookies immediately.

All that might make this recipe seem difficult, but it really isn’t. Once everything is ready, the process goes smoothly.

The method To make vegan brownie cookies

Start by dissolving the sugar in the water on low to medium heat. You don’t want the water to simmer at all. We don’t want to lose any of it and concentrate the syrup, we just want melted sugar. We also don’t want the sugar to stick to the bottom or caramelize, so keep it moving.

Once that’s done, you can add in the chocolate chips along with the oil, coffee granules (or powder) and vanilla. Stir until the chocolate has completely melted. The liquid will look split but that’s ok, it’ll all come together once the dry ingredients are added.

Transfer the mixture into the bowl that had the chocolate chips, add the dry ingredients and stir just until everything is well combined. Then scoop immediately onto your prepared baking sheet, gently flatten any peaks with your finger if you want, top with flaky salt and bake.

The ingredients For vegan brownie cookies

Some things other than the method might affect your results, like the ingredients. Different chocolates and cocoa powders have varying percentages of fat which can impact the cookies. Plus, dutch vs. natural cocoa powder react differently in baked goods.

Neither of those things will make your cookies inedible, they’ll still be delicious. It’s just something to keep in mind.

I’ve only tested this recipe using regular old 51% chocolate chips since it’s what most people would have and also what I had. If you opt to use a chopped up chocolate bar of equal or higher percentage, I imagine it might affect the spread since bars have a higher amount of cocoa butter in them. Whereas chocolate chips are made to hold their shape in the oven. I’ll test it with a chocolate bar at some point and come back to update the recipe!

As for cocoa powder, I used a natural one, not dutch-processed. It’s not that big of a deal to interchange them in a cookie recipe, because unlike cake we’re not relying on a good rise or fluffy texture. But dutch-processed does have a deeper chocolate flavour unlike natural cocoa which is more acidic. So it’ll change the flavour, but not necessarily in a bad way!

Storing these vegan brownie cookies

These brownie cookies will have all the fudgy and chewy goodness the day they’re made. Since there’s a fair bit of melted chocolate in them, they’ll harden with time and get more of a crispy texture, which I’ve been told is reminiscent of a poptart or a cookie-meringue hybrid. Both are really good, it just depends on your preference. You can also microwave the crispy ones to soften them a bit if you’d like. Regardless, to store them, keep them in a closed container for up to a week!

If you make this recipe please let me know in the comments! All feedback is very much appreciated and I would love to hear from you! You can also tag me on instagram @the.quaint.kitchen or use the hashtag #thequaintkitchen to share your creations!