Vegan No Bake Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Why do my no bake cookies fall apart? ›

A: Chances are if the no-bakes turned out dry and crumbly it was because you overcooked them.

If you overmix the dough, the cookies will be dry and crumbly. The best way to fix this is to add more liquid to the dough. This can be done by adding milk, water, or even melted butter. You may also need to add more flour to the dough if it is too wet.

Butter is an emulsifier and it makes cookies tender. It also adds in the crispy-around-the-edges element. Adding too much butter can cause the cookies to be flat and greasy. Adding too little butter can cause the cookies to be tough and crumbly.

If you don't flatten the cookies first, then the fork does double duty – it performs both functions. One very subtle result of creating the pattern is that the little tips of dough bake up crisper than the rest of the cookie, giving you both a bit of additional texture and deeper taste where the dough is more baked.

Why Didn't My No-Bake Cookies Set? Likely, you didn't boil the mixture long enough.

Peanut butter

Peanut butter cookie / Main ingredient

1) Chilling cookie dough controls spread.

Chilling cookie dough before baking solidifies the fat in the cookies. As the cookies bake, the fat in the chilled cookie dough takes longer to melt than room-temperature fat. And the longer the fat remains solid, the less cookies spread.

Why are my cookies dry and crumbly? This is most likely a classic case of using too much flour. It's crucial to properly measure the flour in this recipe, as even 1 extra tablespoon of flour can completely change the structure of the cookies. You also might have over baked them!

The primary purpose of vanilla extract is to add flavour to baked goods. Lacking it, baked goods tend to have a bland and boring taste. Vanilla extract can also contribute moisture to create a soft and fluffy texture.

Due to its liquid nature, using oil in cookies typically results in a denser texture. Also, because oil is 100% fat, it doesn't react with flour the way butter does (butter contains water). Because of that, your cookies won't be as fluffy. If you're a fan of flat cookies, then using oil is an excellent option.

What happens if you use melted butter instead of softened for cookies? ›

Cookies made with melted butter often deflate and become denser when they cool, resulting in a perfectly cooked fudgy center — a similar textural result to brownies that get rapped (aka banged against an oven rack mid-bake to deflate them) or Sarah Kieffer's iconic pan-banging cookies that turn out pleasantly compact.

So it looks like that there are utilitarian reasons for the cross-hatching—to allow for even cooking—but it might have been passed along for nearly a hundred years for primarily aesthetic reasons, where the cross-hatching is more to identify the cookies as peanut butter ones, rather than to cook them well.

The reason is that peanut butter cookie dough is dense, and unpressed, each cookie will not cook evenly. Using a fork to press the dough is a convenience of tool; bakers can also use a cookie shovel (spatula).

It's been the “mark” of this classic treat for more than eighty years, and for good reason: by flattening this dense cookie dough, it ensures that each cookie bakes evenly. Our kitchen-tested recipe is a classic. In fact, home cooks from all over have said these are the best peanut butter cookies they've ever made!

Mixing Butter & Sugar

If your butter is under mixed, it won't have the air pockets to hold it's shape. If it's over-mixed, the air pockets decrease in size and are unable to hold their shape in the oven—causing your cookies to spread. It's best to cream butter and sugar on medium speed for 2 to 3 minutes.

Incorrect Fat-to-Sugar Ratio: The proportion of fat (butter, oil or shortening) to sugar is important for the texture of a cookie. If there isn't enough fat, the cookies may be crumbly. Measure out the correct amounts of fat and sugar for your recipe.

One possible reason is the amount of baking powder in the dough. Make sure that this is measured carefully and use a level teaspoon. Also use a 5ml measuring teaspoon. Too much baking powder can cause the cookies to spread too much.