Iced Gingerbread Chai Cookies

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Why You’ll Love these Iced Gingerbread Chai Cookies

• Inspired by the Starbucks holiday drink. View their 2024 vegan menu options here!
• Vegan
• Gluten Free
• High in magnesium and healthy fats
• No oils
• TWO icing components that look like swirly, creamy latte art – but on a cookie!
• No chill time necessary
• Deeply spiced yet balanced
• It’s safe to eat the dough – there are no eggs nor any refined flours in this recipe. Enjoy!

Ingredients You’ll Need

Cookie Ingredients

Oat flour: finely ground oats are the primary starch holding these cookies together. Starbucks chose oatmilk in their gingerbread chai holiday drink, so we’ll roll with oats, too 😉 Make sure to purchase certified gluten free oats if you have a gluten allergy.

Molasses: a binding ingredient that brings the classic gingerbread flavor – do NOT skip, this ingredient is doing a lot of heavy lifting. The cookie texture, flavor, and color depends on it!

Coconut sugar: just a touch of unrefined sugar to sweeten everything up! Coconut sugar has an excellent, rich and nutty flavor Purchase a bag here!

Cashew butter: a healthy fat that brings out such an underrated caramel-like flavor. I love to make my own one-ingredient cashew butter from scratch – free to substitute almond butter or hazelnut butter here, both will work very well in these cookies!

Chai tea concentrate: this ingredient is what really draws that chai tea flavor forward. We’re using it in the cookie dough and again in the icing to connect the two. Purchase my go-to brand here on amazon.

Baking soda + baking powder: leavening agents! The molasses provides the acidic environment that we’ll rely on to activate the baking soda while baking in the oven, whereas the baking powder kicks the reaction off as soon as you blend the liquid ingredients into the solid. 

Salt: always necessary in my book, but it’s especially necessary here. A little bit of salt cuts away the bitterness coming from the molasses and balances out the cookie’s flavor. 

Cream of tartar: this ingredient is key to getting a soft interior and a puffy, well-risen cookie. It reacts with the baking soda and really sends these cookies into a chewier texture class.

Cinnamon, Ginger, Cloves: these chai spices tie the flavor profile of the recipe together with a neat little bow.

Icing Ingredients

We’re making TWO different icings for a lovely white and caramel swirl reminiscent of latte art on top of the cookies. The first icing is super simple, just two ingredients:

For plant-based cream cheese I prefer to use kite hill (almond base), it comes in an 8 oz tub. 

The second icing is more of a caramel texture – infused with chai spices and chai tea concentrate, it’s the most unique icing flavor I’ve created and I just know you’ll love it! The best part is that there are no new ingredients her – they’re all already used in the cookie dough! Keeping things easy. Also, this chai tea icing recipe makes plenty. You’ll have some extra leftovers after icing the cookies, and it keeps well in the fridge. I think it’s perfect and not too sweet for spreading on other treats throughout the week. 

Substitutions

Recipe Card

Iced Gingerbread Chai Cookies

Inspired by the Starbucks holiday drink, these chewy ginger molasses cookies are deeply spiced and balanced by creamy swirls of white and chai tea infused icing. This one is vegan, gluten free, and guaranteed to knock your cozy christmas socks off!

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Prep Time 30 minutes mins

Cook Time 12 minutes mins

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American, British

Servings 16 cookies

Calories 208 kcal

Equipment

• 1 9 x 13 baking sheet
• 1 Parchment paper

Ingredients

  

• 1 ½ cup oat flour
• ¼ cup molasses
• ⅔ cup cashew butter
• ⅔ cup coconut sugar
• ¼ cup chai tea concentrate
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp cream of tartar
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 ½ tsp ginger
• ¾ tsp cloves
• ¾ tsp salt

White icing

• ¾ cup plant based cream cheese
• ½ cup powdered sugar

Chai spiced icing

• ⅔ cup cashew butter
• ¼ cup coconut sugar
• ¼ cup chai tea concentrate
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• ½ tsp cloves
• ½ tsp cardamom

Instructions

 

Cookies

• Preheat the oven to 350℉ and line a baking sheet with parchment paper, no need to grease.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients (oat flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder, cream of tartar, cinnamon, ginger, cloves)
• In a large bowl, add the cashew butter and coconut sugar. Bean on high using an electric hand mixer or a stand mixer
• Add the liquid chai tea concentrate to the wet ingredients and continue beating until incorporated
• In three batches, add the dry ingredients to the wet, beating on low after each addition
• Roll the dough into spheres using your hands – aim for about golfball size. Space them 3 inches apart on the baking sheet – they will spread and puff up while baking
• Bake the cookies at 350 ℉ for 10 – 12 minutes.
• Remove from oven and let cool slightly before icing

White icing

• Beat the room temperature cream cheese and powdered sugar together until incorporated.*

Chai spiced icing

• Beat all the ingredients together until a runny caramel sauce has formed. You could also use a high speed blender for this part.

Notes

*if using traditional cream cheese, you may need to add a splash of milk to the white icing to thin it out enough. With plant based cream cheese, I find the icing is already soft enough. 

Keyword cardamom, chai, cinnamon, cloves, cookies, ginger, icing, molasses

Nutrition Data

Did you try this recipe? Let us know in the comments below! Happy baking and happy holidays!