Why do my gluten free cookies fall apart?

The dough likely needs more binding or more rest time. Refrigerate the dough for at least an hour before baking. If they still crumble, add an extra egg yolk or half a teaspoon of xanthan gum per cup of flour. Also make sure you are not overbaking. Pull cookies when they still look slightly underdone in the center.

Can I use almond flour for cookies?

Yes, and almond flour cookies are some of the best tasting GF cookies you can make. The natural fat in almonds produces a rich, tender cookie. You can use almond flour as the sole flour in many cookie recipes. It works especially well in shortbread, macaroons, and simple drop cookies.

How do I make chewy gluten free cookies?

Use melted butter instead of creamed butter, add an extra egg yolk, use more brown sugar than white sugar, and slightly underbake. The cookies should look barely set when you pull them from the oven. They firm up as they cool on the baking sheet. Resting the dough overnight also helps produce chewier results.

Do gluten free cookies take longer to bake?

Usually not. Most GF cookies bake in 10 to 14 minutes at 350 degrees, similar to regular cookies. They do tend to brown faster on the bottom, so light colored baking sheets and parchment paper help prevent over browning. Watch the edges and pull when they just start to turn golden.

Can I freeze gluten free cookie dough?

Absolutely. Portion the dough into balls, freeze on a sheet pan until solid, then transfer to a freezer bag. Bake directly from frozen, adding 1 to 2 minutes to the baking time. This is actually one of the best ways to have fresh cookies on demand. Frozen dough keeps for 3 months.

Why are my cookies spreading too much?

The butter is probably too warm or the dough has not rested enough. Chill the dough before baking, use a cooler baking sheet (not one still hot from the previous batch), and make sure your oven temperature is accurate. Also check that you are using the right ratio of flour to fat.

Recipe Type

Cookies Recipes

25 recipes

Curated by Evelina Melnikova

Cookies are where most people start with gluten free baking, and that is a smart choice because they are probably the most forgiving category. A slightly underbaked cookie is still delicious. A slightly overbaked one is just crunchy instead of chewy. Compare that to bread or pastry, where small errors produce inedible results, and you see why cookies are the perfect training ground.

The one thing that changes everything about gluten free cookies is resting the dough. I know this sounds fussy, but hear me out. When you mix a GF cookie dough, the starches have not fully hydrated. If you bake immediately, the cookies spread too much, crumble easily, and have a slightly grainy texture. Rest the dough in the fridge for at least an hour, ideally overnight, and those same cookies come out thicker, chewier, and with noticeably better flavor. The starches absorb the liquid, the butter firms up so the cookies hold their shape, and the sugars develop deeper caramel notes.

Butter temperature is the other major variable. Room temperature butter creamed with sugar gives you a puffier, cakier cookie. Melted butter produces a chewier, denser cookie with more spread. Cold butter cut into the flour makes a crumbly, shortbread style cookie. Same dough recipe, three different results based entirely on butter state. Our recipes specify which technique to use, but understanding the why behind it means you can adjust any recipe to your preference.

Many of these 25 recipes do not need xanthan gum at all. The combination of butter, eggs, and sugar provides enough binding for most drop cookies. When you do need it, our xanthan gum calculator tells you the exact amount for cookies versus rolled doughs. Rolled cookies and cutout cookies do benefit from a small amount of xanthan or psyllium to make the dough easier to handle, but even then the quantities are small.