My latest festive creation is this creamy delectable gingerbread cookie butter and it's made from my homemade gingerbread cookies (Check it out here). This cookie recipe has been on the blog since its inception and it's a personal holiday fave of mine. I've been making gingerbread cookies every Christmas since childhood — see!
Oh yes, my decorating skills have gotten much better! Practice makes perfect. But no matter how you ice your cookies you can #levelupyourleftovers into a scrumptious luscious vegan gingerbread cookie butter. Just remember to remove any jujubes and candy!
My adult gingerbread cookies have white royal piping icing on them to keep 'em monochromatic and classy, so this works perfectly for the cookie butter. If you have a ton of colored flood icing on your cookies the cookie butter might be muddled and strange so I would scrape as much of it off as you can. I also turned some of the gingerbread cookies into a chocolate gingerbread bark that I thought was quite whimsical. Watch the video below to see how both of these recipes come together.
Very important for this recipe... make sure you use a high-powered blender and not a food processor. I didn't test it but I think a hand immersion blender would also work. If you don't have a high-powered blender you will need to crush the cookies in a food processor to get them into a fine crumb. Then use an immersion blender to emulsify and create the smooth gingerbread cookie butter.
Cookie butter is an interesting concept. I didn't really know about it until a few years ago when I saw a jar of it at Trader Joe's that happened to be vegan. Traditionally it's made with speculoos or biscoff biscuits — both of which are a spiced cookie. So it makes sense that one can make a similar tasting treat with gingerbread. This spread is fantastic on the gingerbread cookies, dip sliced apples in it, or try it on this brioche croissant toast that I found at Whole Foods (watch me try it here)!
Let me know if you give this tasty spread a try and what you end up eating it with! Share your photos of this or any hot for food holiday recipe on Instagram and be sure to tag @hotforfood because I just might share it in my stories.
gingerbread cookie butter
Ingredients
- about 8 gingerbread cookies (about 1 cup gingerbread cookie crumbs)
- ½ cup water
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon ground ginger
- 3 tablespoon maple syrup
- ⅓ cup soft or melted refined coconut oil
Instructions
- Pulverize the gingerbread cookies into a fine crumb in a high-powered blender or food processor.
- In a saucepan, combine the gingerbread cookie crumbs, water, ground cinnamon and ground ginger over medium heat while whisking for about 2 minutes, just until it starts to thicken.
- Place the mixture back in the blender with maple syrup and coconut oil and blend on the nut butter setting, if applicable. Or add the maple syrup and coconut oil to the saucepan and use an immersion blender to get it very smooth and creamy.
- Serve slightly warm and keep leftovers refrigerated. Before serving you can heat it in the microwave to warm it up if it's been in the fridge.
Lauren Toyota
Lauren is a plant-based powerhouse, a former TV host turned wildly successful food creator, best-selling cookbook author, and the woman responsible for making vegan comfort food a thing worth craving. Through her blog and YouTube channel, hot for food, she’s amassed a dedicated following by recreating all the nostalgic, indulgent dishes we love—mac & cheese, burgers, cinnamon rolls—but making them entirely plant-based. No compromise on taste, no weird ingredients, just damn good food.