These soft & chewy Vegan Chamomile Cookies have a hint of lemon for a truly unique & delicious cookie flavor. This recipe uses dried chamomile tea leaves mixed into the dough for a delicate, herbal, and floral flavored cookie that is perfectly sweet & soothing.
These chamomile cookies come as SGTO's newest sugar cookie flavor! To quickly recap, last year I made Lemon Sugar Cookies back in April. Since then we've been baking up so many eggless & dairy-free sugar cookie flavors. Some of my favorites so far are the Earl Grey Cookies, Matcha Sugar Cookies, and Orange Cardamom Cookies! Like the earl grey cookies, these herbal tea cookies use real tea leaves infused throughout the dough for a truly delicious & soft sugar cookie.
Ingredients:
Ingredient Notes:
- Chamomile Tea: This is the chamomile tea I used. Any bagged chamomile loose leaf tea brand will work for this recipe though!
- Lemon paste: Must use lemon paste or lemon extract. It cannot be substituted for lemon juice in this recipe. You could also sub for vanilla paste/extract.
How to make soft chamomile cookies
First, cream butter, sugar, & chamomile
Creaming the vegan butter & sugar together is super important as it helps to bring some air into the dough and leads to really soft cookies. Make sure you use room temperature butter, which is butter that is still cold but can be easily indented with a finger.
We also cream in the chamomile tea leaves in this step as mixing with the fat (vegan butter) is the best way to infuse the tea throughout the dough.
Add flax egg & lemon paste
Next, add in the flax egg and lemon paste and mix another 30 seconds.
P.S- I wrote a whole post about vegan egg substitutes lately, but the flax egg is used in place of a real egg for these cookies. It can be subbed 1:1 for a chia egg too.
Mix in dry ingredients & chill dough
Then, mix in the dry ingredients including the flour, baking powder, and salt. For this recipe, we're just using baking powder so we get fluffy cookies that are chewy in the center.
Once the dough has formed, cover with plastic wrap and add to the fridge to chill for 30 minutes-1 hour.
While you don't need a lot of chill time, this step is super important to get the right texture of cookies. If you do not chill the dough, the cookies will spread too much and be flat. Chilling the dough helps get that desirable soft cookie while also making the cookies sweeter!
Roll cookie dough balls in sugar
After chilling the dough, roll the cookie dough into 10 evenly sized balls. Then, roll each chamomile cookie dough ball into a bowl of sugar.
Rolling cookies in sugar helps them get that crinkly texture as it dries out the outer layer of dough, causing them to crack while baking.
Bake the cookies!
Add the cookie dough balls to a parchment-lined baking tray, slightly press the dough balls down with your palm, and bake!
One other key to super chewy sugar cookies is to make sure to slightly under-bake them. Make sure to remove the cookies from the oven when they aren't completely cooked through in the center for the best results.
FAQ & Expert Tips:
I used Celestial Seasonings Herbal Tea brand, however any high-quality tea works. Just open up the tea satchels and use the tea leaves inside any of your favorite tea brands.
Lemon paste contains the essence and flavor of lemon without the acidity of lemon juice. The only good substitute for it would be lemon extract. However, you could definitely switch it for another paste or extract such as vanilla or lavender. If you do that, you could add some lemon zest to the dough too. If you're looking for a cookie recipe using real lemon juice, I'd recommend following my Vegan Lemon Sugar Cookie recipe instead.
I haven't personally tried it, but many of my readers have had success using a gluten-free all-purpose flour mix like this flour from Bob's Red Mill. Keep in mind, subbing almond flour, coconut flour, or other flour alternatives 1:1 does not work for this recipe.
When it comes to sugar cookies, I really don't recommend it. The cookies will not spread the same if you use coconut sugar or maple sugar, but if you would like to try go for it! If using a sugar alternative, just make sure it is granulated sugar and also skip the step of rolling the cookie dough in sugar before baking as this only works with cane sugar.
Chamomile Cookies can be stored on the counter at room temperature for 3-4 days, frozen for 1-2 months, or stored in a closed container in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.
I truly hope you love these soft & chewy Vegan Chamomile Tea Cookies! While they are truly great on their own, serve them alongside a cup of hot tea for a truly delicious chamomile tea dessert. Enjoy!
-TSG
More Vegan Cookie Recipes You Will Love:
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Vegan Chamomile Cookies
Ingredients
- ½ cup vegan butter (room temperature)
- ½ cup+ 2 tablespoon sugar ½ cup for dough, 2 Tbsp for rolling before baking
- 2 teaspoon ground chamomile tea leaves
- 1 flax egg 1 Tbsp (8 grams) ground flaxseed mixed with 3 Tbsp water
- 1 teaspoon lemon paste/extract
- 1 cup+ 3 tablespoon all-purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
Instructions
- First add the butter, ½ cup of the sugar, and the chamomile tea to a mixing bowl and cream together until light and fluffy, about 1-2 minutes. Then, add in the flax egg and lemon paste and whip together about 30 more seconds to combine.
- Next, add in sifted flour, baking powder, and salt to the mixing bowl. Mix until a thick, yet slightly sticky, cookie batter forms. Do not overmix or else you will form too much gluten and the cookies will not spread as much and will be tough.
- Cover the mixing bowl of dough and add to the fridge to chill for 30 minutes- 1 hour.
- Line a baking sheet in parchment paper and preheat the oven to 350F. Next, remove the dough from the fridge and use a 2 Tbsp cookie scoop to form your cookie dough (about 45 grams of dough per cookie). Roll into balls between your palms and then roll in the 2 Tbsp of sugar that was set aside so that each dough ball is coated in sugar.
- Place the chamomile cookie dough balls onto the baking sheet. Then, slightly press each dough ball down with your palm. Make sure that each cookie is kept about 2 inches apart since they will spread slightly while baking.
- Bake for 11-13 minutes until bottoms are lightly browned and the cookie is cooked, but still has soft centers. The cookies will continue baking after they are removed from the oven so the centers should be soft and slightly under-cooked, but not glossy or raw, when they are removed from the oven. Please be careful not to overcook these cookies as they will still be soft but will lose their "chewy" texture if overcooked.
- Remove the cookie tray from the oven and immediately tap the tray on the counter to produce a more “wrinkly” cookie. Then, let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes. Once the cookies have cooled, serve and enjoy!
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