Soft + Buttery Vegan Vanilla Spritz Cookies

These buttery soft vanilla vegan spritz cookies are so easy to make and are the perfect Christmas cookie to make this holiday season! Spritz cookies are the delicious middle ground between sugar cookies and butter cookies. Pressed into fun shapes like Christmas trees and snowflakes, they are a holiday classic cookie but honestly can be made any time of year! 

Top them with sprinkles, dip them in chocolate, or leave them plain. No matter which way you make them, you’ll love how easy this homemade recipe is. Make them in one bowl and in only 30 minutes you have up to 5 dozen cookies! 

Want more vegan cookies? Check out my vegan gingerbread men, chewy vegan ginger molasses cookies, or soft vegan snickerdoodles! 

Ingredients 

This is my favorite recipe for vegan spritz cookies. It is easy to mix up in one bowl and comes together in about 5 minutes. 

The recipe uses basic ingredients so you want to make sure that you are using good quality. This isn’t a place to skimp on the good vanilla! 

• Vegan Butter: You want this to be slightly colder than room temperature, but still soft enough to be mixed into a dough. I have great success with the Earth Balance sticks of vegan butter, but you can use any plant based stick butter you like. Just make sure that you don’t use a tub butter as they have a different water:fat ratio and won’t work. 
• All purpose flour: No fancy flour needed, just a simple all purpose works great. And yes, you can make these with a good gluten free flour mixture! 
• Vanilla extract: A really good quality vanilla is essential in this recipe. 
• Vegan Yogurt: This acts as the egg replacer in the spritz cookie dough. It also adds moisture and keeps them from drying out. 
• Sugar: To make them sweet.
• Salt

Instructions 

Start by mixing together the wet ingredients. In a large mixing bowl with your hand electric mixer, or in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, whip the dairy-free butter with the yogurt and sugar until light and fluffy, about 3 to 4 minutes when mixing on medium speed. Make sure you scrape down the sides of the bowl so that all the sugar is incorporated into the butter. 

Now, add the vanilla and salt. If you want to add some of the suggested flavorings, now is the time to do so. Mix this up again.

Finally, add the flour. Give it a quick mix on low speed, making sure to not over mix the batter. You may need to scrape the sides of the bowl a few times. When the batter is done, it should be soft and not sticky. 

Transfer the dough to a cookie press. Press each cookie onto an ungreased cookie sheet. This is important! You don’t want any non-stick surface on the cookie tray because the cookie needs to grip in order to get the best result. 

Don’t worry about them sticking! They will pop off no problem when fully baked. 

These cookies don’t spread when baking so really place as many as you can onto each sheet. I normally get about 30 cookies per baking sheet, depending on the size of the cookie. There are so many variety of shapes that you can make with a cookie press. 

Tip! I find that for most cookie shapes just one squeeze of the spritz press is enough to get a good cookie, but sometimes it does required two presses. 

If you are adding sprinkles, now is the time to do so! 

Pop them in the fridge to chill for 10 minutes. 

Bake them in a 400F oven for 8-10 minutes and remove them from the oven. They will be a delicate golden brown when finished and shouldn’t look wet at all. Let them cool on the cookie tray for about 10 minutes before removing to a cooling rack. 

Decorating 

What makes cookie making so fun is decorating them. 

Before baking: sprinkle on sanding sugar, sprinkles, chopped dried nuts/fruits/seeds, etc. 

After baking: dip in melted chocolate, pipe a little frosting, dust with powdered sugar, or cover with more sprinkles

How to Use a Cookie Press 

Each cookie press comes with its own set of instructions but they generally follow the same idea. You open the cookie press, fill it with your dough, choose a shape you want your cookie to be, and press it!

Make sure that you use ungreased, unlined, plain boring cookie sheets for these cookies! The magic is in having the dough stick to the tray before baking. 

Also, make sure to hold the cookie press totally vertical to your cookie sheet and give one or two pumps per cookie. Depending on the shape you chose, that will determine how many pumps each cookie needs. 

Finally, gently pull away. Ta da! A perfect spritz cookie is left behind on your tray. 

If the cookie dough sticks for whatever reason, you can always use your fingers to detach it from the press. Just place the dough back into the press and start again. 

How to Store / Make Ahead 

Keep these cookies in a sealed container on the kitchen countertop for up to 5 days after baking. 

These cookies are AMAZING when frozen! Freeze fully baked and cooled cookies with a layer of parchment paper in between each layer of cookies. Freeze in an airtight container for up to 3 months. 

To serve from frozen, allow to fully thaw before enjoying. 

I know you are going to love this recipe! 🙂

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