COOKIES! My weakness, my ultimate weakness. Oh, how I love their chewy sweetness and superior pairing with a cup of hot coffee. COFFEE! My other weakness… lol. You will have to excuse the rhetoric I’ve been baking nonstop for what feels like days, but I am super excited today to have finally mastered these soft keto gingerbread cookies.
I’m slightly loopy on the smells of fall because my whole house smells like one of those fall Yankee candles right now. That’s not a complaint, it’s seriously awesome.
Low Carb Gingerbread Cookies With A Perfect Spice Blend
I had a few very important texture requirement for these cookies. They had to be soft, but they also had to be slightly chewy. Check check on both points.
They also had to have the right spice blend and try to make up for the fact that they didn’t have any molasses. Check on that point too. You don’t miss the molasses, I promise!
These keto gingerbread cookies have a few great qualities going for them:
- Chewy & soft like a soft gingerbread cookie should be.
- Sweet, and spicy with a good level of heat from the ginger & cloves.
- One bowl recipe!
- Keto & Low Carb.
- Entirely Gluten and refined sugar-free.
- 30 minutes including baking time.
What sweetener work best in this recipe
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Ok, so I have been spending a lot of time lately working primarily with Allulose. This recipe is no break from that trend! Allulose creates the perfect texture in these cookies. The sweetener creates that sticky chewy inside texture.
With that said you can use erythritol, or monk fruit, or even a blend of granular sweeteners, just know that the texture will be different. If you use sugar alcohols your cookies will also harden considerably overnight. You may like this texture, but if you want to keep the cookies soft go with the Allulose.
Answers about Sweeteners, Low Carb Baking Tips, and General FAQ
For more detailed information about must-have baking tools and answers about sugar replacements, you can check out these FAQ pages.
We also have a handy sweetener replacement chart you can download for free!
Our FAQ Pages have answers to your biggest low carb baking questions including:
Tips for Baking With Almond Flour
Tips for Baking with Coconut Flour
Guides for Allulose, Monk Fruit, and Erythritol.
Substitutes for Xanthan Gum.
Cookie Batter Tips To Get Perfect Cookies Every Single Time
To create the best ever keto gingerbread cookies there are a few steps you need to follow. This recipe creates a very soft dough that needs to be refrigerated for at least an hour (or overnight).
- Cream the butter, cream cheese, and allulose until very light and fluffy.
- Add the egg and heavy cream and whip until blended.
- Add the dry ingredients and blend together until the cookie dough starts to come together. The dough will be soft and very sticky.
- Wrap the dough in saran wrap and place the dough ball into the fridge for an hour or overnight. Overnight helps the spices develop and give the cookie an all over better flavor, but if you are impatient (like I am) an hour will do the trick!
Very Important Baking Tips!
There are three important tips that should not be skipped for this recipe to come out perfect every single time.
- Roll the dough and do not flatten. They flatten (when baked) into perfect looking gingerbread cookies complete with the cracks if you roll them into balls. The dough is going to be soft and sticky. If you wet your hands before you start to roll, the dough will not stick.
- Give the cookies lots of room to spread. On a parchment-lined quarter sheet, I placed 6 cookies.
- Double your cookie sheet. I mean place another cookie sheet under your primary sheet before placing it into the oven. This prevents the almond flour and allulose from over-browning (see the final image below). It makes a world of difference. If you do not have a second cookie sheet, wrapping the bottom of the pan in tin foil will help a lot.
Serving & Storage Suggestions
These are great 10-15 minutes directly out of the oven when they are still warm and fresh. They store great, covered, at room temperture for up three days. After three days they lose their freshness.
These keto gingerbread cookies, and the cookie dough freeze GREAT! You can make either and store them in the freezer.
You can roll your balls, and freeze them on a cookie sheet, and then store them in a freezer bag for up to a month. Be sure to let the frozen cookie dough balls defrost before baking.
You can glaze these cookies, add a cream cheese frosting, or even serve one with low carb ice cream. We sliced ours in half and made gingerbread ice cream sandwiches, and yes, they were as good as they sound!
Looking for More Keto / Low Carb Cookie Recipes?
We got ya covered!
Soft Keto Gingerbread Cookies
Soft and Chewy Keto Gingerbread cookies with a hot ginger kick!
Ingredients
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter softened
- 1/4 cup full-fat cream cheese softened
- 2/3 cup granular allulose * see notes in post for substitutions
- 1 large egg
- 1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1 1/3 cup sifted fine ground almond flour
- 1/3 cup sifted coconut flour
- 2 Tbsp unflavored protein powder
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 Tbsp cinnamon
- 1/2 Tbsp ginger
- 1/4 tsp cloves
Instructions
- Sift almond flour, coconut flour, baking powder, protein powder, salt, and spices into a medium-sized bowl.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, or in a bowl with a hand mixer, blend cream cheese, butter, and allulose until well blended, light and fluffy.
- Add the egg and heavy cream and blend until creamy.
- Fold dry ingredients into wet ingredients until everything is blended and the dough pulls together. The dough will be soft.
- Cover and chill for at least one hour.
- Preheat oven to 350F and prepare a cookie sheet with parchment. Double up your baking sheet. (see notes in post for baking tips)
- Roll heaping tablespoons onto the cookie sheet. Do not press down.
- Bake for 15-17 minutes or until the cookies turn golden around the edges.
- Pull the cookie tray from the oven and allow the cookies to cool for at least 5 minutes before removing from the tray.
Notes
- Be sure to chill the dough prior to baking
- Roll the dough and do not flatten. They flatten when baked into perfect looking gingerbread cookies complete with the cracks if you roll them into balls. The dough is going to be soft and sticky. If you wet your hands before you start to roll, the dough will not stick.
- Give the cookies lots of room to spread. On a parchment-lined quarter sheet, I placed 6 cookies.
- Double your cookie sheet. I mean place another cookie sheet under your primary sheet before placing it into the oven. This prevents the almond flour and allulose from over-browning (see the final image below). It makes a world of difference. If you do not have a second cookie sheet, wrapping the bottom of the pan in tin foil will help a lot.
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Nutrition Information:
Yield: 10 Serving Size: 1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 167Total Fat: 15gSaturated Fat: 6gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 8gCholesterol: 44mgSodium: 140mgCarbohydrates: 4gFiber: 2gSugar: 1gProtein: 6g
Nutritional information for the recipe is provided as a courtesy and is approximate only. We cannot guarantee the accuracy of the nutritional information given for any recipe on this site. Erythritol carbs (and sugar alcohols) are not included in carb counts as it has been shown not to impact blood sugar. Net carbs are the total carbs minus fibre.
What protein powder do you use? Is it necessary? I’ve never used it before, so I’m curious to know what it adds/does to the cookies.
Hi AP, the protein powder adds a binding to the recipe, without it, the cookies will be too soft and crumble. Essentially the protein powder in this recipe replaces the gluten you would find in traditional cookies. I use Genpro protein powder because it’s what we have kicking around the house, but any low carb protein powder will work. Cheers!
Is there anything that can be used instead of protein powder?
This looks like a great recipe!!! I wanted to make gingerbread men, but would this not be good to do since it mentioned not to flatten?
Hi Fern, this recipe won’t make gingerbread men, unfortunately. They are much softer and fluffier. I think if you rolled them and cut them with a cookie-cutter they would puff and look more like stay puff marshmallow men, vs gingerbread men.
Thank you so much for your reply! Guessing the kids would prefer gingerbread men on sugar cookies anyway! Hmm decisions!
I tried this recipe. I did make a mistake and mix the allulose with the dry ingredients. My cookies did not flatten on their own. I also quadrupled the recipe so I’m not sure if that affected it. However they are tasty. I like things that aren’t too sweet.
Hi there, quadrupling a recipe can cause issues with the texture. Having such a large batch of ingredients will require extra blending – that extra blending will cause toughness in the cookie. This would likely explain why they didn’t spread the way they should have. I’m not sure blending the allulose with the dry ingredients would have that effect. I like to blend the sweeteners with the butter and the liquid ingredients to give them a chance to melt so the end cookie doesn’t have crystalized granules in the texture. Hope that helps!
Getting ready to make these. Did you use powdered ginger or minced fresh?
Hi Sharyn, I used powdered ginger and will be sure to update the recipe to make that more clear. Cheers and Happy New Year!
Made these today and they didn’t turn out like I had hoped. I followed the instructions correctly except I used monk fruit for my sweetener. The cookies did not flatten out and tasted dry. I did refrigerate for 3 hours before baking. Not sure what happened?
Hi Lisa, I am sorry they didn’t work out for you. I do state in the blog post under sweeteners that the texture will change if you use monk fruit. I rarely use monk fruit in any of my baking because it does add the required sweetness but has a tendency to create a dry structure. Allulose melts like sugar – so it contributes to the flattening of the cookies, it also caramelizes and hardens with heat which contributes to the chewy texture. I hope that helps. Cheers!
I followed the recipe except used erythritol instead of allulose. My cookies did not flatten on their own or spread out at all. They had a very granular texture. Used 2 cookie sheets and the cookies were still quite dark on the bottom as well.
Yup, that’s because you used erythritol instead of allulose. They have completely different properties. Allulose will melt and spread Erythritol will not (this is why your cookies didn’t spread) Allulose will stay melted, creating a chewy softer cookie. In the post under sweeteners, I specifically state “Allulose creates the perfect texture in these cookies. The sweetener creates that sticky chewy inside texture. With that said you can use erythritol, or monk fruit, or even a blend of granular sweeteners, just know that the texture will be different. If you use sugar alcohols your cookies will also harden considerably overnight. You may like this texture, but if you want to keep the cookies soft go with the Allulose.”. When I test a recipe I test several sweeteners since they behave differently and give details on which one worked best and which ones to avoid. Erythritol doesn’t do much for a recipe except make It sweet, it doesn’t really melt, will recrystallize when cold, and can burn quickly – although I am unsure why they burned with a double cookie sheet (that should have prevented that, even with 100% Erythritol used in the recipe.). Hope this information helps. Cheers!