Best Allergy Friendly Basic Cookie Recipe - Egg & Dairy Free, Vegan (2024)

Everyone who bakes should have a go to basic biscuit or cookie recipe. Something quick and easy and that you can mix up with different varieties: chocolate chip, jam drops, sprinkles and more. When you have food allergies, an allergy friendly basic cookie recipe is even more of a must have. This is our go to recipe that is dairy free, egg free, nut free and can be made wheat and gluten free by substituting your choice of flour.

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Basic cookies without eggs or milk

Many basic cookie recipes have butter and eggs in them. If you have an egg or milk allergy, or are vegan, you can make a few simple substitutes to make them allergy-friendly.

Easy substitutes for milk and eggs

Instead of butter, these biscuits use a dairy free spread (we use Nuttelex). Milk is replaced with a dairy free alternative. We used oat milk in our biscuits, but you can use any non-dairy milk of your choice.

There are quite a few different ways to make biscuits without eggs. Some of our favourite ways to bake without eggs are to use:

• A flax egg – mix one tablespoon of flax seed (linseed) meal with 3 tablespoons of water, whisk, and leave in the fridge for around 15 minutes to make a gel like consistency.
• Replace the egg with aquafaba – the liquid from canned chickpeas. This is my favourite substitute for eggs in sweet and savoury recipes, and can even be whipped to replace egg whites. Use 3 tablespoons of aquafaba to replace one egg.
• Use an egg replacer product like Orgran No Egg – make up according to the instructions on the packet.

For this recipe we’ve used egg replacer.

Gluten free basic cookie dough

For a wheat or gluten free biscuit recipe, you can easily replace the self-raising flour with your preferred brand of gluten free flour. Make sure that it is safe for any other allergies that you have.

Unlike substituting gluten free flour in cake recipes, you shouldn’t need to vary the cooking time.

One basic cookie recipe, lots of different options

There are so many ways to mix up this recipe to make different allergy-friendly cookies.

Why not try:

• Adding allergy-friendly chocolate chips – We used Sweet William baking chocolate chips which are free from many top allergens including nuts and peanuts. They do contain soy though. Sweet William is an Australian brand. Another great option is Enjoy Life semi-sweet mini chocolate chips.
• Pressing an allergy friendly chocolate drop or freckle into the top of the biscuits before baking – We’ve used Sweet William white chocolate baking buttons.
• Adding cocoa powder to make chocolate cookies.
• Decorating with glace cherries before baking.
• Pressing the rolled balls of dough into colourful sprinkles before baking – We used some green, red and white sprinkles here for a Christmas theme.
• Placing a small indentation on top of your biscuits and filling with a spoon of jam before baking.

If you have a tree nut allergy but are looking for something with a similar “nutty” taste and texture to add to your cookies, have a look at some of the ideas in our post Nut allergy? No problem! 9 Easy Tree Nut Substitutes.

You can even divide the dough into 2 or 3 portions and make different types of cookies out of the same batch.

Ingredients

To make this allergy friendly basic cookie dough you’ll need:

• 125g dairy free spread (Nuttelex or similar)
• 1/2 cup caster sugar
• 1 Tablespoon Orgran No Egg made up with 3 Tablespoons of water (or other egg replacer equivalent to one egg)
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 2 1/2 cups self raising flour (gluten free if required)
• 1 Tablespoon non dairy milk

Choose any decorations or additional ingredients you like to decorate and flavour your cookies. Be sure to read any may contain statements carefully to make sure that ingredients you choose are safe for your allergies.

Method

Preheat your oven to 180C (350F) and prepare baking trays by lining with baking paper or silicone non-stick sheets.

Cream the dairy free spread and caster sugar together in a mixing bowl until light in colour. (You can use an electric beater or just do this by and with a metal spoon). Add the egg replacer and vanilla and beat well.

Add the flour and the non-dairy milk and combine.

*If you are adding chocolate chips or other ingredients to your biscuits, do this now.

Take a heaped tablespoon of the mixture and roll into a ball. Repeat with remaining mixture.

Place the cookie balls on the prepared baking trays, leaving a generous space between to allow for spreading. Flatten slightly.

*If you are decorating the biscuits before baking (with cherries, jam, sprinkles, etc) do this now.

Bake for approximately 15 minutes until the cookies are golden brown. Remove from the oven and leave the cookies to cool on the tray for around 5 minutes before transferring to a wire cooling rack.

This recipe makes about 28 cookies/biscuits.

More allergy friendly cookie recipes

For more allergy friendly baking ideas, make sure to check out our recipes page – including recipes for lemon cookies, Anzac biscuits, cornflake cookies and more.