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Quick and easy vegan hazelnut cookies recipe! If you love chocolate and hazelnuts, those vegan slice and bake cookies are your best friend!
Vegan Hazelnut Cookies
Do you like hazelnuts? Do you like cookies? And do you like chocolate? If so, this vegan cookie recipe is a must for you! They are crispy, nutty, and simply delicious!
After you dipped the baked cookies into a bowl of melted chocolate, you will be drooling! This last step makes them irresistibly tasty!
Since the dough is made without eggs and with plant-based margarine instead of butter, those cookies are 100% vegan and perfectly suitable for whenever you are in desire of nut cookies.
Those hazelnut cookies are very popular in Switzerland during the winter holiday season. Not especially in this shape, they usually come in long sticks and are called “Nusstängeli”. The old lady next to our house used to bake them for every Christmas, she prepared them very well – so delicious!
But I decided that Slice n’ Bake cookies are much easier to make, and most people are probably more familiar with Slice n’ Bake cookies instead of the traditional Swiss recipe (tiny, tiny Switzerland :)!
And hey, you can bake them during the whole year, not only during the holiday season. They taste great with coffee or tea.
Slice and Bake Cookies – Quick & Easy
The best thing about those vegan slice and bake cookies is that they are super easy and quick to make. Once you mixed the dough, you have to form it into a roll, refrigerate, and then slice them into thick slices using a sharp knife.
That’s all the magic. No need to roll out the dough on a floured surface and no cookie-cutter needed for this recipe.
It’s necessary to cool the dough before cutting. This will make it easier and helps to keep the dough together. You can either chill the dough for one hour in the refrigerator or for 15 minutes in the freezer. I frequently choose the second option, and turbo cool the dough. It saves lots of time, and I am not always super patient when baking – I want to eat those cookies finally. 🙂
Prepare In Advance & Freeze
This recipe is very suitable if you want to prepare the cookie dough in advance. Once you rolled it up into a rope and packed it with plastic wrap, you can keep it for a few days in the refrigerator or freezer.
You can then cut and bake them right out of the refrigerator.
If you store the raw dough in the freezer, you must defrost the frozen dough for a few hours or overnight in the refrigerator. It’s nearly impossible to cut frozen dough.
Dark Chocolate Glaze
You must use chocolate chips or bakers chocolate for the glaze. Regular chocolate isn’t suitable for melting and usually doesn’t turn hard again once melted.
I prefer to use semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate chips. They usually don’t contain milk powder and are therefore vegan-friendly. But make sure and either read the ingredient list or watch out for the vegan label.
Hint: It’s often the case that products don’t have a vegan label but still are vegan-friendly. Here is an excellent article if you want to know more about it: Are foods that ‘may contain traces’ of animal products vegan?
Melting Chocolate
You can melt the chocolate either in the microwave or over the water bath. Make sure it doesn’t get too hot. Otherwise, the chocolate will burn and can no longer be used.
Hazelnut Cookie Recipe
→ Make sure to watch the recipe video to see how to make these vegan hazelnut cookies in less than one minute!
One Recipe – Two Variations
There are two different ways to make this recipe. Each one has its unique taste:
- With hazelnuts meal – As you can see in the video
- With roasted and coarsely chopped hazelnuts – As you can see in the pictures
Hazelnut Meal
That’s the easier and more traditional way. No need to roast and chop the hazelnuts. Also, much easier to cut the dough in slices. That’s how they look:
Roasted and Chopped Hazelnut
Two extra steps but also extra taste and crunch. Probably my favorite of both.
The only drawback is that the coarsely chopped hazelnuts can crack the dough a little when you cut it into slices. It’s not such a big thing, but one might find it annoying. Make sure to use a super sharp knife, preferably a serrated knife.
If the dough cracks, simply press it together using your fingers. They will be just fine once baked!
Important: Roast the hazelnuts for 5 minutes in a skillet. They should be golden and fragrant, which is going to add some extra nutty taste to your cookies.
Which Variation to Choose?
I like both variations very much, but my favorite one is with roasted and chopped hazelnuts. If you want it crispy, go with the chopped hazelnuts, if you want to take the easy road use hazelnut meal.
With roughly chopped hazelnuts! With hazelnut meal!
Recipe FAQ
How to store the cookies? Store them in an airtight container at room temperature.
How long does it keep fresh? They are best eaten within three days.
Which sugar to use? Unrefined natural cane sugar is much healthier and contains more nutrients than refined cane sugar. It also gives the cookies a decent caramel note. It can be substituted with brown sugar.
More vegan cookies recipes you’ll love:
- Vegan Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Almond Crescent Cookies (German Vanillekipferl) – Vegan
- Vegan Cinnamon Cookies
- Vegan Linzer Cookies
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Vegan Hazelnut Slice & Bake Cookies
Ingredients
Hazelnut Cookies
- 1/2 cup (110 g) vegan butter, or margarine (1/2 cup = 1 stick)
- 1/3 cup (65 g) unrefined natural cane sugar, or brown sugar, see notes
- 1 1/3 cup (160 g) all-purpose flour
- 1 cup (80 g) hazelnut meal, or roasted & chopped hazelnuts, see notes*
- 1/4 tsp salt
Chocolate Glaze
- 1/2 cup (100 g) vegan semi-sweet chocolate chips
Instructions
Hazelnut Cookies
- Mix vegan butter and sugar for one minute in a bowl using a stand or hand mixer.
- Add the flour, hazelnuts, and salt and mix for another minute until it resembles coarse breadcrumbs.
- Use your hands to knead the crumbly mixture into a smooth dough and form into one or two ropes. Wrap them with plastic wrap and refrigerate for one hour. *see notes
- Preheat your oven to 355°F/180°C.
- Take the logs out of the refrigerator, cut them into 1/2 inch (1cm) slices using a sharp knife, and transfer them on a with parchment paper lined baking sheet.
- Bake for 12-14 minutes in the preheated oven, until the edges are golden brown. Allow cookies to cool completely on the baking sheet.
Chocolate Glaze
- Melt the chocolate chips over a water bath or in the microwave.
- Dip each cookie halfway into the melted chocolate and place on a cooling rack or on parchment paper until the chocolate has hardened. You can speed up this process by placing them in the fridge.
Notes
- Cooling Time: If you are in a hurry, chill the dough for 15 minutes in the freezer instead of 1 hour in the refrigerator. Chilled dough is much easier to slice.
- Store them in an airtight container at room temperature.
- Keeps fresh for 3 days.
- Make-Ahead: You can store the cookie dough logs for up to a few days in the refrigerator or freezer. If stored in the freezer, let them thaw for a while in the refrigerator and then continue with step 4.
- Sugar: Unrefined natural cane sugar is much healthier and contains more nutrients than refined cane sugar. It also gives the cookies a decent caramel note. It can be substituted with brown sugar.
- Hazelnuts: You can either use hazelnut meal or whole hazelnuts. If you use whole hazelnuts, roast them for 5 minutes in a skillet and coarsely chop or pulse in a blender.
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