Everyone loves cookies! Or at least they should be able to. Serve family and friends Nut-Free Cookies this season so everyone can join in the fun!
From Easy Snickerdoodle Bars and Chocolate Chip Cookies to Cinnamon Puffs and Chocolate Dipped Oreos, there are so many fun Nut-Free Cookies you can bake. They make great gifts, especially when the receiver knows they’re safe!
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If you’ve ever watched the movie Stranger than Fiction, you know the importance of a cookie. IRS agent Harold Crick doesn’t.
But he learns this while auditing a baker. She forces him, one who doesn’t like cookies, to eat a cookie, warm from the oven.
He is smitten. With the cookies and with her. And you will need to watch that movie with warm cookies when you’re done with this post!
No matter the reason, everyone should be able to enjoy a cookie. Unfortunately, if the cookies are full of peanuts, or tree nuts like walnuts, almonds, or pecans, your friends and family might not be able to join you for a warm cookie and a glass of cold milk.
That’s why it’s important to have a repertoire and an understanding of baking nut and peanut free cookies. Nut-Free Cookies are a must-have anywhere you’re gathering with friends and family or assembling food gifts.
Why It Matters
As a mom of a child with life-threatening peanut and tree nut allergies, I know the disappointment involved when treats or food gifts aren’t safe for my daughter to eat.
Beyond the sad feelings, I also know the fear that can come when your child has an allergic reaction or is exposed to allergens that might prove deadly.
The best way is to learn how to bake safely for folks with peanut and nut allergies. Bake someone happy with Nut-Free Cookies.
Tips for Success
Follow these tips for success when making Nut-Free Cookies.
Read all ingredients labels carefully. If you’re avoiding nuts for allergy reasons, it’s important to note all ingredients as well as possible contaminants. Pay special attention to words like “may contain” or “processed in a facility that also processes…” If you don’t recognize an ingredient, look it up to be sure it’s not a nut product or derivative. Many chocolate candies, such as M&Ms, and baking chips are processed in facilities with nuts. You’ll want to avoid these. Learn more about US labeling guidelines from the USDA.
Let guests read the labels, too. If your guests are avoiding nuts for safety reasons, save the ingredient packaging so they can verify and decide for themselves if it’s food they want to consume. Do not be offended if they decline. It’s their safety that is at risk.
Start with a spotless kitchen and new ingredients. If yours is not a nut-free kitchen all the time, make sure everything has been wiped down. To risk in-house cross contamination, open new packages of ingredients, such as flour or brown sugar to ensure that your regular supply hasn’t been exposed to nuts or nut products.
Do some bulk baking if this is a frequent need. Know that you’ll need Nut-Free Cookies on a regular basis? Follow these tips for How to Make 12 Different Christmas Cookies Without Going Insane. The concepts work for every time of year.
Never package Nut-Free Cookies with others that might have nuts. After you’ve gone to all that work to keep things free of cross-contamination, be sure not to package nut-filled cookies with nut-free ones. Don’t even place them on the same tray.
Freeze extra for later. Take a few simple steps to store frozen cookie dough or baked cookies so that you or a loved one can enjoy them whenever.
FAQs
There are many standard cookie recipes that can easily be made tree nut and peanut free, including: shortbread cookies, chocolate chip cookies, sugar cookies, and many commercially made Nut-Free cookies as well.
Nuts offer a welcome crunch to cookies, but there are some substitutes you can use such as toffee bits, chopped pretzels, seeds like pepitas or sunflower, and in some cases oats. Be sure to read the packaging on these items as they may be processed in a facility that also processes nuts and peanuts. This can put those ingredients at risk for cross contamination and are best avoided for Nut-Free Cookies.
Sunflower butter will work as a substitute in some cookie recipes. However the chlorophyll in sunflower seeds reacts with baking soda and baking, turning the baked good green. It’s best used in Nut-Free Cookies recipes without baking soda or baking powder — or in recipes that you want to turn green!
Recommended Recipes
Here are some of our favorite Nut-Free Cookies.
Party Food Ideas
Tell us what you think!
We love to hear your experiences with Good Cheap Eats. Click the STARS on the recipe card or leave a STARRED comment to let us know what you think of the recipe.
Harriet
I have been without a stand mixer for a few years now. Someone I work with received a Kitchen Aid for Christmas, so she brought me her old one that is in perfect condition 🙂 I plan to use it to once again make homemade goodies. (Another lady brought me her bread machine. She said that she had moved twice and it had not been used at either house!) I am a blessed woman.
With all the attention being given to added preservatives and such, I rarely buy pre-packaged baked goods anymore. It is too easy to make our own and it is much healthier.
Jessica Fisher
Yay! What wonderful gifts! You are gonna be baking people happy….
Stephanie M.
Hi Jessica:
Could not sleep last night so I got on the computer and checked out a few things, one of them this site. After baking so many cookies at Christmas time, it’s been a while since I baked more of them. But seeing the video has prompted me into wanting to bake more right after Easter. Thank you for posting some clips of Stranger than Fiction. I watched it and it seems so sad; I’m not sure I would like to watch this movie because I don’t like tear jerkers. But in the scene where she’s trying to get him to eat cookies, that’s where I was enticed to bake some. On another note, I wanted to let you know that I finally emptied out all of the contents of our freezer; we have finally finished everything and this week, I actually had to buy some meat. Your January pantry challenge really got me motivated and I’m looking forward to the one in July. I started living out of the freezer in October and it’s taken me till April to finally empty it! Can you imagine? Six months worth of food in a freezer where the owner only lives five minutes from two grocery stores!! NEVER AGAIN!!!!!!!!!! Anyway, I just wanted to say hello and I hope everything is well with your family. Have a great day!
Jessica Fisher
Congratulations, Stephanie! It’s so wonderful what progress you’ve made. Thank you so much for sharing your journey with us. It really is amazing.
Also, the movie is sad but funny and bittersweet, and it does end up all right in a surprising way. You might like it.
Sandi
Congrats on finally getting it emptied! That was an enormous undertaking for you. I’m sure you have a great feeling of accomplishment.
I love Emma Thompson, so I saw that movies ages ago. My tween at the time loved it, and we’ve seen it several times since (either from library or playing on TV) and he still finds it enjoyable. It definitely falls in the “quirky” category.
Stephanie M.
Hi Sandy; thanks for the reply. It certainly was an “undertaking”; one that I will never return to. I learned some great lessons throughout like not to fill the freezer with anything and everything I can just because things are on sale. Those items will always be on sale again and it’s better to just eat what we have rather than to keep on adding to the supply. And you have no idea how good it feels to be done with all of this.:) See you at the July challenge.
Jessica Fisher
Have you seen The Secret Life of Walter Mitty? (the new one) We really liked that. Kinda falls in the same category.