It's So Easy To Swap In Vegan Butter For All Your Favorite Cookie Recipes

Butter is the base of many delicious cookie recipes, and it's for good reason! Butter provides baked goods with the necessary fats, a rich depth of flavor, and a tender crumb. However, it can feel disheartening if you have dietary restrictions like dairy sensitivity or have adopted a vegan lifestyle, especially when that new cookie recipe you've been eyeing uses regular butter, and you don't know how to make suitable replacements. Vegan dessert lovers rejoice — you can swap standard butter for the vegan variety in all of your cookies. Better yet, it's a straightforward ratio of a 1:1 substitute. 

If your recipe calls for two cups of dairy butter, you swap it with the same amount of the plant-based variety. The main thing to note is that you'll want to rely on a type that offers a higher fat percentage. Since standard butter has 80% fat content, you'll want to use a plant-based one that has 80% fat as well. This way, the total fat content does not change throughout the recipe when making the exchange, which could alter the structure of the dough.

Expand your horizons and consider other ways to use this spread for your cookies other than directly swapping it with softened dairy butter in the dough. One idea is to brown it to produce nutty, carmelized notes (like you would with standard butter) to make vegan brown butter cookies with tons of flavor. Or whip up a dairy-free frosting after making your favorite sugar cookies. You only need a plant-based spread, powdered sugar, flavored extract, and oat or almond milk. In no time, you'll have a smooth, luxurious topping ready to ice each cooled cookie. Pro tip: Read up on how to roll our sugar cookie dough to get the desired textural results and the ideal vessel for that sweet, yummy frosting.

Other ideas include combining two dessert favorites (cookies and brownies) to create brookies. Find your favorite brownie and chocolate chip cookie recipe, replace the butter, and switch the chocolate chips for dairy-free varieties. Pour the brownie batter into a pan, dollop large pieces of the cookie dough on top, and bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit until solid (about 26 minutes for an 8x8 pan) for an epic chocolatey treat. Or, give these peanut butter cookies a go for a salty, nutty treat. Since peanut butter is naturally dairy-free, you don't have to worry about making any extra swaps.