The Fruity Secret To Delicious No-Bake Snickerdoodle Balls

Warmly spiced, sweet, and chewy snickerdoodles are a crowd-pleasing favorite, but what if you want the same taste without turning on your oven? Make snickerdoodle cookie dough balls, which contain some items you would expect — like cinnamon sugar and flour — but also a powerhouse secret ingredient. Dates lend an irresistible chewiness and natural sweetness to Julie Kinnaird's no-bake snickerdoodle cookie dough balls recipe. This dried fruit makes up the base of the treat, along with almond flour, almond butter, vanilla extract, and salt. A dusting of coconut sugar and ground cinnamon lend a classic snickerdoodle finish.

The dates give doughy bulk to these bites and also help to bind everything together without the need for butter, which is typical in a regular cookie recipe. However, to unlock their full potential, it helps to give the dates a soak first. About 5 minutes in warm water should do the trick, but you can always let them sit for longer if the dates you bought are on the dryer side.

Also, a food processor is key for making a creamy and homogenous texture for these treats. According to Kinnaird, blitzing the soaked dates along with the flour creates a paste that the almond butter can then be easily mixed into. Once the dates are well-blended with all the other ingredients, the resulting cookie bites do not taste overtly fruity. Instead, the deep caramel flavor of the dates complements the floral vanilla, spicy cinnamon, and nutty almond butter to make for a bite that tastes shockingly similar to classic cookie dough.

Recipe developer Julie Kinnaird recommends creamy and soft Medjool dates for this preparation. Ina Garten's tip for finding the freshest dates at the grocery store is to head to the produce section instead of the bulk foods, but if you can't find the Medjool variety, Kinnaird says to look for Deglet Noor dates instead. And if your supermarket does not have dates in stock, there are a couple of reasonable substitutes that you can reach for. 

Dried prunes and figs will both work for no-bake cookie dough balls. They are similarly soft and sweet, but will change the taste and appearance a bit. Prunes are quite dark in color, so you won't get the same amber-tinged brown hue that you do with dates. As for figs, they have tiny seeds that add some extra texture, while prunes and dates have a removable pit, allowing their flesh to blend smoothly. Also, both prunes and figs have a brighter taste than dates, so the flavor will be more distinctly fruity.

It is worth seeking out dates to really pull off these cookie dough bites, and the cinnamon sugar snickerdoodle vibe is not the only option. If you love peanut butter or chocolate cookies, swap the almond butter for peanut butter and easily temper chocolate to make a perfect finishing dip. Or, stir miniature chocolate chips, chopped nuts, and/or toasted coconut into the dough for a party of textures.