Friday, August 23, 2013

Raspberry Cheesecake Cookies

Last week we stopped at Subway for the boy to get lunch, and he came out and said I should be proud of him because he didn't buy a Raspberry Cheesecake cookie, even though they had them, and they are delicious. He then asked if I could recreate said cookie. Having never eaten a Raspberry Cheesecake cookie, which is assuredly not vegan (or gluten-free because I'm not allowed to eat gluten for the foreseeable future), I asked him about a million questions about the construction of said cookie. Then I went online and figured "well someone must have a copycat recipe that I can bastardize" and sure enough there were! They involved using Jiffy Raspberry Muffin Mix. What? Who does that? I looked up the ingredients list on Subway's website, and that involves neufchatel cheese and "raspberry bits" which contain 9 ingredients (sidebar: the meat at subway has ingredients lists. should the ingredients in meat be "meat?").

Ok screw that noise, I made up my own recipe based on recipes for other cookies.

What amazes me about these cookies is that don't have that strange grainy gluten free texture that a lot of gluten free baked goods have. They are a nice chewy cookie, and have a pretty smooth mouthfeel... for a cookie. The boy says that the original cookie is more of a sugar cookie texture, but the flavor is spot on! Personally I was not going to try to roll out cookies containing chocolate chips and freeze-dried raspberries, so drop cookies were my choice for this.

Ingredients note: I find vegan white chocolate "decorator" chips in the Kosher section of the grocery store. They are totally not good for you. Freeze dried raspberries are REALLY EXPENSIVE, $50/lbs at the co-op, but I bought about a heaping cup's worth, and it cost me $4. A pound of freeze dried raspberries is actually a lot of raspberries. My gluten free all purpose flour of choice is Trader Joe's brand. You can use regular all-purpose flour if gluten isn't an issue, just leave out the xanthan gum. You can also use another brand of gluten-free all-purpose flour, but I can't make any promises as to texture or flavor. Finally, as far as I can tell, Jello Instant Cheesecake Pudding mix is both vegan and gluten free. The package says neither.

The boy took this picture... on a dirty plate from my grilled nooch sandwich. Then he ate the cookies.


Raspberry Cheesecake Cookies

1/2 cup (one stick) Earth Balance Buttery Spread (softened)
1/2 cup (one stick) Earth Balance Shortening (softened)
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup plain or vanilla non-dairy yogurt
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp xanthan gum
1 package instant cheesecake pudding mix
2 1/4 cup gluten-free all-purpose flour
1 bag white chocolate chips (~2c)
1 cup freeze-dried raspberries, half pulverized

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees

2. Cream together the Earth Balance, Shortening, and sugars until light and fluffy

3. Blend in the pudding mix.

4. Add in the yogurt and vanilla and mix thoroughly.

5. Blend in the dry ingredients. Be careful with xanthan gum to not let it clump when you add it! Sprinkle it around the bowl or mix it into the flour and baking soda before hand. It's not called gum for nothing.

6. Fold in the chips and raspberries.

7. Refrigerate the dough for about 30 minutes to allow it to firm up a bit, then scoop onto cookie sheets in whatever size cookies you'd like. Small cookies will bake about 10 minutes, average sized cookies about 12, Subway sized cookies I'd guess about 14 minutes. You want them to look puffy and have a golden brown bottom (who doesn't want that?!). Allow the cookies to cool on the cookie sheets for about 10 minutes before removing to a cooking rack. Allow them to cool completely before putting them away.

2 comments:

affectioknit said...

YUM!

~Have a lovely day!

Touchofgr3y said...

Those look delicious! I'll have to check out the TJ's GF flour; I've done some experimenting with GF flour for baking and had been doing well with the King Arthur's...so it'll be awesome if the TJ's is better than that :)