These pumpkin chocolate chip cookies are everything I want on a fall day. They're soft, puffy, deliciously spiced, and full of gooey chocolate goodness.
I was originally planning to post these pumpkin chocolate chip cookies in October, but we finished them early, they turned out great, and I just couldn’t wait. Fall or not, these cookies are SO good! Oats, pumpkin, cinnamon, spices, and chocolate baked into big soft pillowy cookies – what’s not to love? These pumpkin chocolate chip cookies are vegan & gluten free, and they will be so perfect for lunch boxes because they’re nut-free(!) as well.
I know so many of you have asked how to make these carrot cookies without nuts. That recipe really needs the almond butter to bind them but THIS recipe holds together beautifully because pumpkin puree is a terrific binder. It’s also easier than grating carrots, which means that you’ll make these so much more often, but I’m warning you – they’ll disappear even faster.
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies Ingredients
Soft, puffy, and totally delicious, these pumpkin chocolate chip cookies are secretly healthy! Here’s what makes them SO good (and good for you, too!):
- Flaxseed subs in for the egg in these vegan pumpkin cookies. It also adds a boost of fiber and omega 3-s.
- Oat flour makes them wonderfully puffy and soft.
- Whole rolled oats give them a delicious oatmeal cookie texture and flavor.
- Cinnamon and nutmeg add the perfect notes of pumpkin spice.
- Pumpkin puree is the real star here. Aside from adding essential pumpkin flavor, it acts as a binder and packs in plenty of Vitamin A.
- Cane sugar sweetens them up.
- Coconut oil adds richness.
- Vanilla extract deepens their flavor.
- And chocolate chips make them irresistibly gooey and chocolatey.
Yum!
Find the complete recipe with measurements below.
How to Make Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
Sure, these cookies are light and fluffy and full of pumpkin flavor, but one of the best parts about them is that they’re easy to make! Here’s what you need to do:
- Make a flax egg by stirring together flaxseed and water, and set it aside to thicken.
- Then, combine the dry ingredients.
- And whisk together the wet ingredients, flax egg included!
- Stir together the wet & dry mixtures, and fold in the chocolate chips.
- Drop dollops of the dough onto a parchment-lined baking sheet, and bake until they’re lightly brown and your kitchen smells like pumpkin spice. 🙂
- Finally, let the cookies cool on the baking sheet (the hard part!), and then enjoy them with a coffee, tea, or cold glass of milk.
These pumpkin cookies are on the cake-y side and resemble a yummy muffin top. Like these Blueberry Breakfast Cookies, you could eat one for breakfast, or enjoy one as a semi-guilt-free midday snack or dessert. They also freeze extremely well. If you do freeze them, thaw them at room temp for an hour (or so), or pop them in the microwave for 8-10 seconds. I love thawing one to enjoy with an afternoon cup of tea.
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe Variations
Want to change it up? Here are some ideas:
- If you’re not a fan of chocolate, skip the chocolate chips and replace them with walnuts, pecans, or dried cherries.
- Want chocolate + nuts or chocolate + cherries? Then go half and half on the chocolate chips and another mix-in.
- Play with the spices. I love cinnamon and nutmeg here, but cardamom, allspice, and/or ginger would also be good. Or, feel free to use pumpkin pie spice if you keep it on hand!
- Use another kind of squash! This recipe calls for canned pumpkin puree, but baked and mashed kabocha, butternut, or buttercup squash would be great here too. See this post for step-by-step instructions on how to make your own pumpkin puree. (And fun fact: canned pumpkin usually contains a mix of squash varieties anyway!)
More Favorite Cookie Recipes
If you love these pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, try one of these yummy cookie recipes next:
- Carrot Cake Cookies
- Chewy Molasses Cookies
- Vegan Sugar Cookies
- Thumbprint Cookies
- Almond Butter Cookies
- Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies
- No Bake Cookies
- Or any of these 17 Easy Cookie Recipes!
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
- 1 tablespoon ground flaxseed meal
- 2½ tablespoons warm water
- 2 cups oat flour
- 1 cup gluten free whole rolled oats
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon sea salt
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- ¾ cup canned pumpkin puree
- ¾ cup cane sugar
- ½ cup melted warm coconut oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup chocolate chips* (see note)
- Preheat the oven to 375°F/190°C and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
- In a small bowl, combine the flaxseed and water. Stir and set aside to thicken.
- Make the oat flour: use a food processor or a blender to process 2¼ cups rolled oats into a fine flour and measure out 2 cups.
- In a large bowl, combine the oat flour, whole rolled oats, baking soda, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the pumpkin, sugar, coconut oil and vanilla. Add the thickened flaxseed mixture and stir to incorporate.
- Add the pumpkin mixture to the bowl of dry ingredients and stir to combine. Fold in the chocolate chips. Use a large cookie scoop to drop dollops of the cookie dough onto the baking sheet.
- Bake for 16 to 19 minutes or until the tops have browned (don't under-bake). Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before cooling completely on a wire rack. When cookies are completely cool, they can be stored in an airtight container or frozen.
I use Bob's Red Mill's Certified Gluten Free Rolled Oats.
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Probably my favorite cookie recipe I’ve tried in a long time — followed the instructions to a tee and they came out perfectly. Thanks!
Just made these and did half a cup of maple syrup instead of the sugar and raisins instead of chocolate chips. It worked perfectly! To make them crispier rather than cakier I baked for 10 min, took out and flattened with a fork, then baked for another 10 min.
Thanks for the great tip, I’m glad you enjoyed!
I made these today with a few adjustments and they came out great! I only had 1 cup of oats and no flax seeds so I used 1.5 cups of regular flour and 1 egg. I expected to sub the oat flour for regular flour as a 1-1 ratio but the dough was getting very thick so I ended up with just the 1.5 cups of regular flour. I think they are the amount of cakey as intended but less crumbly than the pictures because of the regular flour. I didn’t have any problems using a real egg.
I know I defeated the purpose of them being vegan and gluten free but they were delicious! I preferred the texture of these over other pumpkin cookies I have made in the past. I think because the oats helped hide some of the cakey-ness.
Hi Rachel – I’m so glad you liked them and that the modifications worked out! I really love the oats in here too 🙂
Wow this looks SO GOOD!!! I was looking for a recipe that included pumpkin and suddenly I found this? Amazing!! I will do them soon!
Just tried these! SO GOOD! Really great GF recipe without compromising texture or flavor. Well done!
thank you, I’m so glad you enjoyed them!
Just made these this afternoon! Turned out perfectly! They are delicious (YUM) and my house smells of freshly baked pumpkin spiced cookies! Love, love, love!
Thanks for the recipe!
yay! so glad you loved them!
The flavor of these is FANTASTIC, but I struggled a bit with the texture. I know that pumpkin makes the cookies a bit cakier anyhow, & now after reading these comments I see that using an egg instead of flax might have added to that problem. The other thing I did was let the dough sit overnight because I ran out of time to bake them after mixing – would that have made them cakier as well? One of the reasons I love oatmeal cookies is that great chew (not crunch) factor, so I’d love to find a way to make these chewy soft, rather than cakey soft.
Thanks so much!
Hi Meg – yep, sorry, these aren’t chewy like regular oatmeal cookies, I tried to note that above. The moisture in pumpkin (plus the lack of butter and lower amount of sugar) makes things more cakey, but we really loved that.
Hi Jeanine!
Have you attempted to make these as a larger batch of smaller cookies? I’m looking for a big batch of something yummy to bring to a family get together (Canadian Thanksgiving!) and I was thinking of trying these out. If I were to make double the amount of these at half the size, any suggestions about alterations in baking times?
I’m a bit of a novice baker, sorry if this is a silly question. 🙂
Thanks so much,
Aidan
I had the same problem as other folks here. the dough itself was moist but the chocolate chips would just make it fall apart, there were too many at least for my recipe. And yes, i followed it exactly. The scoop didn’t spread out and i had to manually push them down, now of course they don’t look pretty. I’m a bit bummed because I made them for a fundraiser for the local SPCA. I hope that they are baked through and tasty but at least one doesn’t have to be concerned about raw egg!
Hi Claudia,
The scoop doesn’t spread too much – these aren’t flat cookies, I’m sorry if the photos don’t accurately show that.
Hi Aidan, I haven’t tried baking smaller cookies, but they should be fine – just bake them for less time.
I made them today, super quick and delicious! Love your blog soooo much!!!
thank you! I’m so glad you loved them!
Is there an easy way to make these not vegan? (Or would that just be pointless?!) Looks delicious!
They don’t taste vegan, I would just go for it 🙂
Kids were already asleep and I didn’t want to use food processor so I used coconut flour. Let’s just say bad move. It was a dry crumbly mixture so I added 1/4 more pumpkin to make full can and add a few Tbl water and tried to bake some but very dry and crumbly balls. For rest of batter that’s in fridge do you recommend adding anything that could possibly revive it??
Hi Sarah – I’m not sure – coconut flour is SO different, isn’t a 1:1 replacement because it’s so dry.
These are yummy but turned out really crumbly and fall apart while trying to eat, perhaps I should have cooked them a bit longer!?
You could try baking them a little longer (my oven runs on the hotter side) – did your flax mixture turn into a gel before you added it?
I actually used one egg instead. Perhaps the flax mixture works better in this case?
Hi Jody, try baking them a little longer. Mine hold together really well, but they can fall apart if under-baked. Hope that helps!
These are delicious! The cookie itself is not very sweet and complemented perfectly by the chocolate chips. Very easy to make. For the first batch, I scooped the dough onto the cookie sheet and popped them in the oven as is. I found halfway through that the cookies were not spreading, so then and with subsequent batches, I flattened the cookies with a spatula before baking. The texture is more soft than crisp, though this may have to do with high altitude baking (which is always a struggle!). Will certainly be making these again and again.
So glad you liked them! They’re soft, not crisp – the moisture in the pumpkin makes them more cakey than regular chocolate chip cookies.
So, if I don’t have oat flour then I use 3 and 1/4 cups of rolled oats?
No, you make your own oat flour out of the first 2 1/4 cups.
Step 3: Use a food processor or a blender to process the 2¼ cups rolled oats into a fine flour and measure out 2 cups.
Oh, duh! I started writing out my shopping list without reading the directions first! Thanks!
Perfect timing for me! My grandson is on doctor prescribed restrictive diet and he’s not allowed wheat, processed flour or dairy. As he was leaving I told him next week I’ll have some cookies for him. He was so excited – he’ll love them!
i never have any luck with baking vegan so i figured i’d give this a shot. the dough just never came together (kind of just a dry, mealy mix) and after baking (for 40 minutes and weren’t burned at all) the cookies crumbled with a light touch. what could i do better next time because pumpkin/oats/chocolate is my favorite combination.
Are you sure you used the correct amount of dry ingredients? (2 cups oat flour + 1 cup whole rolled oats?). I’ve made these at least 6 times and the batter is very moist. Can you let me know if you made any other modifications?
yes I followed it exactly, except doubled it to make more. maybe that was a problem?
I would just double check your measurements – sometimes when I double recipes I mess up the math in my head.
Or if you used store-bought oat flour, make sure it wasn’t too packed before you scooped it. Or if you blended your own oat flour, make sure you blended it fine enough. Hope that helps!
i’ll definitely try again without doubling the recipe. i did make my own oat flour and paid attention to the measurements. hopefully next time turns out better!
These look absolutely delicious! I need to make these next weekend and enjoy them as a cheeky snack in evenings! Thanks for another great recipe!
Rae | Love from Berlin
Look so nice. I will try to cook it.
One of the first things on my list of must-bake for fall are these cookies! Can’t wait!
These are amazingly good!!! I made them with coconut sugar and it gives them a real depth of flavor. I am always looking for good gluten free baked goods to satisfy my sweet tooth. Thank you!!
Yay, I’m so glad you liked them!