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Black bean cookies? You bet. These cookies made with black beans are a healthy dessert that tastes chocolate-y and satisfying.
Here at A Couple Cooks, we love healthy, nutritious, whole foods. Alex and I also love the excuse for a little splurge. So we’ve got two cookie recipes for you today! One is a straight up splurge, our Ginger Molasses Cookies. And one is a little non-traditional: these Chocolate Black Bean Cookies! Despite the name, which might sound unconvincing to some, these cookies are chocolate-y and delicious. Keep reading for how to make them!
How to make black bean cookies
This chocolate black bean cookies recipe is adapted from the good people at Green Kitchen Stories. It’s full of nutrients, and can be customized to gluten-free and dairy-free diets. And here’s the best part: it actually tastes good too! This cookie is chocolate-y and dense — a bit more cake-like than the traditional cookie texture, but it works in this case with the fudgy-ness of the chocolate.
We’ve tested these chocolate black bean cookies with multiple recipe testers and taste testers. And the verdict across the board was — two thumbs up! The only caveat is that there was some suspicion of using the term “black bean” along with “cookie”. So, you may want to re-brand these guys depending on who you’re making them for, to really sell them!
The process for making these cookies is simple: just use a food processor to blend together black beans, olive oil, peanut butter, cocoa powder and sugar into a chocolatey dough. You’ll add just a bit of flour in to hold the cookies together. Then, bake them for about 10 minutes until cooked through. The recipe below calls for saving out black beans to add to the top: this is totally optional, so you can do this only if desired.
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Looking for healthy dessert recipes?
Outside of these chocolate black bean cookies, here are are a few of our favorite other healthy desserts:
- Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Chocolate Tahini Vegan No Bake Cookies
- Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp
- Blueberry Crisp
- Baked Bananas with Toasted Coconut
- Five-Spice Baked Pears
- Berry Brownie Yogurt Parfait
- Maple Vegan Blondies
- Fudgy Vegan Brownies
- Chewy Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies
- Chocolate Sweet Cherry Vegan Tarts
- Easy Bananas Foster (use vegan variation)
- Perfect Homemade Peanut Butter Cups
- Healthy Peanut Butter Buckeye Balls
- Simple Apple Crisp in a Jar
This black bean cookies recipe is…
Vegetarian, gluten free, vegan, plant based, dairy free and naturally sweet.
Chocolate Black Bean Cookies
Black bean cookies? You bet. These cookies made with black beans are a healthy dessert that tastes chocolate-y and satisfying.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 25 minutes
- Yield: 16 cookies 1x
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Baked
- Cuisine: American
Ingredients
- 15-ounce can cooked black beans (or 1 ½ cups cooked)
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 tablespoons peanut butter
- 2 tablespoons milk or almond milk
- ½ cup coconut sugar
- 5 tablespoons cocoa powder
- 3 tablespoons all purpose flour or rice flour (for gluten free)
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ¾ teaspoon kosher salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375°F.
- Rinse the beans and drain them; save out 48 beans for decoration (3 per cookie – or omit this step if desired and just use 1 cup of black beans for the filling). In the bowl of a food processor, add the remainder of the black beans, olive oil, peanut butter, milk, and sugar. Blend until smooth.
- Add the cocoa powder, flour, cinnamon, baking powder and ¾ teaspoon kosher salt to the bean mixture and blend until smooth and the batter resembles a thick mousse.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and spoon 16 evenly distributed dollops of batter. Bake for around 10 minutes (the cookies should still be a little soft when you remove them from the oven). Place the saved black beans on top, if using. Set aside a few minutes before transferring them to a wire rack to cool completely.
Notes
Adapted from Green Kitchen Stories We stored the cookies in the refrigerator due to the black beans on top. If you plan to store the cookies, you may want to omit the black bean topping as the topping did become a bit tough after a few days.
Well.. maybe I made a mistake here but I found these to be quite salty/bitter (maybe my baking powder). Unfortunately there was not enough sweetness and they still seemed to be obviously bean cookies. A good try though.