STRAWBERRY CREAM CHEESE COOKIES- Vegan & Gluten-Free

I love strawberry season!

I love strawberry treats even more!

That’s why when I saw that the grocery store by my house started to carry Daiya Cream Cheese (plain AND strawberry) I knew I had to buy some and I knew I had to make a treat with it. That’s when I remembered a delicious looking recipe I spied a while ago from Iris of The Daily Dietribe- Gluten-Free Cream Cheese Cookies.

I never thought about making them before because I’d have to use dairy-free cream cheese and have never been impressed with the flavour of them. I took a chance though when I spied the Daiya Cream Cheese…probably because the only packaged dairy-free cheese that I like is by Daiya. And the cream cheese did not disappoint, I am I so glad I took the chance. Daiya cream cheese, at least the strawberry flavour, actually tastes like cream cheese! I couldn’t believe it. No weird flavour, no weird aftertaste, just good old sweet and creamy strawberry goodness.

I just knew I had to put a spin on Iris’ cookies with my new purchase. You can find the original recipe here. And here’s the substitutions I made:

I used Daiya Strawberry Cream Cheese instead of regular cream cheese
I used pureed strawberries instead of butter
I used coconut sugar as the granulated sugar
I used brown rice flour instead of white rice flour
I cut the salt amount in half

They baked for 10 minutes and were beautiful. A gentle pink colour and a seriously creamy strawberry flavour. I’ve been missing cream cheese for a while now, so words cannot describe how pleased these cookies made me!

If you are looking for a whole foods based recipe, Iris has another recipe for Gluten-Free Cream Cheese Cookies that doesn’t use cream cheese but cashews instead! I haven’t tried this recipe yet, but I suspect the above changes would also work in this recipe. You can find that recipe here.

xoxo Erin