This simple Paleo Butter Cookie recipe is made with just 5 ingredients –almond flour, butter, honey, vanilla, and salt. I love baking cookies with heart healthy almond flour because it’s so easy to use!
This easy paleo cookie recipe is one that my friend Mary and I like to bake when we get together. We met on the first day of orientation of college at Columbia University and have been very close ever since. She is one of the smartest, funniest people I know. When we were younger we ate our way through New York City, and spent countless hours in the kitchen together as well.
Yesterday, Mary emailed me and asked for, “that cookie recipe with almond flour and butter.” Well, that would cover a couple dozen of my recipes. After a bit of email back and forth, we narrowed it down to one of the recipes I had concocted a few years ago, when I still lived in New York. Here it is, Mary, my recipe for Paleo Butter Cookies.
Butter Cookies
Ingredients
- 2½ cups blanched almond flour (not almond meal)
- ¼ teaspoon celtic sea salt
- ½ cup salted butter, cut into pieces
- ¼ cup agave nectar or honey
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
Instructions
- Pulse together almond flour and salt In a food processor
- Pulse in butter, honey, and vanilla until well combined
- Separate dough into 2 balls and place each on a piece of parchment paper
- Cover each ball of dough with another piece of parchment paper and roll out ¼ inch thick
- Place in freezer for 30 minutes
- Using a 2 inch cookie cutter (or the top of a 2-inch wide jelly jar) cut out cookies *
- Bake at 350°F for 5-7 minutes
- Cool and serve
Please note, if your cookie dough becomes too soft to work with, roll it out again between the 2 pieces of parchment paper and return to freezer for 10 minutes.
Here are some of my other easy cookie recipes:
Glyn says
Elana these are delicious, and so simple to make! I substituted out the agave nectar for 2 tbsp maple syrup, 2 tbsp xylitol and 2 tbsp erythritol. They taste great and have a lovely, chewy texture with a slight crisp on the edges. I will definitely use this recipe to make my next paleo pumpkin pie crust – I think it will work perfectly!
Jessica says
I ran out of Agave and instead used some molasses and a bit of Maple syrup. I also included lemon zest – Delicious!
mary says
Do you think this recipe would work for making raspberry tea cookies? They are my favorite for the holidays, but I need a recipe that does not have wheat flour.
Elana says
Mary, here’s a link to my Raspberry Thumbprint Cookies for you:
https://elanaspantry.com/raspberry-thumbprint-cookies/
Enjoy!
Elana
Palis says
Do you ever put the nutritional info on for your recipes? I was just looking at the butter cookies and a few others….. Thanks… Palis
Elana says
Palis, for more on that go here:
https://elanaspantry.com/nutrition-information/
Have a great day!
Elana
Sean says
Just made these subbing honey equally for agave and using my own homemade almond flour (saving my super fine flour for other things) and they turned out great! Thanks!
kristina says
Just recently started the paleo diet and made this recipe the other day. Delicious, thanks for sharing! First attempt at using almond flour and LOVE it. I dropped the dough from a teaspoon and mashed them with a fork like a PB cookie cause I was in a hurry. Turned out perfectly.
Janelle says
I love these cookies. I’ve also found that you can roll them up in parchment or plastic wrap into a “log” shape then freeze or refridgerate and simply slice into rounds when they are cold enough. This way you dont lose any dough. I also press an almond on top for garnish before baking.
Lalita says
Use a cheese slicer on the log. Works wonderfully.
Jenifer says
Thank you for the suggestions. I follow both of them and was pleased with the results.
Ally says
Adjusted this to create a snickerdoodle recipe (combined with the recipe in the cookbook), and they are amazing. Holy yum!
Nancy says
Can you explain how you altered this recipe because I love snickerdoodles?
Elana says
Nancy, here’s a link to my Snickerdoodles recipe for you:
https://elanaspantry.com/paleo-snickerdoodles/
Enjoy!
Elana
Susan says
I made these today although I copied the recipe wrong and used 1/2 cup of sweetener (coconut palm sugar) instead of the 1/4 cup . I also added 3/4 cup of shredded coconut and they were fantastic.
Then, after staring at these cookie recipes for the last week or so now, I realize that Elana has almost a basic cookie recipe which many of the recipes are based on and so from this I now have mine: 10 oz almond flour, 1/2 tsp baking soda, 1/2 tsp salt, 1/2 cup (4 oz) butter, 1/2 cup (2.8 oz) coconut palm sugar, 2 TBSP water, 1 TBSP vanilla (butter, sugar, water and vanilla melted in a pot).
I use a medium size cookie scoop, but still roll the balls in my hands and flatten to about 1/4″. After I started weighing my flour, I have not had any issues at all with dough consistency and my cookies have all been coming out really great. I’m so excited!
So, from the basic recipe, I added in the shredded coconut and they turned out really great! Or, just add in 3/4 cup of chocolate chips and you’ve got Elana’s basic chocolate chip recipe. My next experiment will be to use this basic recipe and add in spices to make a spice cookie. I’ve been really happy with all the cookies that I have made so far and now I have several go-to recipes. Now, if I can just stop eating them!!!
Rebecca says
I just received my first bag of Honeyville almond flour today and decided to try this recipe first. (Before now, I’ve been using blanched almond meal from my local farmer’s market.) These cookies are the best butter cookies I’ve ever had. I did not do the flattening-freezing step. I wrapped a whole batch of the dough in a sheet of plastic wrap and let it sit in the freezer while the oven heated up. Then I scooped out small spoon (like the smaller spoon in a place-setting) sized scoops onto a cookie sheet covered with parchment paper. I then baked them at 350 for 11 mins and they were these little mounds of deliciousness. My toddler has been scaling the kitchen counters to grab them, even as I type this. AMAZING!!!!!!