Winter is the perfect time to make spice cookies. Filling your kitchen with the delicious scent of cinnamon and ginger, these treats will warm your heart and your stomach. As I’ve written about before, I am sugar intolerant (sadly, this really is a thing), so baking good cookies is quite a challenge. In this recipe, most of the sweetness comes from (unsweetened) applesauce, which is healthy and adds flavor without adding extra sugar. I could go into the nerdy nutritional details here about how fructose (the sugar in fruit) is digested and absorbed more slowly than glucose (pure sugar), but I’ll spare you. Suffice it to say that the sugar in fruit is a healthier alternative to adding straight cane sugar to a recipe. Not only are these cookies paleo-friendly, they can easily be modified to conform to an AIP diet as well. Happy baking!

Yield: 15 cookies

3/4 c. tigernut flour (check out Anthony’s if you haven’t tried it before!)

3/4 c. arrowroot starch

1 Tbs. gelatin

1 tbs. coconut sugar

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. sea salt

1 1/4 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. ginger

1/4 tsp. allspice

1/3 c. coconut oil

1 Tbs. coconut butter (Wildly Organic is an awesome brand)

1 Tbs. molasses

1 Tbs. vanilla

1/2 c. unsweetened applesauce

1/2 c. chopped pecans (omit for AIP)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, melt coconut oil and coconut butter. Add molasses, vanilla, and applesauce and stir well. Add all dry ingredients (tigernut flour through sea salt), breaking up any lumps in the tigernut flour. Sometimes I sift the tigernut flour before adding it to the dough. If I’m feeling lazy, I just break up the lumps with the back of a spoon as I mix it into the dough.

Stir in chopped pecans if using.

Drop dough by 2 Tbs. (#30 scoop) onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.

Bake for 8-10 minutes, until puffed up but still slightly dark in the center. Cool completely on cookie sheet before removing. Cookies will be very tender when warm, but will firm up as they cool.

Enjoy!