Vegan Banana Bread Cookies with Chocolate Chips

These vegan banana bread cookies are simple to make and combine the flavours of banana bread with a soft-baked chocolate chip cookie. Unlike other recipes, these healthy banana bread cookies contain whole grains and overripe bananas for natural sweetness and a chewy, soft texture. They're also great for a take along breakfast or a quick snack and they store really well in the fridge or freezer so you can make these ahead of time as well.

The chocolate chips in this recipe do add some refined sugar, however, I used semi-sweet dark chocolate morsels and made sure not to overload the recipe with them. These vegan banana bread cookies are soft-baked, dairy-free, egg-free, easy to make and freezable. You'll love them!

Make sure to read the entire post because each step matters and there are many helpful points below.

Jump to:

• Ingredient Notes & Substitutions
• How to make this recipe
• Helpful Tips for Best Results
• Storage
• More Vegan Cookie Recipes
• Vegan Banana Bread Cookies with Chocolate Chips

Ingredient Notes & Substitutions

Overripe bananas: these are essential for adding body, and structure to the cookies. Overripe bananas are also quite sweet which helps naturally sweeten these cookies. Often, grocery stores will sell bags of brown bananas so you don't have to wait for your bananas to ripen.

Flax Meal: ground flax seed is called flax meal. This ingredient acts as a binder similar to how eggs would. I prefer to use brown flax seeds over golden flax because it tends to gel faster and better than golden flax. Ground flax is sometimes referred to as a flax egg, which is a common egg substitute in vegan recipes. If you don't have ground flaxseed, use 1 tablespoon of whole chia seeds or 2 teaspoon of ground chia seeds.

Coconut oil: The coconut oil should be soft for this recipe. If you use rock hard coconut oil, it will be very challenging to incorporate it. You can also use softened vegan butter in equal measure instead of coconut oil.

Maple syrup: Instead of conventional sweeteners like brown sugar, white sugar or coconut sugar, this recipe uses maple syrup. You can also substitute the maple syrup for agave syrup or liquid honey in equal measure.

Pure vanilla extract: to add flavour and aroma to the cookies.

Spelt flour: If you don't have spelt flour on hand, you can exchange it for whole wheat flour in a 1:1 ratio. I have not tested this recipe with all purpose flour or gluten-free flour blends, unfortunately, so I can't guarantee it will work.

Baking soda: the leavening agent used for these cookies.

A pinch of salt: to help balance and enhance the flavours.

Rolled oats: these are not the same as quick oats, so make sure the package says rolled oats. These add flavour, body, structure and fiber to these cookies.

Semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips: you can also use chocolate chunks if you prefer. Alternatively, you can sub the chocolate chips for chopped walnuts, or pecans in equal measure. For more choclate flavor, you can also add a few additional chocolate chips to the top of the cookie dough before baking.

How to make this recipe

These vegan banana cookies are very easy to make, with the most time consuming part being mashing the bananas. For the detailed step-by-step instructions, please see the recipe card.

STEP 1: Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. To a large bowl, add the mashed banana, coconut oil, maple syrup, vanilla and flax mixture and stir to combine. 

STEP 2: In a medium bowl, sift together the dry ingredients (except the chocolate chips and oats), and then add it to the banana mixture (the wet ingredients).  

STEP 3: Mix in the oats and chocolate, portion the dough/batter onto the lines baking sheet, then press them down into a cookie form.

STEP 4: Bake for 12 minutes until they're slightly golden brown around the edges. Allow them to cool on the cookie tray before transferring to a cooling rack.

Helpful Tips for Best Results

• Use very ripe (overripe) bananas - they're easier to mash and much sweeter. The bananas should have some brown spots on the peel. 
• The batter/dough mix is supposed to be somewhat sticky. It should resemble a cross between muffin batter and cookie dough. It's meant to be like that, so don't worry.
• Use a medium sized cookie scoop to portion the dough/batter.
• When pressing the cookie dough,  you can lightly flour your hands if you find it sticking too much. Alternatively, you can use slightly wet hands to press the cookies; I find both methods help.
• Allow the cookies to cool for 10 minutes on the baking sheet before transferring them to a wire rack to cool completely to room temperature.

Storage

Storage: Because this recipe uses fresh bananas, it's best to keep them in an air-tight container in the fridge to retain their flavour and texture. They will last for 3-4 days this way. 

Freezing: place the cooled cookies in a single layer in an airtight freezer safe container. I like to use a large freezer bag and place them in two layers with a piece of parchment paper between each layer of cookies. Defrost them in the fridge the night before you want to enjoy them. 

More Vegan Cookie Recipes

If you love my healthy banana cookie recipe, you might want to give these cookie recipes a try:

Vegan Chewy Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies

Vegan Gluten-free Maple Almond Cookies

Vegan Peach Thumbprint Cookies

If you made my Vegan Banana Bread Cookies please leave me a comment below with a star rating; it really helps others who are interested in making the recipe. For more from The Simple Green, follow me on Instagram, Facebook or Pinterest. Consider becoming a subscriber to receive emails of new recipes and posts.