These jacked and ripped gingerbread people cookies are thin and crispy and deliciously spiced, and make a wonderful sugar-free holiday treat!
Gluten-free and low-carb, these fun festive cookies are made with a perfectly balanced mix of lupin flour and coconut flour (without almond flour!)
They’re also egg-free, and you can substitute the butter for coconut oil if you like.
Are you planning on baking some low-carb cookies over the holidays? These fun gingerbread cookies are the perfect recipe for you!
These Christmas cookie recipe is super quick easy to make by hand, there’s no need to use an electric mixer!
Ingredient details
You’ll only need a few ingredients to make these delicious keto and gluten-free gingerbread man cookies!
Lupin flour & coconut flour: This mix of flours is gluten-free, low-carb, high protein and high fiber.
I think this combo is definitely better than almond flour, and just perfect if you are trying to avoid it or just sick of almond flour everywhere!
I have been testing the proportions out in a few recipes and a slightly larger amount of lupin than coconut as I used in this recipe works best.
The taste of either flour by itself can be a little overpowering. But they pair beautifully – coconut flour’s sweetness cancels out lupin flour’s bitterness.
The savory quality of lupin also helps bring down the coconut taste, and you can’t even tell it’s there. (I wanted gingerbread cookies, not coconut ginger cookies!)
Golden erythritol: If you don’t have golden or brown erythritol, you can use regular white erythritol and add a teaspoon of blackstrap molasses.
Make sure the sweetener you choose is erythritol, or a erythritol based blend (like monk fruit plus erythritol or stevia plus erythritol).
Sugar alcohols take longer to crisp up than sugar, but erythritol is ahead of others in the category. Allulose, xylitol or blends containing them won’t produce crispy cookies, no matter how long you wait.
Spices: Ground ginger, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg & a touch of vanilla to round it up!
You’ll notice I’m being very generous with spices. This is to make sure you can taste delicious and spicy gingerbread through the lupin and coconut flours!
The keto flours used in this recipe have stronger flavors than bland wheat flour or gluten-free flour mixes based in rice, tapioca and oats.
If you have a selection of spices that you and your family loves, feel free to swap them up. But add a little more than you would have to a “regular flour” recipe.
Xanthan gum: It’s used in gluten-free flour mixes and it’s ideal for keto baking. Xanthan gum helps the lupin flour and coconut flour stick together to form a dough pliable enough to be rolled out thin and cut into pretty cookies.
How to make
It’s so easy to make these keto cut-out gingerbread cookies from scratch! You can make the dough just mixing with a spoon.
You’ll be chilling the dough for at least one hour to make it easier to roll out, so don’t start preheating the oven just yet.
1. In a medium bowl, whisk the lupin flour, coconut flour, xanthan gum and baking soda. Make sure to get rid of all flour lumps.
2. In a larger bowl, melt the butter. Add the golden sweetener, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and vanilla. Mix until combined.
3. Add the flour mix to the melted butter, and mix with a spoon or spatula until the dough forms. This cookie dough looks crumbly but it sticks together when pressed.
4. Mix well until the dough is uniform without dry patches. If the mixture is too dry, add a little low-carb milk (1-2 tablespoons) until it comes together.
5. Separate the dough in two equal portions to work with one at a time. Form squares (or disks) and flatten it to 1-inch thickness.
Wrap each one up in cling film and refrigerate for at least one hour.
6. Start preheating the oven to 350 °F (177 °C). Roll out the dough on a silicon mat or parchment paper. The thinner you roll the dough out the crispier the gingerbread cookies will get. You can go as thin as 3/16 inch (4.8 mm) with this dough.
7. Cut the cookies with gingerbread people cutters, or your favorite cutter. Re-roll the dough scraps as you go to cut out more cookies. I got 30 cookies with a 3-inch cutter.
8. Lift them gently with the tips of your fingers and transfer to a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake the cookies for 350 °F (177 °C) for 13-14 minutes.
Cookies are ready when they start showing a little brown around the edges.
Gently slide them off onto a cookie cooling rack as soon as they are done. Wait until they cool down before serving.
Expert tips
Chill the dough
This will make the dough less sticky, firmer and easier to work with. Divide the dough in half and shape each to a square (or disk, whatever you prefer).
Divide the dough to chill in the fridge wrapped in plastic. This way the dough won’t dry out (you can leave it refrigerated for a couple of days with no issues).
The dough may crack towards the edges as you roll, specially in the beginning when it’s colder. This is normal, just use your fingers to glue the pieces of dough back together.
Sandwich the dough for rolling
Keeping the plastic on top of the dough when rolling it out is a great trick. With the dough sandwiched between plastic wrap on top and a silicon mat on the bottom, it won’t stick to the rolling pin or anywhere and it will be easier and less messy to work.
Double-bake for extra crispy cookies
These lupin flour cookies are about as crispy as a keto cookie can get. If you’d like them even crispier, almost like gingersnaps, you can try baking them twice.
First bake then just until they are lightly golden (about 10 minutes). Remove them from the oven, allow them to cool down to room temperature and them bake again for about 5 minutes more, until they are just brown around the edges.
Keto icing for decorating
These keto gingerbread cookies look best decorated! I made them into muscular gingerbread people, aren’t they the cutest? Here’s a simple sugar-free royal icing recipe that you can make if you’d like to decorate them:
- 1/2 cup of powdered sweetener
- 2 teaspoons of egg white protein powder
- 1 to 2 tablespoons of water
Mix the powdered sweetener with the egg white powder in a small bowl. Then add first tablespoon of water and mix, adding more as needed, until it becomes a paste.
If the icing is too thin, add a little bit more of sweetener. It it’s too thick, add a tiny bit more of water.
Then you can put inside a pastry bag with a thin round tip, or just transfer into a plastic ziplock bag and cut off a tiny corner to squeeze the icing from. You can even use plastic squeeze bottle.
Wait until the lupin gingerbread cookies are fully cooled down to room temperature before you start decorating them, or the icing will melt down!
Storage and freezing
The gingerbread lupin cookies can be kept in a closed container at room temperature for up to 1 week. They can be frozen for up to one month in an airtight container.
The unbaked disks of shaped dough can be frozen for up to 3 months wrapped and placed in a airtight container or freezer bag. Thaw them in the fridge overnight before using to bake cookies.
Gingerbread Cookies (Keto & Gluten-Free)
Ingredients
- ½ cup (60 g) lupin flour
- 6 tablespoons (48 g) coconut flour
- ½ teaspoon xanthan gum
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ cup (114 g) salted butter or coconut oil
- ½ cup (100 g) golden erythritol sweetener
- 1 ½ teaspoon ground ginger
- 1 ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- low-carb milk 1 to 2 tablespoons, as needed for dough to come together if dry
Sugar-free Icing (Optional)
- ½ cup powdered sweetener
- 2 teaspoons egg white powder
- 1 to 2 tablespoons water
Instructions
- In a medium bowl, whisk together 1/2 cup lupin flour, 6 tablespoons coconut flour, 1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum and 1/2 teaspoon baking soda. Make sure to get rid of all flour lumps.
- In a larger bowl, melt 1/2 cup salted butter. Add 1/2 cup golden erythritol sweetener, 1 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger, 1 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves and 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg. Mix to dissolve sweetener and spices into butter.
- Add the flour mix to the melted butter, and mix with a spoon or spatula until the dough forms. It should look crumbly but stick together when pressed. Mix well until the dough is uniform without dry patches. If it seems too dry, add a little low-carb milk (1-2 tablespoons) until it comes together.
- Separate the dough into two equal portions to work with one at a time. Form squares (or disks) and flatten it to 1-inch thickness. Wrap each one up in cling film and refrigerate for at least one hour.
- Preheat to 350 °F (177 °C). Get one pack of dough from the fridge and roll it out over a silicon mat or parchment paper. You can roll it out as as thin as 3/16 inch (4.8 mm) for crispier cookies.
- Cut the cookies with gingerbread people cutters, or your favorite cutter. Re-roll the dough scraps as you go to cut out more cookies.
- Lift them gently with the tips of your fingers and transfer to a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake the cookies for 350 °F (177 °C) for 13-14 minutes. Cookies are ready when they start showing a little brown around the edges. Transfer them to a cooling rack as soon as they are done. Wait until they cool down completely before serving or decorating.
Sugar-free Icing
- Mix 1/2 cup powdered sweetener with 2 teaspoons egg white powder in a small bowl. Then add 1 to 2 tablespoons water of water and mix, adding more only as needed, until desired piping consistency is achieved. Frost cookies after they are cooled, and let set before serving or storing.
Notes
Nutrition
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I’m glad to hear it Emma!
THank you for sharing a lupin flour cookie recipe that has NO ALMOND in it! These were great, I did a trial run and they are approved for Christmas 😀