These Marbled Matcha Black Sesame Cookies are perfectly soft and chewy in the middle and crispy around the edges. The perfect balance of sweet, nutty and mellow savory flavours. (Vegan + Gluten Free)
Matcha Black Sesame Cookies
You’ve probably seen black sesame seeds lightly sprinkled over salads, rice, sushi rolls and other various Japanese dishes but have you tried it in desserts? It has a fragrant roasted rich nutty flavour with a mellow bitter-sweet undertone and is very commonly used ingredient in Japanese desserts.
One of my all time favourite parings is Matcha and Black Sesame! They pair so well together and compliment each others earthy-bitter and rich-nutty flavours.
So if you’re a) a matcha lover, or b) love chewy, soft, crispy sugar cookies– then you’re totally in the right place. These Japanese inspired sugar cookies are textural and flavour perfection.
How to Make Marbled Sugar Cookies
These cookies are made with wholesome ingredients, friends. No eggs, butter, dairy or refined sugars used in these vegan sugar cookies. And they also happen to be gluten free too! Check it out:
The Ingredients
- Cashew Butter: The base of these cookies giving it a slightly nutty profile and soft sugar-cookie like texture. Do not substitute with another nut butter as cashew butter is the most neutral and won’t over power the matcha and black sesame flavour.
- Aquafaba: Helps bind the cookies and make them chewy.
- Maple Syrup + Cane Sugar: Gives moisture, crisp and sweetness.
- Gluten Free Flour Blend: For these cookies, we’re using a blend of oat flour, sweet rice flour and almond flour. My secret hack for making extra chewy cookies is by adding a bit of sweet rice flour (think mochi!).
- Matcha
- Black Sesame Powder
- Vanilla
The Directions
Unlike all of my other cookie recipes, these do require a bit more work because we’ll be making three cookie doughs with different flavours but they are still very easy to make. No stand mixer or fancy equipment needed, just a couple bowls, whisk and cookie scoop needed.
- First we’re doing to make the base of each dough by mixing the cashew butter, maple syrup, aquafaba and vanilla. Then adding in the oat flour, sweet rice flour, cane sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
- Next, we divide the dough and portion out 1/3 into another bowl. Add in the black sesame powder, mix and chill.
- Back to the original bowl, portion out half the amount and sift in the matcha powder and mix until well combined. Then chill all 3 doughs for 30 minutes.
- Remove from the refrigerator and working quickly, scoop out 1 tbsp of dough from each bowl, roll them into balls and place on a parchment lined cookie tray. Work quickly because the dough is quite sticky. If you’re making these in a warm or humid enviroemnt, you can scoop the dough onto the cookie sheet and use a spoon to mold them into taller balls that way. Making taller balls will help with excessive spreading of the cookies.
- Bake the cookies for about 15 minutes, just until the edges are slightly golden brown. (NOTE: the cookies photographed here are purposely under-baked by 2 minutes because I wanted each of the colours to really shine).
- Bake the cookies for 15 minutes or until edges are golden brown. Then remove from the oven and let them sit on the cookie sheet for 5 minutes (they will continue to bake just a bit). And then lastly, transfer them to a wire rack to let them cool for another 10 minutes before digging in. They are very soft right out of the oven but will firm up once cooled.
These cookies aren’t just gorgeous, but they taste incredible. They remind me of Pillsbury sugar cookies– crispy on the outside, soft and chewy in the middle with a slightly mochi-like texture. When biting into all three flavours at once, you get this lovely combo of earthy matcha, nutty black sesame and the humble vanilla.
There probably won’t be leftovers but if there are, I do suggest storing them in the freezer so they retain their texture. When ready to eat, pop them into a toaster oven or oven at 350 F for about 5-8 minutes. I secretly think they’re even better after baking them again.
More Vegan + Gluten Free Cookies to Love!
- Tahini Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Breakfast Banana Oatmeal Cookies
- Vegan Brown ‘Butter’ Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Vegan Matcha Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Cashew Butter Blueberry Oatmeal Cookies
- Date Sweetened Peanut Butter Cookies
And if you’re looking for a classic vegan chocolate chip cookie, here’s my favourite recipe!
If you recreate this Marbled Matcha Black Sesame Cookies recipe let me know how you liked it by leaving a comment and rating below or by tagging me on Instagram @Okonomikitchen, I love seeing all of your tasty recreations!
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Marbled Matcha Black Sesame Cookies
- Total Time: 30 minutes
- Yield: 12 1x
Description
These Vegan Marbled Matcha Black Sesame Cookies taste are perfectly chewy in the middle and crispy around the edges. (Gluten Free + Dairy Free)
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup cashew butter (130g)
- 3 tbsp aquafaba (45g // or substitute with non-dairy milk)
- 1/4 cup maple syrup (80g)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract (5g)
- 3 tbsp raw cane sugar (36g)
- 1/3 cup almond flour (37g)
- 2.5 tbsp black sesame seed powder (18g)
- 1/3 cup fine oat flour 30g
- 2 tbsp sweet rice flour 20g
- 1 tsp matcha powder (5g)
- 1/2 tsp baking powder (2.5g)
- 1/2 tsp baking soda (2.5g)
- 1/2 tsp salt (2.5g)
Instructions
- Into a mixing bowl add in the cashew butter, aquafaba, maple syrup and vanilla and whisk to combine. Then add in the oat flour, sweet rice flour, cane sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt and stir until combined.
- Take 1/3 of the dough and add it to a separate bowl. Add the black sesame powder and stir until combined. Cover and place into the refrigerator to chill.
- Next, back to the large mixing bowl add in the almond flour and mix until combined. Take half the amount of dough and transfer to another bowl. Sift in the matcha and then stir until combined. Cover both bowls and place into the refrigerator. Chill the cookie dough for about 30 minutes.
- Pre heat the oven to 350 F (180 C). Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper (or use a silpat). Scoop out about 1 tbsp of dough from each bowl using a small cookie scoop and roll into a bowl. Do not over-roll but just enough to form a ball. If the dough is very sticky, scoop out the dough from each bowl onto a parchment lined cookie sheet and use a spoon to combine and shape the dough into rounds.
- Bake cookies for 15 minutes or until edges are golden brown. After 5 minutes, carefully remove the cookies from the tray onto a wire rack and allow them to cool for another 10 minutes. Enjoy!
Notes
- Helpful Equipment: spatula, mixing bowls, whisk, cookie baking sheet, small cookie scoop
- Nutritional Information Disclaimer: Nutrition information is a rough estimate calculated on an online tool (Cronometer).
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Category: dessert
- Method: baking
- Cuisine: vegan, gluten free, north american, japanese
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 cookie
- Calories: 273
- Sugar: 16.1
- Sodium: 151.9mg
- Fat: 15.4
- Saturated Fat: 2.6
- Unsaturated Fat: 11
- Trans Fat: 0
- Carbohydrates: 30.1
- Fiber: 2.3
- Protein: 6.6
- Cholesterol: 0
SAVE IT FOR LATER! ↓
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Super great recipe! Taste just now normal cookies ❤️
Has been craving for cookies like this after going vegan! First time trying your bake recipe and loving it!
I tried to follow this as closely as possible, weighing everything out by the gram, and found that the recipe calls for way too much matcha if you go by the grams (it went bitter and the texture was very different to the other flavour doughs. Kind of disappointing since I trusted the recipe and used up so much of my expensive matcha.) I suspect it would have been the correct measurements if I had just used a teaspoon instead of scales.
If you use a measuring tablespoon to measure out the dough for each cookie, you will end up with half the number of cookies the recipe said it would make, so instead of 1 tablespoon of each batter, you actually need half a tablespoon.
For this next note, it could be due to me making the cashew butter on my own using my vitamix and not blending it enough, leading to a stiffer cashew butter and a different cookie texture, so it may not be the recipe’s fault; when i put the balls of dough in the oven, they only spread slightly but were pretty much still balls, so I had to manually flatten them 10 minutes in. For the next batch, I flattened them beforehand, but when I cooked them thoroughly, the texture ended up really tough, like a rusk. My cookies looked nothing like the photos. So if you’re planning to make this recipe, I would recommend using store-bought cashew butter or just making sure your home-made cashew butter is blended really well. My cashew butter was already a smooth paste but perhaps that wasn’t enough. I also used normal caster sugar instead of raw cane sugar; not sure if that would have affected the texture too?
Also note that the metric measurements in the brackets don’t change when you use the button that multiplies the recipe amounts. I went to the store to grab something for this recipe only to realise I didn’t have enough when I got back because the metric measurements don’t increase with that functionality.
Can I sub honey for the maple syrup?
Also can the almond flour be subbed for normal flour?
Honey for maple should be okay, but it is much thicker so keep an eye on the dough consistency. However, I do not recommend subbing normal flour for almond flour as thats where it gets most of its buttery-ness from!
Can I omit sugar in the recipe, does that make any difference, thanks for your recipe!!!!
Please don’t omit it! The sugar is already very reduced and anything more will change the texture. Enjoy!
Thanks for your answer, I will try the recipe and give feedback later
These cookies are amazing! Such a great blend of flavors unlike anything I’ve had in combination before. Will be making these again for sure. Fun to make, healthy ingredients, and delicious!
OMG! These cookies did not disappoint!
Saved this recipe for a long time, finally got the time to make it. Totally worth the effort and will make it again!
I didn’t have all the ingredients but subbed with oat flour and tahini, and still tasted bomb!
My husband also really enjoyed it too.
I made these for my friends, and they absolutely loved them! I ended up sending them all the recipe too. We all really enjoyed the combination of flavors and thought the “plain” cashew butter dough complemented the matcha and black sesame ones really well. Mine didn’t turn out nearly as pretty since I didn’t grind my oat flour fine enough, but my friends liked the grainy texture too. I didn’t have almond flour, so I just used oat flour and sweet rice flour, and I didn’t have aquafaba either, so I used oat milk. It all worked but I think the dough was just a tad too sticky. Nevertheless, I’m definitely making this again!
Made these cookies and they were so yummy!!! The texture of this cookie is so chewy and nutty. It’s not too sweet and the combination of matcha and black sesame is so good. Mine didn’t turn out as pretty but it was definitely delicious.
I’m personally not vegan, but I actually prefer these over sugar cookies. Thank you for the recipe ^^
These cookies define so well my expectation of a cookie ahah Nothing to envy from non vegan or store bought cookies !
I did a black sesame – matcha version only so they come less pretty than yours ^^ but the texture is very pleasant and as a sesame lover (plus matcha lover) it was just so nice.
My mom just taste one and ask me to hide the jar XD because she loves how the sesame flavour comes directly in mouth.
I baked them 4 minutes more than needed so they are also a bit crispy out side (but I still like it). Will be more careful next time ^^
Thanks again for the recipe.