This Healthier No-Bake Cookies recipe is a delicious take on the popular No-Bake Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies. Made with coconut oil, old-fashioned oats, cocoa powder, and more for a simple holiday cookie recipe.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe:
The no-bake cookie recipe has all the flavor and sweet taste, but these Healthier No-Bake Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies will leave you feeling guilt-free because of the healthier ingredients!
- Made quickly: These can be ready in about 15 minutes.
- Great for a crowd: This healthy dessert makes about 20-22 cookies!
- Naturally sweetened: All you need to sweeten this easy recipe is honey, no refined sugar.
“Found this recipe from getting the meal plans! It is a fave at our house and no one notices the differences with the healthy swaps 🙂.” — Chris
For another healthy cookies, give our healthy pumpkin cookies a try! They have the perfect balance of pumpkin and chocolate flavor, but not too sweet.
Key Ingredients:
Natural peanut butter and virgin coconut oil are used to create this sweet treat with no butter needed.
Oats are the filler for the no-bake recipe. We prefer to use quick cooking oats because they will set up better, and old-fashioned oats will have an extra chewy texture.
Cocoa powder will add to the perfect chocolate peanut butter flavor, so there is no change there from the more traditional no-bake recipe.
Honey is another change that makes this a healthy treat, but it will still please your sweet tooth.
See below for a detailed list of ingredients!
Equipment Needed:
How to Make Healthy No-Bake Cookies:
- In a large saucepan over medium-low heat, add coconut oil, creamy peanut butter, honey, and salt.
- Carefully, slowly stir as the ingredients melt and mix until they are completely combined, and bring to a rolling boil. Let the mixture boil for 45-60 seconds to make sure that the sugar in the honey is heated for long enough to make sure the cookies are able to set up properly.
- After letting the mixture boil, add in the cocoa powder and vanilla, mixing until everything is completely combined.
- When the cocoa powder is combined, remove the saucepan from the heat and stir in the oats until all of the oats are coated in chocolate and there are no dry oats left.
- For easy prepping, line a large cookie sheet with wax paper or parchment paper and drop the cookie mixture by the spoonful. Each cookie will be about 1 ½ Tablespoons of mixture, or feel free to shape the cookies now if you want more of a holiday-looking cookie.
- Place cookies in the fridge or freezer to allow these cookies to set up completely. They should look dry or mat when they are finished setting up and will lift off the parchment paper and baking sheet easily.
Tips and Recipe Notes
- Swap the peanut butter for almond butter, cashew butter, or sunflower seed butter to cater to other food allergies.
- Crunchy peanut butter can also be used in this recipe, but it will add a little crunch.
- Cacao powder can also be used in place of the cocoa powder.
- Add a little bit of coconut flakes for another chewy texture.
Storage and Reheating Instructions
Store the cookies in an airtight container for 7 – 10 days at room temperature or in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.
FAQ’s for No-Bake Cookies the Healthy Way
You could use quick oats instead of old-fashioned oats, but I prefer the texture that old-fashioned oats give these cookies. Either will work great.
Yes! Once everything cools down, the coconut oil will set up just like butter would have in the chocolate mixture.
To ensure they are gluten-free, be sure to use certified gluten-free oats to make these cookies gluten-free.
At room temperature, they will need about 1-2 hours to cool. You can always pop them in the fridge for 30 – 60 minutes or the freezer for 20 – 30 minutes to speed up the process.
More No Bake Cookies to Make:
Skinny Chunky Monkey Cookies Recipe and Chocolate Mint No Bake Cookies are super simple to make up!
No Bake Cookie Butter Cookies and No Bake Peanut Butter Kiss Cookies are a fun take on more traditional cookies we all love.
Healthier No Bake Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe
Ingredients
- ¼ cup coconut oil, not melted
- ½ cup natural creamy peanut butter
- ¼ cup honey
- dash of salt
- 2 Tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 ½ cups old fashioned oats
Instructions
- In a large saucepan over medium-low heat, add coconut oil, peanut butter, honey, and salt. Slowly stir as the ingredients melt and mix until they are completely combined and bring to a boil.
- Add in the cocoa powder and vanilla; mix until completely combined.
- Remove the saucepan from heat and stir in the oats until all of the oats are coated in chocolate.
- Line a large cookie sheet with wax paper and drop the cookie mixture on by the spoonful (each cookie was about 1 ½ Tablespoons of mixture).
- Place cookie sheet in the fridge or freezer to allow these cookies to set up completely, then enjoy.
Notes
Nutrition
Did You Make This Recipe?We’d love to hear your thoughts! Leave a review or a question in the comment section below the post.
Looking for a peanut butter balls recipe
Does anyone know if Maple syrup would work instead of honey? I’m not a fan of the flavor of honey in baking recipes
It probably would, but I would say probably use less than the 1/4 that it calls for since it’s so thin.
Like this one?
https://www.sixsistersstuff.com/recipe/easy-chocolate-peanut-butter-balls/
So do you actually boil the mixture? If so, how long?
You just bring it to a boil then remove from heat.
We really liked these no bake cookies. Ours were runny so I put them in a muffin tin. I’ll make sure to let it boil next time!
Found this recipe from getting the meal plans! It is a fave at our house and no one notices the differences with the healthy swaps 🙂
How many calories per cookie?
Does this have a coconuty taste to it? Not much of a fan of coconut
You can substitute the coconut oil with butter.
Could you use peanut butter powder in place of the peanut butter?
That should work great if you rehydrate to make the same amount as the peanut butter called for
These are Really Good!
I’ve made these several times and husband wanted to try them with shredded coconut. So I added 1/2 cp unsweetened coconut instead of the 1/2 cp of oatmeal, they’re really good!
All the classic flavor with less guilt! These no-bake cookies are a fantastic treat.