RECIPE: Gluten-free hazelnut and coffee cookies

A gluten-free cookie recipe with no butter

This rather glorious late spring London weather has been a real treat of late; it's apparently been hotter than Spain this weekend. Which is good timing, as iced coffee connoisseurs Emmi CAFFÉ LATTE recently asked me to come up with a sunny recipe for a sweet treat that would pair well with a glass of their Strong Macchiato. It's part of their #MakeItAYayDay campaign to help turn ordinary days into YAY days.

gluten-free hazelnut
and espresso cookies

Getting into the spirit of things, I've had trifle for breakfast (I made really great lemon quark and blueberry trifle by the way, with lemon curd-soaked madeira cake sponge layers - yay all the way - recipe coming soon), and now there are these cookies. Think of this as an afternoon tea pick-me-up, with a good caffeine hit. 

If you can enjoy them whilst kicking back and soaking up some rays, all the better for it.

Key and coincidental points: these don't use butter and are gluten-free. That wasn't my intention when I first came up with this very simple recipe yonks ago, but an end result that makes it accessible to more people. And that's never a bad thing.

Gluten-free hazelnut and coffee cookies

Makes around 10 to 14 cookies

Wonderfully chewy and low in fat for a cookie. There's no butter!

265g roasted and skinned hazelnuts, chopped
150g golden caster sugar
½ tsp sea salt
1 tbsp of espresso powder
20ml strong espresso, cold
4 large egg whites
1 tsp vanilla extract
Zest of a large orange

gluten-free hazelnut and espresso cookies
l

Preheat the oven to 170C.  Line some baking trays with non-stick baking paper.

Put the sugar, salt, espresso powder and nuts in a food processor and blitz until fine.

In another bowl, whisk the egg whites until stiff. Pour the cold coffee into the egg whites. Add the vanilla and orange zest.  

Fold the nut mixture gently into the egg white mix, keeping as much of the air in it as possible whilst still fully combining everything.  

Add spoonfuls of batter onto the cookies sheets.

Tip To try and make them look equal in size, I measure out the amount of batter for each cookie.  I use just under a ¼ cup measuring spoon for each, which makes generous cookies (they do spread out a bit during baking too).  If you want them smaller and want more of them, try 1 tbsp of batter for each.

Place in the middle of the oven and bake for 25 minutes or until golden on top.

Enjoy!

This is a sponsored post, in partnership with Emmi CAFFÉ LATTE as part of their #MakeItAYayDay campaign, offering inspiration and motivation to step away from the norm and do something a little spontaneous, quirky and fun every day. 

And they'd love for you to get involved. If you've done something a bit lovely and out of the ordinary recently, let them know by tagging them on Twitter and Instagram @UKCaffeLate, and using the #MakeItAYayDay hashtag.