Vegan Black and White Cookies

If you can't get to New York City for Christmas, these cookies are the next best thing! Bring a little NYC magic into your kitchen/home. I don't know the story behind this classic New York snack, but it's definitely a staple. They taste like a thin vanilla cake.

It's a dream of mine to visit NYC during the holidays. It just looks so festive! Plus, there are so many vegan eats to be had.

For some reason these cookies didn't spread out as much as they should've, so they look a little different than the traditional cookie. It might be our oven. Our cookies seldom turn out how they're pictured on other blogs and in cookbooks.

Vegan Black and White Cookies

adapted from Vegan Cookies Invade your Cookie Jar

Ingredients

for the cookies:

1 cup unsweetened original almond milk

2 tsp fresh lemon juice

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 1/4 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract

1/2 lemon zest

1/4 tsp orange blossom water (the OG recipe calls for orange extract, which will be more flavourful)

2 1/2 cups AP flour

1/4 cup cornstarch

1 1/4 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp salt

for the icings:
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup boiling water + some tablespoons
1 to 2 tsp vanilla extract
2/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions
Prehat oven to 350 degrees F and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

In a medium bowl combine milk and lemon juice, let stand for 1 minute. Add oil, sugar, vanilla, lemon zest and orange extract.

Sift flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into a large bowl. Form a well in the centre and pour in the liquid. Stir until a thick batter forms and the lumps are dissolved.

With a 1/4 cup measure, for smaller cookies, or a 1/3 cup measure, for larger cookies, scoop the dough onto the baking sheets. Leave a space of 3 inches between the soon-to-be cookies.

Bake for 18 to 20 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted in the centre comes out clean.

Remove the cookies and allow to cool on the baking sheet for two minutes before placing on a cooling rack. Place the cookies on the domed side or upside down.

Now, you're supposed to use a metal bowl for the icing but I'm not sure why. If you don't have a metal bowl I think you could risk mixing the icing in a regular bowl *insert shrugging emoji*

Dump the icing sugar into a large metal bowl (or not) and pour the boiling water in. Mixx with a whisk until smooth. Add vanilla extract. Add some more water if it's too thick but you don't want this icing to be too runny.

Dust crumbs from the flat side of the cookies and ice with the vanilla icing. All over the flat side. Place some sprinkles on half the cookie. if you'd like. Do this right after you ice each cookie, so the icing doesn't harden. Once that's done, return them to the cooling rack.

Now let's make that choclate icing! Add to the remaining vanilla the chocolate that has been melted. I put it in a microwave-safe bowl and melted it at 30 sec bursts for a total of 1.5 mins, mixing about between each round in the microwave. The time will depend on the strength of your microwave. You can also melt the chocolate in a double-broiler.

Once you add the melted chocolate to the remaining vanilla icing it might be a bit thick, so add hot water a tablespoon at a time until the desired consistency is reached.

Spread the chocolate icing onto one half of each cookie and return to the cooling rack to harden.