Vegan Lebkuchen Cookies

Name: Vegan Lebkuchen Cookies
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 8 min
Total time: 28 min
Ingredients: 2 cups flour; ¾ cup brown sugar; 1 ½ tsp baking powder; 4 tsp gingerbread spices; 2 tsp cocoa powder; ¼ cup soy milk (+ extra for brushing); 2 tbsp maple syrup; 4 tsp vegetable oil; 1 cup icing sugar; 2 tbsp lemon juice; 7 oz dark chocolate

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We love these soft and spiced gingerbread cookies. These German inspired vegan Lebkuchen have a warming flavour and are easy to make!

A stack of star shaped lebkuchen, and a pile of round lebkuchen.

What is lebkuchen?

Lebkuchen is a type of German sweet baked treat that comes in many forms. It can be a type of cake or cookie and they are many traditional variations of lebkuchen.

Recipes vary widely, but one of the most characteristic features of lebkuchen is the taste of the spices known as Lebkuchengewürz.

This spice mix is typically made up of cinnamon, cloves, ginger, star anise and a few other spices. This spice mix is what gives lebkuchen and gingerbread their typical flavour.

If you are familiar with the German fairy tale of Hansel and Gretel, you can imagine the witch’s edible house made of lebkuchen.

Some types of traditional lebkuchen are quite dense and chewy. But our recipe makes wonderfully soft gingerbread cookies! We can’t get enough of them…

Christmas shaped cookies on a wire cooling rack.

What does lebkuchen mean in English?

The closest translation for lebkuchen, would be gingerbread, but it may be different from the kind of gingerbread you are familiar with.

If you tried to translate it directly, you would end up with life (leb) and cake (kuchen). But the origin of the word is uncertain, with the leb part of the word possibly deriving from the Latin, libum, meaning a type of flat cake, or from the Germanic word Laib, which means loaf.

Is lebkuchen vegan?

Because it typically uses honey as a sweetener, lebkuchen is not normally vegan. Recipes may also include eggs or butter. But as this vegan lebkuchen recipe proves, it’s simple to make them without the use of any animal products - and they’re so yummy too!

Ingredients for the vegan lebkuchen arranged in small bowls.

Ingredient tips

In spirit with traditional recipes, we’ve tried to keep the recipe simple and use easy to get ingredients. Here’s what you’ll need:

Flour - plain ( all-purpose)
Gingerbread spices - we make our own, it’s easy!
Cocoa powder - Just a bit of it deepens the colour and adds a richness to the taste.
Baking powder - To get that soft and cakey cookie texture.
Brown sugar - We like dark brown sugar for the richest colour and taste, but light brown will also work fine.
Maple syrup - in place of traditionally used honey. For even deeper, better flavour!
Oil - Choose a neutral tasting oil such as canola or sunflower oil.
Soy milk - A bit of liquid to bring it together.

Depending on how you would like to finish your lebkuchen you’ll also want:

Some vegan dark chocolate.
Or some vegan powdered sugar or icing sugar to mix with lemon juice.

Step by step

Here's a visual overview of how to make vegan lebkuchen - you'll find the full recipe in the card below.

A mixing bowl containing flour, cocoa, sugar, spices and baking powder.

Step 1 - In a mixing bowl, combine the dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, cocoa powder, brown sugar and gingerbread spices.

A whisk mixes the wet ingredients in a jug.

Step 2 - In a jug, combine the oil, soy milk and maple syrup.

Hands hold a ball of the lebkuchen dough.

Step 3 - Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix into dough.

The mix will be crumbly at first, but should come together with some work. If it’s still too dry to form into a dough, you can add some extra soy milk. But only add it a teaspoonful at a time as it can quickly become sticky if you add too much liquid.

A hand cuts out stars from the rolled out dough.

Step 4 - On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to ¼ inch (6mm). Use a cookie cutter to cut out shapes. The scrap dough can be rolled out again until all dough is used up.

Alternatively you can make 1 inch / 2.5cm balls and then flatten them with the palm of your hand.

Brushing the tops of the cookies with soy milk

Step 5 - Transfer to a lined baking tray and brush with soy milk.

The freshly baked cookies have a rich golden colour.

Step 6 - Bake at 180C / 350F for 8 minutes. They should have risen and look cooked, but still be soft. Leave to cool on a wire rack.

A bowl of lemon icing next to the baked lebkuchen.

Step 7 - For lemon-glazed lebkuchen, combine icing sugar and lemon juice into a smooth glaze and dip in the cookies, or brush on. Leave to set.

A fork dips a cookie into melted chocolate.

Step 8 - For chocolate coating, use a fork to dip the cookies in tempered melted chocolate (detailed instructions in the recipe card!). Let drip off and leave to set.

How to make filled lebkuchen

One of the ways we like to vary this recipe is to make filled lebkuchen - like the heart shaped you can buy.

You can use jam or marzipan, or like we do, a mixture of both as a filling.

Use the same recipe as below for the dough, but roll it out to half the thickness.
Cut out your shapes, then place a teaspoonful of filling onto the centre of half of your shapes.
Next, place one of the remaining pieces of cut out dough, on top of one of the pieces covered with jam.
Gently press down to merge the edges of the two dough layers. It can help to wet the edge of the bottom layer first.
Bake the filled lebkuchen in the same way as plain ones.
We think the filled gingerbreads are best when also covered in chocolate!

Star shaped lebkuchen, one plain, the remaing are covered in chocolate or lemon icing.

How to store lebkuchen

Our vegan lebkuchen cookies are meant to be soft. If left out, they will naturally harden over time.

Don’t store lebkuchen in the same container as other types of cookies, as the different moisture levels of cookies can lead to soft cookies becoming hard, and hard cookies becoming soft.

Keep lebkuchen in an airtight container, and add a small piece of bread to the container. The moisture in the bread will help to keep the lebkuchen soft. You can also use a slice of apple, but change it occasionally and don’t let it directly touch the cookies.

A bit taken out of a cookie reveals the cakey gingerbread inside.

Which of these variations is your favourite style of lebkuchen? The lemon glazed, the chocolate covered or the jam-filled? Let us know in the comments below!

Try these other vegan cookie recipes!

Vegan Linzer Cookies

Vegan 'Vanillekipferl' Crescent Cookies

Cinnamon Palmiers