Healthy Homemade Animal Crackers
These simple and easy 8-ingredient Healthy Homemade Animal Crackers are the ultimate snack!
They’re so simple, yet so addicting. They’re not overly sweet, but you’ll keep coming back for more.
And more.
And more…
You’d never know these DIY Animal Crackers are whole grain, gluten free, sugar free, dairy free, and vegan! They sure don’t taste like it.
I don’t know what it is about Animal Crackers but I can never stop at just one. Anyone else out there get the same feeling? It’s probably because Animal Crackers are a little bit salty, a little bit sweet, a whole lotta delicious. Too bad the storebought versions are made with unhealthy, low-quality ingredients. This is the ingredient list of Barnum’s Animal Crackers (unhealthy ingredients are listed in bold):
Enriched Flour, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Sugar, Soybean Oil, Yellow Corn Flour, Partially Hydrogenated Cottonseed Oil, Calcium Carbonate, Baking Soda, Salt, Soy Lecithin, Artificial Flavor.
First of all, we’ve got “enriched flour,” which is basically flour that is stripped of its nutrients and then bleached. Then we’ve got both high-fructose corn syrup and sugar, which are highly refined, high calorie, high glycemic, and contain no nutritional value. Next we’ve got hydrogenated oil (aka trans fat). Don’t even get me started on the dangers of hydrogenated oil. Finally, we’ve got artificial flavor. Because a synthetic flavoring made by some scientist is so necessary (can you sense my sarcasm?).
Okay, rant over. Because now we’ve got these Healthy Homemade Animal Crackers so snack on! These cute little crackers are whole grain (no enriched flour here!), sugar free (no high-fructose corn syrup or white sugar whatsoever), and all natural (because no ingredients designed in a lab belong in our food).
I swapped the white flour + corn flour with oat flour + homemade corn flour (by grinding up organic corn flakes).
I swapped the high-fructose corn syrup + sugar with all-natural granulated erythritol + organic stevia extract.
I swapped the soybean oil + hydrogenated oil with coconut oil.
I swapped the artificial flavor with all natural, homemade vanilla extract.
Healthy Homemade Animal Crackers
Ingredients
- 120g (1 cup) Oat Flour
- 90g (½ cup) Ground Corn Flakes (I used Erewhon®)
- ½ cup Granulated Erythritol
- 1 tsp Double-Acting Baking Powder
- ¼ tsp Salt
- ¼ cup Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Milk (room temperature)
- 56g (¼ cup) Coconut Oil (melted)
- 2 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1 tsp Liquid Stevia Extract
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and line 2 cookie sheets with parchment paper.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the oat flour, ground corn flakes (should be ~3 cups of corn flakes before grinding), erythritol, baking powder, and salt.
- In a stand mixer bowl with beater attachment, add the coconut oil, almond milk, vanilla extract, and stevia extract. Mix on low speed until completely mixed.
- Dump the dry ingredients into the stand mixer and mix until completely mixed (it should be slightly crumbly, but if you grab a handful, it should easily compact into a ball).
- Roll ⅓ of the dough in between two silicone baking sheets until ~¼" thick. Use animal cookie cutters to punch shapes into the dough, then push them out of the cutters onto the prepared cookie sheets. Keep re-rolling the dough until all the dough is used up.
- Bake for ~11 minutes, or until the cookies are golden brown. Let cool on the pan. Serve and enjoy! Keeps for ~5 days.
Enjoy!
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With love and good eats,
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– Jess
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Indulge − no strings attached!
These look adorable! And so yummy too…. x
that was perfect
Hi
the animal cookie cutters you referenced send you to animal cookies on Amazon, not the actual cookie cutters.
Shoot! Sorry about that. I fixed the link 🙂
Can the coconut oil be subbed for anything else?
I haven’t tried subbing the coconut oil here but I think butter or Earth Balance could work! 🙂
What can you use in place of the corn flakes? I don’t use corn products.
I haven’t tried subbing the corn flakes here so I’m not sure. I guess you could try their brown rice crispy cereal?
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Will almond flour or coconut flour work as a substitute? Thanks Sandy
If I wanted to make these chocolate animal crackers, what changes would I need to make to the recipe. Also where do I find the Granulated Erythritol?
Thanks so much
Sandy
Bless you for your site & hard work…
I would try subbing ¼ cup of the oat flour with ⅓ cup dark cocoa powder. I linked to where I buy erythritol right in the recipe box 🙂
I wouldn’t recommend almond flour or coconut flour here because they don’t bind as well as oat flour.
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I know this recipe is quite old but I’ve only just stumbled on your blog (amazing by the way!). I keep bumping into the same problem though – the only sweeteners I’d like to use in my baking are erythritol and xylitol. Is there any way I could substitute the liquid stevia for one of these (or a combo) two sweeteners?
I see in your other recipes, agave is mentioned a fair bit too. Think I could substitute for that as well or would it depend on the recipe?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Aw thank you! As for subbing the stevia and agave, it really depends on the recipe. Can you comment on the particular recipes you were wanting to make?
Do you know if this freeze well? Either just the dough or after being baked? This is the first recipe I have found that meets all my son’s dietary restrictions and he loves animal crackers. Thank you!