Cottage cheese cookies are a satisfying guilt-free treat that combines the creaminess of simple cottage cheese with the sweetness of a cookie. The texture is soft and chewy, with a golden brown light crust on the outside and a tender pillowy center on the inside. And let me tell you, no one can even tell that these are made with cottage cheese!
Similar to my Ricotta cheese cookies, these cookies taste very light and fluffy. However, this recipe is more healthy, and easy to make. The cookie dough comes together in a few minutes.
I’d say these cookies are something between puff pastry, soft cookies and baked cottage cheese cake. A healthy dessert and snack in one.
Just like with my cut out sugar cookies, I decorated these with in Easter theme with the same cookie cutters, see Equipment for more details.
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Why You'll Love These Cheese Cookies
- Healthy, low sugar, and kid-friendly. And let me tell you, these are perfect snacks for kids, this batch of cookies is made with just ¼ cup sugar and ¼ cup butter, and most of it is pure milk protein - cottage cheese. Healthy and guilt-free snack!
- Simple prep. With just 6 inexpensive ingredients, prep time, and 30 minutes of chill time you get the perfect soft cottage cheese cookie recipe.
- Nutritious. Baking with Cottage cheese is not only easy, but it also has some great health benefits. It is an excellent source of calcium, protein, and vitamins, and often contains healthy gut essentials - probiotics. Depending on which brand you choose, there are some low-sodium options as well.
- Customizable for any special occasion or holiday: Valentine's Day, Easter, Christmas, Thanksgiving and more!
💭 If you still wondering what you can make with cottage cheese except breakfast idea, then you gonna love this tasty alternative. Kids love to cut out Easter shapes from these healthy cookies! Serve for breakfast or a snack!
🛒Ingredients
- Cottage cheese or farmers cheese - I recommend Russian or Polish tvorog and contains about 6%-10% fat, this cheese can be found in Russian or Polish grocery markets. Anything less than 6% is not suitable as the cheese will be too liquid and the dough will not come together.
- Vanilla extract - for more fun flavors experiment with almond, rum, and coconut extracts.
- Flour - all-purpose flour, I don't recommend using any substitutions a this will alter the texture.
- Butter - I prefer using unsalted butter and adding salt to taste. Many brands add different amounts of salt according to their recipes which can change the flavor of the cookie very quickly.
For the full list of ingredients, please scroll down to where you'll find the recipe card.
🥣Instructions
In a large bowl combine cottage cheese and blend it until almost smooth with a few curds remaining.
Next in the same bowl cream butter, sugar, and vanilla together with the cottage cheese.
I combined everything with an hand blender over low-speed setting. The mixture should be not very smooth and a little chunky is fine.
In a separate bowl combine flour, baking powder, and salt. In batches, add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients bowl.
Stir everything together with a spatula until just combined. Don’t overmix as this may result in dry cookies.
Continue to knead the batter (using your hands) into a ball. The dough will be soft and tender.
Tightly cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Transfer the cookie dough onto a lightly floured surface (a silicon baking mat works best).
Using a rolling pin, roll the dough out flat to no less than to ¼ inch thickness. This will ensure that our cookies are fluffy and soft.
Decoration. Using cookie cutters, cut out the dough into desired shapes. I used the same easter cookie cutters that I mentioned in this sugar cookie recipe. Transfer each cookie onto a prepared baking sheet.
Re-roll the remaining dough and continue cutting until all is used. Repeat with the rest of the dough by rolling it again into a ball and then flat.
Bake the cookies for 20-22 minutes in a preheated oven to 350 Fahrenheit. The cookies are ready when the edges start to become golden.
Allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely before decorating.
Sprinkle the cookies with c confectioners sugar or a simple glaze (see notes).
✅ EXPERT TIP This recipe works best with 6%-10% cottage or farmers' cheese. Anything less than 6% is not suitable as the cheese will be too liquid and the dough will not come together. If you can find a Russian or Polish grocery store near you, I highly recommend purchasing Russian tvorog for this recipe.
📋Tips
- These cookies are best enjoyed on the day of making. The texture is very soft and fluffy. They will start to harden the next day but still, the delicious flavor will remain.
- For a more delicious vanilla flavor, I highly recommend adding vanilla sugar to the regular sugar or doubling up the vanilla extract (2 ½ teaspoons).
- The melted butter will set and harden once the dough has been refrigerated. The unrefrigerated dough will be sticky and hard to work with and for this reason, we need to refrigerate it for 30 minutes.
- Don’t use too much flour when dusting the surface, the dough needs to remain airy and fluffy. If there's too much flour the cookies may become too hard. For same reason don’t over-knead the dough and once a ball forms refrigerate it right away.
- The texture of these cookies is soft, moist, fluffy, and airy. After baking the cookies will be golden brown.
- Enjoy the cookies right after baking once cooled or within 2 days. After that, they will start to harden and lose their airy and soft texture. I don’t recommend freezing those either.
- For smoother cookies, I recommend blending the cottage cheese first to remove the larger curds and lumps. This is what I did for the recipe here. Or you can smoothen the cottage cheese in a fine mesh strainer with a spoon or simply use a food processor for this. It doesn’t have to be perfectly smooth, some curds are totally fine and will not affect the end result.
How To Add More Flavor
Try different icings or frosting ideas: simple sugar cookie icing, nutella glaze, orange or lemon glaze (similar to what I used in my Carrot Cookie recipe), or cream cheese frosting (similar to my Pumpkin Cookies) or berry jam.
Or try these mix-ins: chocolate chips, finely chopped nuts or dried fruit.
To make these cookies more fun: cut out different shapes and decorate with icing sugar or experiment with different flavor extracts such as coconut, rum, almond, or lemon extract.
Storage Instructions
- 🍱To Store. Let the baked cookies cool first before transferring into an airtight container. Store at room temperature for up to 2 days.
- 🥶Freezing. I don’t recommend freezing these cookies nor freezing the unbaked cookie dough as the texture will not be as fluffy and soft after storage.
✅ EXPERT TIP Different Cottage cheese brands vary, some are a little softer and easier to blend. For others, you may need to ‘’even it out’’ and break it apart a little longer. You can do that with a stand mixer, handheld mixer, strainer, or like I did, with an immersion blender.
🤷Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, if you are baking it. Once you open the package, drain the excess liquid that sits in the bottom of the cottage cheese.
No, these are two similar but still different things. Both are mild, white, grainy, and creamy cheeses. However, the texture of Ricotta is smoother, with smaller curds. Cottage cheese and farmer's cheese often have bigger curds, the texture is more grainy and dryer. You can't really use ricotta and cottage cheese interchangeably in recipes.
Cottage cheese is naturally lightly salty from sodium found in milk. However, brands often add extra salt during the last steps of making it. Actually, there are various flavors on the market: sweet and savory. For this recipe, I used 9% cottage cheese with a mild flavor, not salty.
⏲️ Recommended Equipment
- Food Processor or Immersion Blender (Hand Blender)
- Rolling Pin
- Measuring cups and spoons
- Airtight Food containers for storing
- Mixing Bowls
- Large Baking Sheets
- Cookie Cutters - For this, we like to use Easter cookie cutters. Wilton or Ann Clark sets, bunny shape cutters.
Easy Cookie Recipes
Take a look at our Baking archives to find even more tasty treats.
📖Recipe
Easy Cottage Cheese Cookies
Ingredients
- 7 oz cottage cheese, 6 %-9% milk fat 196g, softened
- ¼ cup unsalted butter softened
- ¼ cup white sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 pinch of salt
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- Confectioners' sugar for serving
Instructions
- In a large bowl combine cottage cheese and blend it until almost smooth with a few curds remaining. Next in the same bowl cream butter, sugar, and vanilla together with the cottage cheese. I combined everything with an immersion blender over low speed setting. The mixture should be not very smooth and a little chunky is fine.
- In a separate bowl combine flour, baking powder and salt. In batches, add the dry ingredients to wet ingredients bowl.
- Stir everything together with a spatula until just combined. Don’t overmix as this may result in dry cookies. Continue to knead the batter (using your hands) into a ball. The dough will be soft and tender.
- Tightly cover dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
- Transfer the cookie dough onto a lightly floured surface (silicon baking mat works best). Using rolling pin, roll dough out flat to no less than to ¼ inch thickness. This will ensure that our cookies are fluffy and soft.
- Decoration. Using a cookie cutter, cut out the dough into desired shapes. I used same easter cookie cutters that I mentioned in this suagr cookie recipe. Transfer each cookie onto prepared baking sheet.
- Re-roll the remaining dough and continue cutting until all is used. Repeat with the rest of the dough by rolling it again into ball and then flat.
- Bake the cookies for 20-22 minutes at preheated oven to 350 Fahrenheit. The cookies are ready when the edges start to become golden.
- Allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before decorating. Sprinkle the cookies with c sugonfectioners sugar or simple glaze (see notes).
Notes
- These cookies are best enjoyed on the day of making. The texture is very soft and fluffy. They will start to harden the next day but still, the delicious flavor will remain.
- Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 2 days.
- This recipe works best with 6%-10% cottage or farmers' cheese. Anything less than 6% is not suitable as the cheese will be too liquid and the dough will not come together. If you can find a Russian or Polish grocery store near you, I highly recommend purchasing Russian tvorog for this recipe.
- Don’t use too much flour when dusting the surface, the dough needs to remain airy and fluffy. If there will be too much flour the cookies may become too hard.
- These cookies are simple and as a finishing touch, powdered sugar is enough. However, if you want to take it to the next level and add more sweetness and flavor, try these: simple sugar icing, Nutella glaze, lemon glaze, cream cheese frosting or fruit jam for serving.
Delicious way to enjoy cottage cheese in a healthy low sugar cookie recipe!
what is the nutrition per cookie?
Thank you for pointing this out, the nutrition has been added.