These iced animal crackers are made with nourishing ingredients and taste delicious! They are gluten free and refined sugar free, but you would never know! They still have the same nostalgic crunch and sweet flavor, without artificial ingredients.
Iced Animal Cracker Ingredients & Accessories
Grass-fed butter – I always use grass-fed butter because it is more nutritious than regular butter. It is a good source of vitamin A , vitamin K2, and the antioxidant beta carotene. It also has a higher proportion of healthy, unsaturated fats and CLA than regular butter.
Gluten free flour – I used Bob’s Red Mill 1 to 1 Baking Flour. Just make sure that your gluten free flour includes xanthan gum.
Monk fruit sugar: Monk fruit sugar doesn’t affect your blood sugar levels and can improve your glycemic control. In this recipe I use monk fruit sugar, but you could also use coconut sugar to keep the recipe refined sugar free.
Vanilla: I always recommend pure vanilla extract
Honey: I use raw organic honey because it retains most of the beneficial nutrients and antioxidants that honey naturally contains. Regular honey is processed, which may remove beneficial nutrients like pollen and reduce its level of antioxidants.
Animal cookie cutters – This is the cutter I got off of Amazon. I liked the designs and it was simple to use!
Do they taste like the original?
Depending on which animal crackers you grew up on, they may taste differently. I think they resemble the Barnum animal crackers more than the Stauffer’s cookies. Regardless, they taste delicious and the crunch is just so good! Be careful, they are addicting!
FAQs
I don’t have these special cutters. Is there anything else I could do?
This dough is perfect for any cookie cutters! The baking time is based off of the size of the cutters I used, so you just might need to adjust the baking time.
Do I have to add the icing and sprinkles?
Nope! They’re delicious even without the icing and sprinkles. Here is a post for the original animal crackers.
Childhood remake recipes bring me so much joy!
I absolutely love recreating my childhood favorites with more nourishing ingredients. It’s so fun to make these recipes for my kids, and I feel like I’m a kid again!
Here are some other childhood remake recipes to try!
Iced Animal Crackers
Ingredients
For the cookies:
- 5 tbsp grass-fed butter softened
- 1/4 cup monkfruit sugar (or coconut sugar)
- 2 tbsp raw honey
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 cup gluten free 1:1 flour
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
For the icing:
- 1 cup monkfruit powdered sugar
- 3-4 tbsp almond milk
- 3/4 tsp beet root juice powder (or other natural dye)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 250F
- Using a mixer, beat the butter and sugar together. Then mix in the honey, yolk, and vanilla extract. Finally add the flour, baking soda, and cinnamon and mix.
- Roll out the dough onto a piece of parchment paper or silicone baking mat to 1/4 inch thickness. Rub flour on the rolling pin if it is sticking to the dough.
- Cut out animals using cookie cutters. Once the dough is completely covered with animal shapes, remove the excess dough with a butter knife.
- Bake for 18-20 minutes, or until the edges turn golden. While baking, roll out the leftover dough and repeat steps 2 and 3. Continue repeating until all of the dough is cut into shapes.
- Mix together the powdered sugar with 3 tbsp almond milk. Slowly add more almond milk until you get a slightly runny consistency. Mix in the natural dye to your desired hue.
- Once the cookies have cooled, dip the tops in icing. Before the icing hardens, add the sprinkles. Enjoy! These are best stored in an air-tight container on the counter).
