Get wild and crazy with all the yummy ingredients in these Gluten Free M&M Monster Cookies!
Do you know that in my entire baking life I have never ever made a monster cookie??? I mean, I’ve eaten my fair share of monster cookies, but I have NEVER actually baked one myself. Why?!
That is a question left forever unanswered because, um, first of all, they are delicious. Second of all, they follow absolutely no rules, and I love not following rules in the kitchen. That’s what makes baking so darn fun. I follow the rules everywhere else I go (well except for my recent $300 ticket for talking on my phone while driving…I didn’t know!) that sometimes it’s just fun to be a rebel. A rebel without a cause!
Actually, no. If you’re going to go through all the effort of breaking the rules, you should at least have a cause to make it all worth it.
Well, these Gluten Free M&M Monster Cookies were well worth the cause! And the cause was: make something freaking delicious that you want to shove your face in.
Let me make a slight confession here before I continue with this stupidly glorious recipe:
I don’t really even know what makes a monster cookie a monster cookie. Is there some kind of special formula that classifies one cookie as a monster and another as a…well…plain old cookie? I don’t know, but I’m just going to pretend that my cookies are colossal enough to join the realm of monstrous cookies.
From the monster cookies I’ve eaten, I gather they generally include M&Ms, oats, chocolate chips, and peanut butter. Anything beyond those ingredients are pretty much up to you. And since I’m in charge, I added raisins to that mix-in list.
I learned a long time ago that a raisin paired with an M&M is the perfect balance of sweetness with a chewy, smooth texture. I don’t even like raisins, but for some reason an M&M transforms them into a snack that just needs to be eaten. Okay, so maybe it actually transforms them into a treat and that’s why I like them. Probably the reason I like chocolate covered raisins, too. Or probably I just like chocolate. Yeah, that’s it.
I started these cookies off using a base recipe for some stellar blonde brownies I recently made. The trick to making the brownies caramely and extra chewy was nuking the butter with the sugar until it comes to a rolling boil. That gives your sugar a head start in caramelizing and results in a chewier cookie or brownie, which is exactly what I wanted for these monster cookies.
After I had my butter/sugar base, I added the rest of the basic cookie ingredients and threw in a few handfuls of oats before letting the dough chill in the fridge. Once the dough was no longer warm, I mixed in the chocolate chips and M&Ms. It’s essential that you don’t skip the chilling step, otherwise your warm dough will melt the candies and chocolate. But once the dough is back up to room temperature, you can bake these cookies right away; no extra chilling needed.
It also helped to bake these cookies with chunky peanut butter instead of creamy. That way you don’t have to add the extra ingredient of chopped peanuts to your cookies for added texture. It’s already there. Plus, who likes creamy peanut butter anyway??? It’s crunchy or get out of my face around this house. That’s right, move along creamy.
Emry helped me make these cookies, and her eyes were the size of silver dollars when I started adding milk chocolate chips followed by dark chocolate chips followed by a few scoops of M&Ms all to the same cookie batter. She must have asked about 10 times when the cookies were going to be done once I placed them in the oven. I don’t think she’s ever eaten a cookie loaded with so many goodies before.
But hey, there are oats in there. Does that balance it out??? Nah, but whatever.
And then there’s Braelyn. She came home from school and about died and went to heaven when she saw cooling racks on the counter stacked with these ginormous cookies. It was all I could do to get her to wash her hands before she grabbed one and shoved it in her mouth.
But for reals, the amount of germs that must be on her hands after a full day of school makes me want to hide in a corner with a hazmat suit and cry. Disinfect yo’self child!
Once those hands were cleared for grabbing, these cookies definitely earned the Braelyn stamp of approval. She picked one of these cookies for 3 days straight to be her treat of choice after dinner. Smart child right there.
These cookies really are the cookie of all cookies. They have that perfect slight crisp on the outside with a soft chewy center. They’re full of texture from crunchy peanuts, to chewy raisins, to crisp M&Ms, to smooth chocolate chips. Basically they’re so good that I just ate one straight out of the freezer…like right now…it’s 10:00 pm here…oh well, it was worth it…totally worth it!
So if you are a “monster cookie” fan, whatever that may be, you are sure to be a fan of these. These cookies have it all and more! Literally.
How would you describe a monster cookie?
- 1 stick salted butter
- 1½ cups organic cane sugar
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½ cup crunchy peanut butter
- 2 large eggs
- ¾ cup brown rice flour
- ¾ cup sweet sorghum flour
- ½ cup potato starch
- ⅓ cup tapioca starch
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon xanthan gum
- 1½ cup gluten free old fashioned oats
- ½ cup raisins
- ½ cup M&Ms
- ⅓ cup milk chocolate chips
- ⅓ cup dark chocolate morsels
- In a large microwave safe mixing bowl, heat butter, cane sugar, and brown sugar together on high for 1 minute. Stir mixture and heat for another minute and 15 seconds until mixture reaches a rolling boil. Stir vigorously until smooth and set aside for 5 minutes.
- While mixture is cooling, in a smaller mixing bowl, sift together brown rice flour, sorghum flour, potato starch, tapioca starch, baking soda, salt, and xanthan gum. Set aside.
- Add vanilla to the butter/sugar mixture and mix until smooth. Add peanut butter and mix until well incorporated. Add eggs and mix until smooth. Add dry mixture to wet and mix until incorporated. Stir in oats and raisins until evenly distributed.
- Cover dough and chill in freezer for 10 mins or fridge for about 20 mins until dough cools and is no longer warm. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Once dough is cool knead in milk and dark chocolate chips and M&Ms by hand.
- Roll about 2 tablespoons of dough at a time into balls and place 2" apart on cookie sheet. Bake one cookie sheet at a time for 12-14 minutes until tops and edges of cookies are browning Remove from oven and allow cookies to cool completely on baking sheet. Continue baking with remaining dough.
- Store cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for 3 days or in freezer for up to 3 months.
