These festive gluten-free cherry pie cookies give you all the flavor of a cherry pie in bite-size cookie form. A tender melt-in-your-mouth sugar cookie topped with sweet cherry pie filling - these cookies are so easy to make!
Festive Cherry Pie Thumbprint Cookies
Got weekend BBQ plans this with no time to make a pie? These gluten-free cherry pie thumbprint cookies pack all the flavor of a cherry pie in easy-to-eat melt-in-your-mouth cookie form. AND they come together lickety-split.
Keep this recipe handy; these cookies can sub in for pie all year long - bring them to a summer 4th of July potluck or dress up your holiday cookie platter!
Gluten-Free Cherry Pie Sugar Cookie Dough
For a classic tender buttery cookie, this recipe uses a combination of superfine blanched almond flour and tapioca flour. The result is a gluten-free almond thumbprint cookie that's crisp on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside.
Super-fine Blanched Almond Flour: Finely ground almond flour gives a hint of nuttiness with the classic flavor of a freshly baked cookie. The sweet nuttiness of almond flour pairs beautifully with a buttery sugar cookie. Almond flour also adds moisture and fat to the cookies, which means you need more flour than a traditional cookie recipe to keep them from spreading, but this also allows them to stay thick and moist.
Tapioca Flour: If used alone, almond flour would create a snappy cookie, but paired with tapioca flour, it becomes soft and pillowy. Tapioca flour adds chewiness and fluffiness to the cookie crumb. It's what keeps the cookies from being too dense.
Tips for Gluten-Free Cherry Pie Thumbprint Cookies
Roll balls firmly
Measure out your cookie dough and firmly roll it into a ball in the palm of your hands. At this point, make sure there are no visible cracks.
Keep them from cracking by pressing them immediately after rolling
While it may seem efficient to roll all the cookie dough balls out first and then press the thumbprint into them, this will lead to more visible cracking. As the cookie dough balls sit, they develop a thin shell that will lead to cracking when pressed. Instead, work one at a time: roll out a cookie dough ball, dip it in sugar, and press the thumbprint into it. Repeat.
Keep in mind: cracking is just an appearance issue, the cookies will still bake up and taste the same, even with cracks. So try not to stress too much if your cookies crack a bit at this stage!
Use a measuring spoon for perfect "thumbprints"
Thumbs are not round (duh), so if you choose to use your actual thumb, your cookies will be less uniform. I recommend using a 1 teaspoon size measuring spoon to press the "thumbprints" in the cookies. This will make a deep well that's perfectly round.
Overfill the thumbprints
The cookies spread a bit and get fluffier when baked, so to make sure the cavity is still full after baking, overstuff the thumbprints with cherry pie filling. I recommend three cherries in each cookie, even if they're stacked on top of each other.
Cherry Pie Filling or Fresh Cherries
For these cookies, you can either use premade canned cherry pie filling or make your own cherry pie filling from fresh or frozen cherries. Both have their own merits.
The canned cherry pie filling cookies are beautiful and festive - they look bakery worthy with bright red cherries surrounded by a jammy filling. I recommend looking for a cherry pie filling that notates "more cherries" as you'll be using mostly the whole cherry part! Note that cherry pie filling is different than just canned cherries. It's been cooked and reduced to have a thick syrup. This will bake up jammy and will keep the filling from running all over your cookies. If you buy canned cherries (ie. not pie filling), you'll need to follow the steps to make your own cherry pie filling.
The homemade cherry cookies are less sweet, tasting more like classic cherries, but their appearance is much more rustic, with the filling baking up less jammy.
Recipe
Buttery Gluten-Free Cherry Pie Cookies
Ingredients
- 1¼ cups (140 g) Bob's Red Mill super-fine blanched almond flour
- 1 cup (112 g) Bob's Red Mill tapioca flour
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- ½ cup (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter, room temperature
- ¼ cup + 2 tablespoons (78 g) granulated sugar, plus ¼ cup more for rolling
- ¾ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- ¼ teaspoon almond extract
- 1 21- ounce can cherry pie filling
- 1½ lbs fresh or frozen cherries, pitted
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup water, 2 tablespoons reserved
- 1½ tablespoon cornstarch
- 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
INSTRUCTIONS
- If making homemade cherry pie filling, prepare that first. If using canned cherry pie filling, skip to Step 2. To make the homemade filling, combine the cherries, sugar, water, and lemon juice in a small saucepan (reserving 2 tablespoons of water). Bring to a boil and cook, stirring regularly, for 5-6 minutes, until the cherries begin to soften, but are still whole. Mix the remaining water with the corn starch to make a slurry. While mixing, pour the corn starch slurry into the cooking cherries and cook for another 2-3 minutes until the sauce has thickened. Transfer to a bowl and chill completely before using on the cookies.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Place ¼ cup sugar in a small bowl for rolling and set aside.
- Sift together almond flour, tapioca flour, and salt in a medium bowl. Set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment or a large mixing bowl with a hand mixer, cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, 3-5 minutes. Add the vanilla and almond extracts and mix to combine.
- Slowly add the dry ingredients into the butter and mix until well combined. Mix for 30 seconds longer to moisten the dough until very pliable.
- Working one at a time, roll 1-1½ tablespoons (~20g) of dough into a tight 1-inch circle, smoothing any cracks (the tighter you roll the dough, the less likely it is to crack). Gently flatten into a disc and toss the disc in the bowl of sugar to coat. Place 1-inch apart on the baking sheet and carefully and slowly use your thumb or the back of a 1 teaspoon measuring spoon to make a deep indent, smoothing any cracks if desired. Repeat with remaining dough.
- Fill each cavity with 2-3 cherries with a bit of its thick syrup. Overfill the cavities, stacking cherries if needed, to ensure they're filled to the brim even after baking.
- You can chill or freeze the cookies on the baking sheet or bake it immediately. Bake for 14-15 minutes (adding 1-2 minutes if baking from frozen), until the cookies are set and the bottoms are just barely golden brown. Let cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Notes
Cristen -
We made these to take over to a fellow gluten free friend's house for dinner. It was hard to keep my family from eating them before the event.
We opted to use backberry jam since we needed them to be dye free and didn't have time to make our own pie filling. Make deep wells with thicker walls to keep the jam in. I also added a little more jam after they came out. Deliciuous!!!!
Sarah Menanix -
I'm so sorry they turned out flat! I just made these for Christmas yesterday as well, but I haven't ever had them turn out like that.
Hm - I don't have any experience with high-altitude baking, but that seems likely! The internet says to increase flour slightly and perhaps oven temperature, as well as chilling the dough.
My other guess would be: Did you measure everything by weight? Did you use Bob's Red Mill brand of tapioca flour or a different brand? I've found other brands of tapioca flour to be less finely ground and don't behave the same in baking...
Jennifer M -
These are phenomenal!! My very first gluten free baking I've done. Not complicated. Didn't take long. And tasted amazing! Thank you so much!
Jackie -
Can you use Bobs Red Mill GF 1 to 1 all purpose baking flour, 2 1/4 c of GF all purpose flour instead of the almond and tapioca flour.
Sarah Menanix -
I would not recommend this as almond flour has a higher fat and moisture content, so you need a lot more almond flour than you would other gf flours.
While I haven't tested it so I really can't say how it would turn out, I would probably start by replacing both flours with 200g (about 1.75 cups + 1 tablespoon) Bob's 1-to-1 and then baking off a tester cookie.
Anne F -
Pretty dry and blah taste. Expected something better.
Sarah @ Snixy Kitchen -
I’m so sorry they turned out dry and blah for you! It sounds like they may have been over baked if they baked up dry and perhaps the brand of cherry pie filling you used was not as sweet and flavorful (or, for example, if you made homemade cherry pie filling, it will greatly depend on how flavorful the specific cherries you use are to begin with). To bump up the flavor, you can try slightly increasing the salt, vanilla, and sugar in the cookie dough and also adding a bit more sugar to the cherries.
Heather D. -
These are the best cookies I've ever tasted!! They are even better the next day when they've had a chance to soften. I'll definitely be making these again!! SO GOOD!!!!
Angela -
These cookies were the favorite at my family's cookie party. We had to bring a regular cookie, and a gluten free/vegan cookie. Even those who didn't like gluten free cookies declared these to be the best cookie at the party! Thank you so much for a wonderful cookie recipe!
Kelly -
New to Gluten Free and to Baking......What do you suppose would happen if I added an egg?
Heather D. -
It doesn't need an egg - they set up perfectly without it!
Michelle Ducharm -
They were a hit!
Courtney -
Awesome recipe!! These cookies were so easy to make, smelled incredible when they came out, and tasted absolutely delicious! I filled half with cherries and the other half with homemade guava jam. Phenomenal five star recipe, thank you! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Beverly -
Did not work well at all. Would not form a dough. Just too dry. I went down to 2 cups total flours, added 1/2 cup more butter, and it worked.
Sarah Menanix -
I'm so sorry you had trouble. Did you use a stand mixer? I wonder if it wasn't beat hard enough - at first, it will seem dry, but the oils from the almond flour will release, creating a dough. Did you use Bob's Red Mill brand flours as well?
Kim -
These sound delicious and make my mouth water! Can't wait to make them when I buy almond flour. How do you think they'd work placed in a muffin tin to created the mini-pie shape rather than trying to make the well deep enough shaping it with an indent?
Sarah Menanix -
ooo - that sounds brilliant! I think they'd work great. Let me know how they turn out please!
Jennifer M -
Great idea! Did it work? Might try this next time
Ice -
Just made this! And it disappeared in minutes! I've never used cherries this way before, but I love it. Great recipe!