These soft and chewy apple cinnamon oatmeal cookies are exploding with sweet apple flavor. Filled with cinnamon and apple spices, loaded with applesauce and apple chunks, and topped with a creamy maple frosting, they’re absolutely perfect for the fall season.
In the fall months, apple desserts are often overshadowed by pumpkin pie and all things pumpkin spice. While these soft pumpkin cookies always hit the spot, today’s apple cinnamon oatmeal cookies have climbed to the top of my fall cookie list.
Speaking of favorite desserts, have you tried salted caramel apple pie yet? It’s my #1.
Tell Me About these Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal Cookies
- Texture: These apple cinnamon oatmeal cookies are soft and chewy with moist centers and crisp edges. They’re much softer and more airy than our oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and oatmeal raisin cookies. Each is loaded with apple chunks and topped with creamy frosting. So much texture in just 1 cookie!
- Flavor: You’ll enjoy many fall flavors in each bite including apple spice, cinnamon, and maple—same flavors you can find in these healthy apple muffins. If you’re looking for a maple cookie to try, these maple brown sugar cookies are a popular choice.
- Time: The apple oatmeal cookie dough comes together quickly. Some cookie doughs require chilling in the refrigerator and others don’t. This recipe doesn’t, but some readers have found chilling the dough helpful because it helps reduce over-spreading. (We don’t usually chill the dough, but see step 1 below.)
Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal Cookies: What Works & What Doesn’t
Here are a few helpful tips my team & I learned while testing this recipe.
Choosing the Right Ingredients
Here are some of the key ingredients in apple cinnamon oatmeal cookies.
- More oats than flour = chewier cookie. You need 2 cups of whole oats and 1 cup of flour to achieve the perfect chew.
- Sugars. You’ll need both granulated sugar and brown sugar in this recipe. We prefer dark brown sugar this time of year, though light brown sugar works just as well.
- Applesauce. While applesauce can make cookies taste a little rubbery, the melted butter keeps their chewy texture in check. We recommend using a thick unsweetened applesauce to prevent overspreading. Avoid thin and soupy applesauce. And if you have any leftover, try a batch of these applesauce muffins.
- Walnuts. We love adding walnuts to these apple cookies, but you can leave them out if desired. The nuts are completely optional.
- Apple chunks. Make sure you cut the apple into very tiny chunks—not slices like I recommend for apple pie. I use only 1/2 cup for the cookies—you don’t want to use much more than that because the dough will be too moist.
- Spices. I recommend using apple pie spice and cinnamon. If you don’t have access to store-bought apple pie spice, use a little extra cinnamon or you can make your own with cinnamon, cardamom, and nutmeg. If you have and love apple pie spice, you’ll enjoy it in these baked apple cider donuts too!
A drizzle of maple icing is the perfect finishing touch to these cookies. But if you have a little more time, salted caramel frosting would be equally as delicious!
Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal Cookies Recipe
Description
These soft and chewy apple cinnamon oatmeal cookies are exploding with sweet apple flavor. Filled with cinnamon and apple spices, loaded with applesauce and apple chunks, and topped with a creamy maple frosting, they’re absolutely perfect for the fall season.
Ingredients You’ll Need
Instructions
- Some readers have found that these cookies spread a little too much without chilling the cookie dough first. I haven’t run into that problem, but feel free to chill this cookie dough for 1-2 hours after step 4, before rolling and baking. Enjoy!
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. (Always recommended for cookies.) Set aside.
- Whisk the oats, flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and apple pie spice (if using) together in a large bowl.
- Whisk the butter, applesauce, brown sugar, and white sugar together until combined. Then whisk in the egg and vanilla. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and whisk until just combined. Fold in the apples and walnuts. The cookie dough will be thick and sticky.
- Using a medium cookie scoop, scoop cookie dough into balls (about 2 Tbsp of dough each) and place 3 inches apart on the cookie sheet. Slightly flatten the balls out as the cookies won’t spread much unless you help out first!
- Bake for 14-15 minutes or until lightly browned and set on the edges. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for 10 minutes on the cookie sheet before icing.
- Whisk all of the ingredients together and drizzle over cookies. You may have a little icing leftover. Drizzle more on each… because it’s just so good.
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