Vegan Cookie$

While perusing the blogs, I came across a recipe for vegan chocolate chip cookies from Babycakes, by Erin McKenna (Clarkson Potter, 2009). I'm kinda fascinated by baking without eggs or dairy (because I can't imagine it's anywhere near the same) so I examined the recipe closely. It seemed a little spendy to me, so I looked around online to price the necessary items. I found what I could using Peapod.com; the asterisk'd items were found on Amazon.com. The vegan chocolate chips were priced at vegangoods.com.

I excluded pricing the baking soda and salt because those ingredients are also found in a non-vegan chocolate chip cookie recipe. Granted, vanilla is too, but the standard Nestlé Toll House recipe only calls for 1 teaspoon of the stuff. The vegan recipe requires 6x as much.

16 oz jar $7.95 23 oz jar $2.29 - 2 oz bottle $7.99 per lb $2.19 22 oz bag $3.34 16 oz bag $4.01 - 8 oz $10.82 10 oz bag $5.89

1 cup coconut oil* 6 tablespoons unsweetened applesauce 1 teaspoon kosher salt 2 tablespoons pure vanilla extract 1 1/4 cups evaporated cane juice* 2 cups Bob's Red Mill gluten-free all-purpose baking flour* 1/4 cup flax meal* 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 1/2 teaspoons xanthan gum* 1 cup vegan chocolate chips

Total = $44.48

For comparison purposes, here are the ingredients for non-vegan cookies: Toll house morsels $2.99 12 oz bag; 2 sticks butter $3.49 lb; brown sugar $1.09 1lb box; granulated sugar $1.49 1lb box; 2 eggs $2.89 dozen; 1 cup nuts $4.19 8oz walnuts; 2 1/2 cup flour $2.29 5lb bag (all items found at Peapod.com)

Total = $18.43

Vegan cookies are just not recession-friendly, unless one modifies the recipe to contain regular flour, regular oil, and regular sugar, and that's only a savings of a few dollars.

Any vegans out there making cookies for cheap? I want to know.