Gluten-Free Oatmeal Toffee Cookies

Simple Ingredients To Get Started

If you’ve made our Gluten-Free Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies or Oatmeal Raisin Cookies, you’ll notice the ingredients list might look familiar! These delicious toffee cookies are a riff on those recipes, and the flavor is fabulous. Let’s take a look at the ingredients list:

• Gluten-Free Rolled Oats. You’re looking for certified gluten-free rolled oats (sometimes labeled old-fashioned oats). We don’t recommend quick oats or steel-cut oats for this recipe.
• Gluten-Free Flour. Our go-to gluten-free flour blend for all our gluten-free cookie recipes is King Arthur Measure-For-Measure Gluten-Free Flour. If you use another 1:1 flour blend (like Bob’s Red Mill), make sure it contains xanthan gum, and measure carefully!
• Baking Powder & Baking Soda. For the perfect puff and spread.
• Salt. To balance the flavors. It’s a must!
• Softened Butter. In order to cream properly, the butter should be soften enough for your fingertip to make an imprint, but shouldn’t look greasy or shiny (a sign it’s too soft).
• Brown Sugar & Sugar. A mix of light brown sugar and granulated sugar (white sugar) gives you the best of both flavor and texture.
• Eggs. Room temperature eggs blend in best! (Cold eggs can cause your creamed butter/sugar to separate.)
• Vanilla Extract. Always.
• Toffee Bits. You’ll need 1 full (8-ounce) bag of toffee bits. I like Heath Bits ‘O’ Brickle English Toffee Bits, since they’re gluten-free. If you really want to go over the top, you can absolutely make homemade toffee bits!

How To Make Oatmeal Toffee Cookies, Step By Step

As always, you can find the printable full recipe with ingredient amounts, detailed instructions, and tips in the recipe card below!

1. Break Up The Oats. Place the oats in the bowl of a food processor (or the jar of a blender) and pulse a few times to break up the oats. Ideally, you want some whole, and some broken up. This just gives the cookie a great texture. Try not to pulverize the oats into flour as this will drastically change the cookie’s texture.
2. Combine Dry Ingredients. In a medium bowl, combine gluten-free oats, gluten-free flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Whisk to combine, then set aside.
3. Cream Butter & Sugar. In the bowl of a stand mixer (or a large bowl), combine softened butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar. Cream together with the paddle attachment 2-3 minutes until smooth, fluffy, and lighter in texture. Scrape down the edges of the bowl.
4. Add Eggs & Vanilla. Next, add the eggs one at a time, followed by the vanilla extract. Mix to combine well, then scrape down the sides of the bowl again.
5. Mix In Dry Ingredients. Add the oatmeal flour mixture to the mixer and blend until just a few floury patches remain.
6. Add Toffee Bits (Save Some For The Tops!). Set aside 2-3 Tablespoons of toffee bits for the tops of the cookies, then add the rest of the toffee bits to the cookie dough and mix to evenly distribute. 
7. Chill Dough 2 Hours. Cover the dough and refrigerate 2 hours. Do NOT skip this step, or your cookies will spread significantly more.
8. Preheat & Prep. When you’re about 30 minutes away from baking, heat oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper so you can alternate baking sheets with each batch.
9. Scoop & Roll Cookie Dough. Use a large cookie scoop to scoop 3-Tablespoon balls of cookie dough. Roll the dough smooth between your hands and place 6 cookie dough balls on one of the prepared cookie sheets.
10. Bake, Finish & Cool Cookies. Bake 6 cookies at a time in the preheated oven for 12-14 minutes, or until the cookies are slightly golden brown around the edges and the centers look *just* underdone. (They’ll set more as they cool). Remove from the oven and gently shape with a round cookie cutter into perfect circles, if desired. Garnish with a few more toffee bits and a little flaky sea salt, if desired. Let the cookies cool 1-2 minutes on the baking sheet before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
11. Repeat this process with remaining cookie dough until all cookies are baked, alternating baking sheets with each batch so you don’t put cold dough on a hot cookie sheet.
12. Serve & Store. Enjoy once the cookies have cooled. Store in an airtight container at room temperature 2-3 days, or freeze in a freezer bag up to 2 months. 

FAQ + Tricks For The Best Toffee Oatmeal Cookies

Measure Carefully. Metric measurements will make a BIG difference in getting the right measurements, and they’re always my first choice for perfect bakes. BUT, if you don’t have a kitchen scale, use the scoop and level method to measure the oats and flour. Spoon flour into the measuring cup, then level it with the back of a knife. (Rather than using the measuring cup to scoop flour–which packs in extra flour)

Don’t Skip The Chilling Step! Chilling the dough allows the oats to soften, the flour to hydrate, and the dough to firm up a bit so it doesn’t spread as much in the oven. If you skip this step, your cookies will spread significantly more in the oven and will bake unevenly.

Can I Add Chocolate? Absolutely. You can add 1 cup of chocolate chips to the cookie dough along with the toffee bits to turn them into toffee oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. It’s a delicious variation!