Chocolate Chip Coconut Cheesecake Protein Cookies

A few hundred recipes in, and I’ve finally made a proper protein cookie. These chocolate chip cheesecake cookies, on the other hand, are bonafide cookies. They’re soft without being too chewy and perfectly crumbly without falling apart. I can’t stress their level of deliciousness enough.

As far as protein cookie macros go, I’m rather pleased with how these turned out. As I was adding things like coconut oil and higher calorie ingredients, I worried they might turn out a little too high calorie. Each cookie ended up with 73 calories, 5.3 grams of protein, 7.3 grams of carbs, and 3.5 grams of fat.

I don’t want to name names, but a Benny and Harry’s Protein Cookie has 420 calories, 16 grams of protein, 66 grams of carbs, and 16 grams of fat. Granted, they’re a bit larger. So let’s say you ate three of my protein cookies to equal things out. That’s 219 calories, 15.9 grams of protein, 21.9 grams of carbs, and 10.5 grams of fat. Whew! That’s enough math for one day. Luckily, these protein donut holes are much easier to make than solving equations.

Chocolate Chip Cheesecake Protein Cookie Ingredients

This recipe has a bit more extensive ingredient list than most, but I don’t want you to think that means it’s difficult. If you have everything on hand, you can have these protein cookies prepped and in the oven in under 10 minutes. Below I’ll include a few notes on common ingredient questions or potential modifications.

Coconut Flour

Considering this is a coconut cheesecake protein cookie, I’d urge you to go with coconut flour. But if you have everything but and just want to give them a try, you could use another flour. If you’re using something like all purpose flour, you’ll want to use at least a 2:1 exchange ratio since coconut flour is so absorbent. That means you may need 1/2 cup of all purpose flour.

If you go this route and have a dough that’s too thick, you can add more fat or even a bit of liquid like a lower calorie milk or water at the end of mixing.

Protein Powder

You can use any protein powder you’d like. I always use a whey concentrate or blend in my baked recipes, and the macros in my recipes are always with Optimum Nutrition Gold Standard or Dymatize 100% Whey.

I’ve found that whey isolates or other super lean protein powders (very little fat or carbs in their nutrient profile) can make recipes tough or dry. You can fix this by adding a bit more fat to the recipe. In this recipe, for example, that might look like an extra teaspoon or two of coconut oil.

Pudding Mix

This ingredient is readily found these days in most grocery stores. If you can’t find cheesecake specifically, the vanilla or white chocolate would work just fine. And if you’d like to go with something else, you could use corn starch, arrowroot powder, xanthan gum, or another thickener.

Swerve

I feel like I’m constantly talking about Swerve these days so if you’ve heard my spiel before, carry on. I’ve always used stevia and even turned stevia into a high protein powdered sugar in my crunch berries protein donuts recipe. But recently, I’ve been using Swerve in both granular and powdered forms. This protein cookie recipe calls for Swerve confectioners in the dough itself.

If you don’t have any on hand, you could try the protein powdered sugar I mentioned above or you could add a bit more pudding mix or other thickeners mixed with another low calorie sweetener.

Cream Cheese

It can be difficult to find fat-free cream cheese. Since this protein cookie recipe only calls for 2 ounces, it’s not a big deal if you roll with 1/3 fat instead. Actually, I just did the math and realized there’s a 10-calorie difference. I apologize for wasting your time with this ingredient note.

More Protein Cookies You Might Like

With similar macros, my Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Protein Cookies are a great alternative for chocolate peanut butter lovers.

And if you’d like something a bit different, my Stuffed S’mores Cookie Balls have marshmallow and melted chocolate stuffed inside a graham cracker protein cookie.