Dried Fruit Cookies | The Picky Eater

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These healthy dried fruit cookies are packed with pecans and dried cherries. Whether it is the holiday season, or you just want a fruit-based dessert, these cookies are perfect! Whip them up with easy prep and only 10 minutes of cooking time. They have a chewy texture and are low in sugar too!

These cookies are a little reminiscent of fruitcake – in a good way! They are speckled with nuts and cherries and have a moist, decadent texture. For your friends and family who love fruitcake, you can call them fruitcake cookies. For the ones who don’t? Just skip the reference and call them dried fruit cookies! They’ll love them, I promise!

I like to bake these cookies all year long, but they shine as a great edible gift during the holidays, star dessert on the kitchen table, or as a potluck recipe to bring to a Christmas party.

To be honest, fruitcake was actually my inspiration for this cookie. A fruitcake is made with dried fruit and nuts – those are two things I can get behind! So, I decided to give this classic holiday recipe a makeover. 

Instead of a dense, aged cake that often incorporates artificial colors, I’ve taken all the good parts of the recipe for a cookie variation. You will keep the fruit and the nuts, for a light and healthy low-sugar dessert everyone will enjoy. Happy baking!

👩🏽‍🍳 Why You’ll Love Dried Fruit Cookies

• Low-Fat: These holiday fruitcake cookies are made with healthy ingredients and are relatively low in fat, using only ½ cup of butter for the entire batch of cookies.
• Low-Sugar: The amount of sugar in this dry fruit cookies recipe is reduced with only ½ cup for the entire recipe. Added sugars are also avoided because this recipe uses unsweetened dried cherries rather than the usual sweetened cherries. Most fruitcake cookies recipes use candied fruit, which means that they’re loaded with sugar. With this cookie, you’ll get the tartness from the cherries, which compliments the chewy cookie dough and the crunchy pecans.
• All Natural Ingredients: This easy fruit cookies recipe uses all-natural whole food ingredients — you won’t find any artificial colors or flavors here!
• Fiber: Instead of using traditional white baking flour, this recipe calls for whole wheat flour or oat flour, which adds fiber to these holiday fruit cookies. 
• Kid-Friendly: I’ve never met a kid who passes up a cookie, and these dried fruit cookies will be no exception. They’re chewy with a bit of crunch from the pecans and tartness from the cherries. Your kids will be asking for more than one, and with only 6 grams of added sugar per cookie, this is a treat you can feel good about serving!

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🥘 Ingredients

This easy fruity cookies recipe calls for simple ingredients that you can easily find at the grocery store! Just like with any tasty cookies, you will use the classics that are pantry staples in most households.

• Butter: Make sure to let the butter come to room temperature before you begin preparing the dough.
• Egg: Large eggs are standard for baking recipes, so be sure to use that size for this cookie.
• Brown Sugar: Brown sugar imparts a molasses-like flavor. Use either light or dark brown sugar — the latter will have a more intense flavor.
• Milk: Using full-fat milk helps to give these chewy cookies plenty of richness, but you can opt for a lower-fat version if you prefer.
• Whole Wheat Flour: This type of flour builds just the right structure for this delicious cookie. All purpose flour can be used too.
• Baking Soda: A leavening agent, baking soda helps the cookie rise and contributes to its texture. Baking powder could be used but the baking soda is best.
• Salt: Salt helps to bring out the best in all of the ingredients of this dried fruit cookies recipe.
• Pecans: A mix of chopped and whole nuts helps to give a varied texture in the cookie.
• Unsweetened Dried Cherries: These help to give the cookie a traditional fruitcake-like appearance and also impart classic cherry flavor.

🍲 Ingredient Substitutions

• Sugar: You can use another sugar alternative to the brown sugar, like cane sugar, monk fruit, or coconut sugar.
• Fruit Mixture: Any dried fruit will work in place of the cherries. Raisins, currants, dried cranberries would all be delicious. We also love to use a combination of other dried fruits like dried apricots or craisins for mixed dried fruit cookies!
• Nuts: Substitute macadamia nuts, walnuts, or your favorite variety in these delicious cookies.
• Green Cherries: To more closely replicate fruitcake, add candied green cherries.

🔪 How To Make Dried Fruit Cookies

Here’s how to make this easy dried fruit cookie recipe. For more detailed instructions and nutrition facts, see the recipe card below.

Combine Butter and Sugar: Place butter and brown sugar in a large bowl of an electric mixer with a paddle attachment or a food processor, and beat with an electric mixer for 2 minutes at medium speed. You want the mix to be light and fluffy.

Add Wet Ingredients: Add the egg and milk to the creamed mixture and beat to combine thoroughly.

Add Dry Ingredients: In a separate small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt.

Combine Wet and Dry Ingredients: Add half the flour mixture into the butter mixture and combine fully. Then, add the remaining half and beat until combined. Do not over-mix.

Add Nuts and Fruit: Stir in the pecans and mixed fruit.

Portion The Dough: Use a small cookie scoop to portion out the soft dough and then refrigerate for 1 hour.

Bake The Cookies: Preheat the oven to 400 F and remove cookie dough from the fridge. Make sure your cookies are spaced 2″ apart on parchment paper or silicone mat-lined cookie sheet pans. Place in the preheated oven and bake for 8-10 minutes or until golden brown. 

Cool: Allow the chewy fruit cookies to cool for one minute on the cookie sheet before moving to a cooling rack to come to room temperature.

💭 Expert Tips

• Mix Separately: Mix wet ingredients and dry ingredients in separate bowls before combining. 
• Be Mindful Of Bowl Size: Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, which means you’ll want to put the wet ingredients in a larger bowl.
• Use A Cookie Scoop: This handy kitchen tool helps you get perfectly uniform cookies. 
• Refrigerate Cookie Balls Before Baking: This process solidifies the fat in the cookies. This means that when the cookies are baking, it will take longer for the chilled fat to melt than room temperature fat which will help keep the Christmas fruit cookies from spreading too much when they bake.
• For Crispier Cookies: If you prefer crispy dried fruit Christmas cookies, bake for closer to 10-12 minutes.

📖 Variations

If you want to make an upgraded variation of fruitcake, stick close to this recipe for fruit cookies. But if you want to get creative in the kitchen, you can try these ideas!

• Dried Fruit Oatmeal Cookies: Use an oatmeal cookie base made with old-fashioned oats or quick oats. Then, fold in the nut and fruit add-ins for the perfect oatmeal dried fruit cookies!
• Add Maple Flavor: For something a little different, experiment with using maple syrup in place of some of the sugar.
• Extract: Add vanilla extract to add warm fragrance and balance out the flavors or almond extract to add more nutty flavor. 
• Chocolate Chips: There may be no better way to sweeten up a special cookie than with the magic of chocolate chips. Use milk chocolate, dark chocolate, or semisweet chips – or use white chocolate, which works well with the cherries.
• Top With Glaze: After the cookies have cooled on the wire rack, drizzle them with a powdered sugar glaze.
• More Add-Ins: Try using a trail mix with dried cherries in place of the nuts and cherries for an out-of-this-world take on this simple cookie.

🍽 Serving Suggestions

You can serve these dried fruit and nut cookies as a snack all on their own or pair them up with some delicious beverages or toppings. Here are a few ideas:

• Ice Cream: Dip these cookies into ice cream or use them to make an ice cream sandwich. 
• Milk: Dunk them into a tall glass of cold milk or a milk alternative like oat milk, almond milk, or soy milk. 
• Hot Beverages: These are delicious served with hot coffee, tea, or hot chocolate. I personally love them with this oat milk hot chocolate.
• Eggnog: Get in the holiday spirit and sip some eggnog with these festive Christmas cookies with dried fruit!

🙌 Dietary Adaptations

• Vegan Option: Use coconut oil or vegan butter in place of the butter, a flax egg in place of the egg, and your choice of dairy-free milk in place of the cow’s milk.
• Gluten-Free Option: For a gluten-free recipe, use gluten-free oat flour or an all-purpose gluten free flour mix.

🫙 Storage Directions

To Store At Room Temperature: Store the dried fruit and nut mix cookies in an airtight container for up to 3 days. 

To Freeze: If you’d like to make these cookies in advance, you can freeze the cookie dough. Here is how to keep them:

• Roll the cookie dough into a long log. 
• Wrap in plastic wrap and store in an airtight container.
• When you’re ready to bake the cookies, take the dough out of the freezer. Allow to thaw at room temperature. 
• Roll dough into balls and then refrigerate for 1 hour.
• Bake the sweet cookies as directed.

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