What’s better than dense and chocolatey brownies? Gluten Free Frosted Mint Brownies of course! These decadent mint brownies are gluten-free, vegan, nut-free and soy-free. Perfect for whenever a chocolate-mint craving strikes!
March is here and that means Spring is right around the corner, and so is St. Patrick’s Day! I’m using this month as an excuse to make some delicious chocolate mint desserts since I LOVE that flavor combination (it’s right up there with PB and chocolate for me). And since I discovered some really great natural food coloring, I decided to make these ones green instead of leaving the frosting white.
These brownies are based off of my One-Bowl Fudge Brownie recipe, but these have slightly less oil and sugar in them. They are still nice and dense inside, just not quite as fudgy, and they make the perfect base for these amazing grasshopper bars!
While I was making up the frosting for these brownies, I kept thinking about one of my friends who used to be a cake decorator. We went over to her house when we were kids and she taught us some cake decorating basics, how to make roses, her secret frosting recipe, and her best cake tips.
As a 10 year old kid in love with sugar, I couldn’t help sneaking bites of the frosting as we made everything. In fact, any time we made treats I was always dipping my finger in the batter or dough. Our friend very matter-of-factly shared with me that cake decorators must never sample their frosting, otherwise they would lose their lady-like figure.
I still sample my baking of course, but I laugh every time I make frosting since it reminds me of her. And what she said is somewhat true: if you make a lot of sweets like I do, I can’t constantly eat it while I’m making it or I’d end up eating way too much sugar.
Sometimes when I make treats I’ve had so many tastes of the dough or frosting that by the time everything is put together, I don’t feel like eating any more of it. I’m a frosting fiend, so keeping myself from eating all the frosting is tough!
Even though these are gluten-free, vegan, and nut-free, they are definitely an indulgent treat, still pretty high in sugars and fats. I recommend waiting to “take a taste” until you’ve had everything put together at the end (plus you’ll save all kinds of hidden calories). Trust me – you’ll enjoy it more at the end!
Originally, I cut these into 9 bars, but with the frosting these are very rich and sweet, so I suggest cutting these into 12 (you can even cut them into 16 bars if you want more portion control).
How to make gluten free mint brownies
This recipe is pretty easy! The frosting is a variation of our amazing dairy free buttercream, and the brownie base is so simple to make.
Here are the steps for making these brownies (don’t forget the printable recipe card is at the end of this post!):
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line an 8×8-inxh square baking pan with parchment paper. Set aside
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the sugar, rice milk, cocoa powder, ground flaxseed, oil, vanilla, salt, and peppermint oil. Mix well to combine
- Whisk the sorghum flour into the chocolate mixture until a thick batter forms
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 30 minutes
- Remove pan from the oven and allow to cool completely before adding frosting to the top
- While you’re waiting for the brownies to cool, prepare the frosting: combine the palm oil, powdered sugar, rice milk, and salt with a hand mixer until creamy
- Mix in the peppermint oil and the natural food coloring powder and mix again, scraping down the sides periodically, until fully incorporated and creamy. Set aside – don’t frost the brownies until they have cooled completely!
- For the chocolate drizzle: Melt the chocolate chips with the coconut oil by microwaving for 30 seconds at a time in a small bowl, stirring after each heating session until the chocolate has melted completely and is smooth. Allow the chocolate to cool a bit so it’s not hot when you drizzle it on the frosted brownies
- Once the brownies have cooled, remove the entire sheet of brownies by lifting the parchment paper with the brownies and setting them onto a cutting board (parchment paper and all).
- Frost the brownies and then drizzle with the melted chocolate. You can cut these right away or wait for the chocolate drizzle to set up a bit
- Enjoy!
I used the natural powder colors from McCormick that I also used in my Strawberry Chocolate Pancake recipe. The McCormick natural food color comes in 3 packets: blue, red, and yellow.
For this mint frosting I used equal parts blue and yellow and the color turned out perfectly! I also found that the colors got brighter the longer the frosting sits.
We used peppermint oil in this recipe, but you can use peppermint extract instead if you don’t have peppermint oil.
Since peppermint oil and peppermint extract have different strengths, you’ll want to use more peppermint extract. You might need to taste test the recipe starting with 1/4 teaspoon peppermint extract for the frosting and 1/4 teaspoon for the brownies and then adding more a little bit at a time if you want.
What if I don’t like the taste of flaxseed?
Many people don’t seem to notice the ground flaxseed in these mint brownies (it acts as the binder in this recipe instead of eggs so don’t skip it!). But some readers have mentioned that they don’t like the taste of the flaxseed in our regular brownies.
One of our readers recommended using a combo of flaxseed and egg replacer, so I tested the brownie base with half the ground flaxseed (1/4 cup instead of 1/2 cup) plus 1 Tablespoon of egg replacer powder (I used Bob’s Red Mill egg replacer powder) and they turned out great!
I haven’t tried making the brownie base completely flaxseed-free yet, so I’m not sure how that would turn out.
So if you don’t like the taste of flaxseed, you can use this swap:
- Replace 1/2 cup ground flaxseed with 1/4 cup ground flaxseed + 1 Tablespoon egg replacer powder
Gluten Free Frosted Mint Brownies (Vegan)
Ingredients
Mint Brownies:
- ¾ cup unbleached cane sugar
- ½ cup rice milk or other non-dairy milk
- ½ cup ground flaxseed
- ½ cup cocoa powder
- ¼ cup oil I use light tasting olive oil
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 7 drops peppermint oil
- 1 cup ultrafine whole grain sorghum flour
Mint Frosting:
- ¼ cup + 2 Tablespoons palm oil
- 1 ¼ cup powdered sugar
- 1 Tablespoon rice milk or other non-dairy milk
- Dash salt
- 4 to 5 drops peppermint oil (or 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract)
- ¼ teaspoon blue McCormick natural food coloring powder
- ¼ teaspoon yellow McCormick natural food coloring powder
Chocolate Drizzle:
- ¼ cup allergy-friendly chocolate chips
- ½ teaspoon coconut oil
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line an 8×8-inxh square baking pan with parchment paper. Set aside
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the sugar, rice milk, cocoa powder, ground flaxseed, oil, vanilla, salt, and peppermint oil. Mix well to combine
- Whisk the sorghum flour into the chocolate mixture until a thick batter forms
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 30 minutes
- Remove pan from the oven and allow to cool completely before adding frosting to the top
- While you’re waiting for the brownies to cool, prepare the frosting: combine the palm oil, powdered sugar, rice milk, and salt with a hand mixer until creamy
- Mix in the peppermint oil and the natural food coloring powder and mix again, scraping down the sides periodically, until fully incorporated and creamy. Set aside – don’t frost the brownies until they have cooled completely!
- For the chocolate drizzle: Melt the chocolate chips with the coconut oil by microwaving for 30 seconds at a time in a small bowl, stirring after each heating session until the chocolate has melted completely and is smooth. Allow the chocolate to cool a bit so it’s not hot when you drizzle it on the frosted brownies
- Once the brownies have cooled, remove the entire sheet of brownies by lifting the parchment paper with the brownies and setting them onto a cutting board (parchment paper and all).
- Frost the brownies and then drizzle with the melted chocolate. You can cut these right away or wait for the chocolate drizzle to set up a bit
- Enjoy!
Notes
Nutrition
Recipes clockwise from top left:
Kiwi Pear Spinach Pineapple Smoothie Recipe – Melissa & Greg, My Wife Can Cook
Matcha Green Tea Crepes – Julia, Imagelicious
Crustless Kale Artichoke Ricotta Quiche – Veena Azmanov
Easy Vanilla Green Tea Cupcakes – Gloria, Homemade & Yummy
Gluten Free Frosted Mint Brownies – Sarah, The Fit Cookie
Sarah Jane Parker is the founder, recipe creator, and photographer behind The Fit Cookie. She’s a food allergy mom and healthy living blogger based in Wyoming. Sarah is also an ACSM Certified Personal Trainer, ACE Certified Health Coach, Revolution Running certified running coach, and an ACE Certified Fitness Nutrition Specialist
I laughed as I read that comments about the cake decorating! I remember that time too. She looked at my rose that I had worked so hard on and said “Well, we are not all meant to do be cake decorators”.
The drizzle is my best friend! 🙂
I’ll have to try these brownies soon! Yummy!
Every time I make frosting I think about what she said about not tasting the frosting – as I sample my frosting haha! Your rose was probably pretty great since a kid made it, that stuff takes practice 🙂 Let me know if you make those brownies, they are super yummy, you guys will love them
Oh but you HAVE to taste it!! :p I remember when I was doing cake decorating… I’d actually be so over sugar I didnt want to eat it at all! I love the sound of these and really curious about the natural colouring!
It is so hard for me not to taste my cooking, especially when it’s cookie dough or frosting!! The natural food coloring is really cool, I like that it’s powder so it’s really easy to measure with a spoon
I could eat one of this right now after doing the housework. Perfect to go with a nice latte….some ME time would be great!!
These make the prefect me-time treat! So decadent and delicious 🙂
Love the green twist! Though I’ll admit that when I first read the recipe title, I thought it could be made of cricket flour 😉
Too funny!! I was thinking about calling them mint chocolate brownies, but everyone else has a recipe for those so I decided on grasshopper brownies. I have tried a cricket bar once, but my mouth started tingling so I stopped eating it. I’ve been apprehensive to try cricket products again since I wasn’t quite sure if I was having an allergic reaction to it 😮
These look so rich and moist! I love the addition of peppermint – I mentioned on FB that they could work for a Halloween theme but with the peppermint I think they’d work great during Christmas as well!
I love that idea! These would be a perfect Christmas treat, and would be awesome for a Christmas party or cookie exchange.
These look so yum Sarah… They look so perfect and I cannot believe that they are gluten free. I bet they tasted yum…..
These taste pretty amazing!! No one would ever guess that they are allergy-friendly 🙂
I definitely have trouble sampling while I am making desserts! I found some of the food coloring you mentioned and need to try it out!
That’s great! That food coloring is so good for baking, I love it. There were other brands I have used before, but they weren’t re-sealable and rather expensive, so I’m glad I found the McCormick colors at Walmart!