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These vegan Easter cookies are a bunny-shaped homage to the nostalgic pink and white Mother’s circus animal cookies with sprinkles from your childhood. Fun to make and perfect for any occasion, these iced animal crackers are both delicious and cruelty-free.

This recipe makes ~80 vegan circus animal cookies. If you’re short on time, you can freeze half the dough and only make 40 cookies now.

Table of Contents

(click the links below to skip to the section you’re looking for)

• Circus Animal Cookies Recipe
• Pink and White Chocolate Recipe
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Ingredient Substitutions
• Contact Me with Questions
• Similar Recipes

These frosted copycat mother’s cookies made their debut at my pastel and bunny themed vegan tea party. I barely refrained from eating them all before my guests arrived. I had been wanting to make these vegan Mother’s iced animal crackers for years! I used to inhale these circus animal cookies before I was vegan.

I almost forgot about them until I discovered Fatally Feminine’s adorbs circus animal necklace, modeled after the pink and white frosted animal cookies from our childhood. I’ve wanted this necklace for a decade, but couldn’t spend $100 on something that I might only wear a few times a year.

When I was updating this blog post, guess what I found?! A new etsy seller named DecadentTrinket makes a very similar animal cracker necklace for a way more affodable price! My birthday is in May, so if you want to show me how much you love me, I will accept that display of affection in the form of kawaii jewelry.

Ingredients for Vegan Cutout Cookies

• 1 cup (222g) vegan butter or margarine
• 1 cup (192g) organic sugar, blended
• ½ tablespoon (4g) ener-g egg replacer
• 1 tablespoon (15g) water
• 1 teaspoon (4g) pure vanilla extract
• 2 teaspoons (9g) baking powder
• 3 cups (390g) unbleached, all-purpose flour

How to Make Vegan Circus Animal Bunny Cookies

Cream the Butter and Sugar. In a mixing bowl, combine 1 cup (192g) organic sugar and 1 cup (222g) vegan butter until it’s light and fluffy. Use a stand mixer with a paddle attachment or a handheld electric mixer.

Sift the Dry Ingredients. In a separate bowl, sift together 2 teaspoons (9g) of baking powder and 3 cups (390g) of flour. Whisk until combined, and set aside.

Prepare Egg Replacer. Mix ½ tablespoon (4g) ener-g egg replacer with 1 tablespoon (15g) water, according to the directions on the box.

Combine Wet Ingredients. Add the prepared egg replacer and 1 teaspoon (4g) vanilla extract to the sugar and margarine mixture. Mix.

Combine Dry and Wet Ingredients. Add the dry ingredients to the mixing bowl, half at a time, mixing thoroughly after each addition. Stop the stand mixer, and scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl with a baking spatula to make sure no dry ingredients are sneakily hiding.

Preheat the Oven and Prepare Baking Sheets. Turn the oven to 350°F (175°C). Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

Roll and Cut Dough. On a floured surface, roll some of the dough with a floured rolling pin to ¼" thickness. Use a mini bunny cookie cutter (or any desired shape) to cut out the baby bunny cookies. Dip the cutter in flour if the dough starts to stick.

Chill the Cookies. Place the bunny cookies on the parchment paper lined baking sheets. Freeze each tray of cookies for 5-10 minutes (or the amount of time it takes you to fill the next tray). This helps them retain their shape during baking.

Bake the Cookies. After chilling, bake the cookies in the preheated oven (350°F/175°C) for 9 minutes, or until the bottoms are lightly golden.

Cool the Cookies. Remove the tray from the oven, and allow the cookies to cool completely on a cooling rack.

Repeat. Continue these steps until all the dough has been used up. If you decide to save some of the dough for a future project, you can use it to make these unicorn cookies.

Vegan Mother’s Cookie Icing/Frosting/Coating Ingredients

• 7-8 ounces (200-225g) vegan white chocolate
• pink vegan food coloring
• 4 tablespoons (54g / ¼ cup) melted coconut oil
• vegan nonpareils

How to Make Vegan Pink and White Animal Cookies

Prepare your Surface. Cover part of your counter or a large baking sheet with a rolling mat or parchment paper. You can tape down the parchment paper at the corners with scotch tape if it tries to curl at the edges. This area is for you to place the dipped cookies.

Melt Chocolate. Melt half the vegan white chocolate (4 ounces or 110g) either in a double boiler or in the microwave. If you use the microwave, only set it for 30 seconds each time, and stir in between. Once it’s smnooth, it’s done. You’ll want to work quickly at this stage so that your chocolate doesn’t start to firm up before you finish.

Color the Chocolate. Add pink vegan food coloring to the melted white chocolate, one drop at a time, until you get the perfect color. I used wilton rose gel coloring.

Thin the Chocolate. Add some of the coconut oil (just a teaspoon at a time is a good increment) to the bowl, little by little, stirring in between each addition. You want it thin enough to dip the cookies in.

Dip the Cookies. Using a fork, dip each cookie into the frosting and scrape all the excess off before setting them onto the prepared countertop or baking sheet.

Decorate. Sprinkle the vegan nonpareils onto each vegan Easter cookie individually (before the white chocolate starts to harden). See my list of vegan sprinkles for which ones are vegan.

Repeat. Continue these steps until the pink chocolate is all used up. Use the same method to make the white chocolate, but this time, don’t add any color.

Leave to Harden. Let the iced cookies sit on the counter for a few hours or put them in the fridge to harden. You want to make sure the chocolate has hardened before trying to stack them.

This icing for these pink and white sugar cookies is also an excellent substitute for the chocolate in my chocolate covered pretzels recipe.

Frequently Asked Questions About Iced Animal Crackers

How can I make these vegan frosted animal cookies gluten-free?

To make gluten-free Easter cookies, simply replace the all-purpose flour with a gluten-free flour blend.

How do I store Easter cookies to keep them fresh?

If you like to make your cookies in advance of holidays to minimize stress, you can keep these Easter cookies fresh by storing them in an airtight container and keeping them in the freezer until the day before you want to serve them.

Are pink and white iced animal cookies vegan?

Unfortunately, Mother’s Iced Animal Crackers are not suitable for vegans. That’s why I created this recipe. Now the vegans in your life can enjoy a nostalgic treat, thanks to you!

Are traditional animal crackers vegan?

If you can find organic animal crackers, like the ones sold at Trader Joe’s and Costco, those are probably vegan. If you’re not a strict vegan and you eat non-vegan sugar, you would likely consider most plain animal crackers to be vegan. Check ingredient lists for things like “natural flavors” since those can be animal-derived. I’m a strict vegan, so I only buy animal crackers from Trader Joe’s, Costco, and these Happy Snacks animal crackers.

Ingredient Substitutions for Mother’s Circus Animal Cookies

• Vegan Butter: If you avoid soy, Earth Balance makes a soy-free vegan margarine. I always buy organic whipped Earth Balance, but I have also used Miyoko’s butter successfully. If vegan butter or margarine is hard to find or not something you have in your house, you can use an equal amount of Spectrum organic palm shortening in its place.
• Vegan Sugar: For the sugar in this cookie recipe, you can use any number of sugars, as long as they’re vegan: raw sugar, organic sugar, or vegan sugar. If you’re not sure if your sugar is vegan, you can contact the company and ask, but basically, just avoid conventional white sugar or granulated sugar, and you should be ok.
• Ener-G Egg Replacer: You can replace the egg replacer in this recipe with any brand of egg replacer you prefer. If you don’t have any egg replacer, simply mix ½ tablespoon of any starch (cornstarch, potato starch, or arrowroot powder) with 1 tablespoon of water.
• Vanilla Extract: Vanilla flavoring and vanilla extract can be used interchangeably. The only difference is that vanilla extract is in a base of alcohol and vanilla flavoring is in a base of glycerin. Try to use 100% pure vanilla extract or flavoring. If the ingredients don’t specifically say vanilla bean, then it may be made of chemicals. More rare, but still possible, it could be made with animal products.
• Flour: If you don’t have all-purpose flour or you have some, but not enough, fear not. You can replace some or all of the flour in this gothcore cookie recipe with any combination of wheat flour, spelt flour, or whole wheat pastry flour. It will taste healthier with some of these though. If you avoid gluten, or if you have friends or family who are gluten free, you can substitute the all-purpose flour with a gluten-free flour blend to make these cookies gluten free.
• Baking Powder: Keep in mind that baking powder does expire, so it works best if it’s fresh/newish. I use non-aluminum because my memory is already terrible and I don’t want Alzheimer’s Disease. But if all you have is regular baking powder, that will work. If you’re out of baking powder, you can replace the 2 teaspoons of baking powder in this recipe with ½ teaspoon (3g) baking soda.
• Food Coloring: I used wilton gel color for this recipe, but you can look at my entire list of vegan food coloring for other options.

Comments or Questions?

If you make this vegan animal cookies recipe, I would love it if you’d snap a pic, post to instagram, and tag me @vegandollhouse. It seriously makes my day/week/month!

Please message me (instagram or email) if you have any questions or feedback about the recipe.

Similar Recipes

If you’re looking for other bunny-shaped or Easter foods, you might like my marshmallow peep bunny cake and my Easter ham.

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I use mostly organic ingredients when I cook. I realize that not everyone has the disposable income to buy only organic ingredients. So, I only specify organic on the ingredients that matter: when buying the organic version is the only way to ensure that an item is vegan.

This post links to items I used when I made this recipe. If you click on the purple Buy Now button on a product page, you will go to a website (like Amazon) where you can buy the same product I used. Sometimes, the store you purchase from (Amazon, Etsy, etc.) will pay me for referring you. This costs you nothing extra, and I would never recommend a product that I don’t use. These affiliate programs help me buy the ingredients to create these recipes for you. Read more about this in my privacy policy.

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