Cookie Smackdown: Joan’s vs. Jules

This is a tough job, but someone has to do it!

Joan’s Gluten Free Great Bakes

I recently made some of Joan’s Gluten Free Great Bakes Chocolate Chip Cookies. They come in little frozen balls, so you can make as many or as few as you’d like. A little parchment paper is all you need to come up with some pretty awesome cookies. They were such a nice surprise in the sea of mediocre gluten free cookies! These are unbelievably moist, heavy, chewy with slightly crisp edges, and don’t seem at all like other gluten free cookies.

They are the closest thing to real chocolate chip cookies right out of the oven that I’ve tried. I really love the convenience of not having to mix ingredients, and it’s certainly something that family members will grab out of the freezer and make a few every now and then. They come only 12 to a package, but sometimes you’re just worth it. Next time I may cut them in half to make 24 smaller ones as they come out pretty large and thick. (Consider placing a large order with a friend with several products to save on shipping. Products are shipped frozen.)

Ingredients: Gluten Free Flour Blend (corn starch, tapioca flour, rice flour) light brown sugar, sugar, butter, eggs, gf baking soda, xanthan gum, gf vanilla, chocolate chips.  Contains: eggs and milk

Click here to see this product on Joan’s site.

Jules Gluten Free

Then I tried Jules Gluten Free Cookie Mix. It comes in a bag of dry ingredients. In addition to the parchment paper, you need butter, vanilla, shortening, eggs, and any chips or nuts you want to add in. Mix all that together and you come up with the most dreamy, creamy real cookie dough that you can imagine. It seems many of the mixes that I have tried are a sandy crumbly mess before you even bake them, so there is very little hope they will be much better than that out of the oven.

My son requested M&M’s in the cookies since you can choose your own add-ins. He would not likely take the time to mix all this stuff up on his own, although he certainly could, so these are slightly less convenient than Joan’s. They turned out to be very tasty, but a little flat for my liking. I think next time I will add a tsp of baking powder to see if I can get them to rise a bit more. The flavor was definitely a hit, though. Not too sweet, nice and soft and light and really ungluten-freeish. Is that a word? The mix makes about 60 cookies (minus a few for all the dough you will likely eat.)

Ingredients: Jules’ Gluten Free All Purpose Flour[Modified Tapioca Starch, Potato Starch, Corn Starch, Corn Flour, White Rice Flour, Thickener (Xanthan Gum)], Brown Sugar, Cane Sugar, Baking Soda, Salt, Vanilla Powder, Baking Powder (Aluminum Free).

Click here to see this product on Jules’ site.

The Winner

Okay, so it’s not quite a smackdown. If you are familiar with my reviews, you know I only review things I LOVE, so both would have to be in that category to begin with to make it into a Gluten Freeville review. My tasters were split on their favorites, but both were worthy competitors, and WE are all the winners! They are quite different from each other, so fortunately I don’t have to choose one. I can enjoy them both! Both cookies were pretty incredible and I’d be thrilled to serve or be served either one. I will definitely be making both of these again.

Gluten Freeville Product Reviews: Products are either purchased by us or sent to us for sampling. If we don’t LOVE it, you won’t see it reviewed here. No money is ever accepted in exchange for a product review. The sole purpose of our product reviews is to introduce you to great new products we have found as a resource to you, the reader.