The Best Healthy Vegan Chocolate Frosting
The Best Vegan Chocolate Frosting- all you need is 4 simple ingredients to make this decadent and addicting chocolate frosting! (refined sugar-free)
Say hello to the frosting of your dreams. Made in 1 bowl with just 4 wholesome ingredients, you’re going to want to slather this chocolate decadence on everything!
The first time I made it I found myself downing spoonfuls like it was pudding. I mean, it does kind of taste like chocolate pudding but the texture is a little thicker, more like a frosting, in my opinion.
So let’s talk about how simple it is to make. All you need is almond butter, cocoa powder, dairy-free milk and a bit of pure maple syrup. You melt the almond butter in a large bowl until it’s nice and drippy. Then you add the remaining ingredients to the bowl and stir until it has a silky smooth consistency.
That’s pretty much all there is to it! The hardest part is resisting eating the whole bowl at once. :)
Now I haven’t tried this with substitutions for the almond butter but I’m sure cashew butter, peanut butter, or even sunflower butter would work the same. Of course the flavor will vary a little with each but you can adjust for that by adding more sweetener or salt, if desired.
For ease of stirring, I recommend sticking with pure maple syrup. If you’re not vegan you could probably get away with using honey but you would need to melt it with the almond butter so that it’s incorporates evenly and doesn’t leave you with a chunky frosting.
This chocolate frosting is perfect for spreading on top of cakes, brownies, cupcakes, or cookies. I’ve been known to dip graham crackers in it too for a quick little treat. Just beware, it’s hard to stop once you start!
The Best Healthy Vegan Chocolate Frosting
Yield: approximately 1/2 cup frosting
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 5 minutes
Ingredients:
- 1/2 cup almond butter*
- 1/4 cup cocoa powder
- 5 tablespoons non-dairy milk
- 3 tablespoon pure maple syrup
Directions:
To a large microwaveable bowl, add the almond butter and heat for 15-20 seconds, or until almond butter is thin and easy to stir.
To the bowl, add the cocoa powder, milk and maple syrup. Stir until a smooth consistency is reached. There shouldn’t be any lumps of cocoa powder. Taste test to see if you prefer more sweetener or salt. Serve immediately or seal and refrigerate for up to 1 week (the frosting may keep shorter or longer depending on your environment so this is ultimately up to your personal judgement).
*you can substitute cashew butter, peanut butter or sunflower butter with varied results in flavor
Did you try this recipe? Please let me know how it turned out by rating the recipe, leaving a comment below or sharing a picture on Instagram with the hashtag #makingthymeforhealth. I love hearing your feedback! 
ALMOND BUTTER??!?!?! AAAAAAGH You’re so brilliant! This frosting looks abosolutely sinful and I love that it’s made with better-for-you ingredients. Now I just need something to frost….slash, a spoon.
So ridiculously excited to try this on EVERYTHING!!! Love when good-for-you ingredients taste AMAZING :)
Me too! Thanks Brittany!
Yum!! I might use this for Camryns first birthday cake next month. Just trying to gather some ideas now.
I can’t believe she almost a year already!
It’s all about the fat baby! Well done and I know this tastes divine! I can see slathering this all over a coconut cupcake! HELLO!
That would be SO GOOD! :)
This is going to mean big trouble for me…at least it’s healthy! I want to eat this by the spoonful (or bowlful)!
Hubba hubba!!! haha This looks AMAZING! I want to lick that bowl! lol :)
This looks so yummmmmy! When I first saw this post title I was thinking, “Oh please, please don’t have a bunch of coconut oil in the recipe…” because while I like a bit of coconut oil in a lot of recipes, I don’t usually like when sweets made vegan have a lot of it and taste coconutty when they really shouldn’t (in my opinion). But this easy recipe? I can 100% get behind. I will be trying it for sure!
I feel the same way about the coconut thing. It’s the most common ingredient, especially in vegan frostings. I think you’ll love this one though!
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This looks really good! Do you think it would work to sub agave for the maple syrup?
Yes I think that would work!
I just made this with agave syrup , cause I ran out of maple syrup, and it tasted absolutely wonderful. I also added 1/4 sunflower butter & 1/4 chunky peanut butter! My husband & I loved it over Avocado chocolate cake. It paired beautifully……
This seems WAY too runny to be a frosting?
Does it just fall off the cake?
Did you make the frosting? The consistency isn’t like powdered sugar frosting but it’s certainly firm enough to stay on cake, or whatever you want to use it for. You can see how I used it on this cake: https://www.makingthymeforhealth.com/vegan-chocolate-zucchini-snack-cake/
It mostly depends on how drippy your almond butter is. So long as it isn’t super runny then you should be fine.
Perfect! So delicious with peanut peanut!!
I’m so glad you liked it! :)
I made this recipe now twice. Fantastic, great consistency, texture and flavor. I put it on a chocolate cake. The chocolate cake I picked is the recipe on the back of the Hersheys Cocoa container, except I replaced regular milk with Almond milk, and used an egg replacement. The only thing is that when you make those replacements, instead of cooking the cake for 35 minutes at 350, you need to cook it for 1 Hour 10 minutes approximately, always checking that the dough is fully cooked.
Thanks for this great recipe.
Thanks for the helpful tip, Carlos! I’m glad you enjoy the frosting too! :)
LOVE this chocolate frosting! I used peanut butter as that was all that I had, and added a pinch of salt. I put it on top of black bean muffins for breakfast, honestly so so delicious!
I’m so glad you like it! I feel like my pictures don’t do it justice. It’s one of my favorite frostings. :)
This frosting was everything I wanted and more! Used it on chocolate cupcakes and they were the best cupcakes I’ve had in a long time. :) Thank you!
Absolutely Delish!!!!!!
Wow. I’ve made so many vegan frostings and haven’t been satisfied with all but one. But now that I’ve tried this one, the search is over. So clever! No powdered sugar, coconut oil or dairy!?! It is so good and I can’t believe how it thickened up. I didn’t have almond butter so I used natural peanut butter instead. It is so rich, but not too much, chocolatey but not bitter. It’s perfect. Thank you!
I’m so happy you like it as much as we do! It’s my addiction. :)
This frosting is the answer to my prayers!!! I also added some peanut better and salt – thank you so much – it really works
Hi Sarah!
Do you use almond butter that is made with almonds as the only ingredient? Or could you let me know what almond butter you use please? Thank you!
I typically buy Maranatha which has palm oil in it but you could also use almond butter with just almonds. The frosting might be a little bit more drippy with the latter but it should still work!
Hi Sarah,
Thanks for the recipe!
I followed the recipe exactly. It became very runny. What can I do?
Cheers,
Clara
It’s possible that your almond butter was too runny. You could add more cocoa powder to help it firm up.
Please include grams next to cups.
Used peanut butter instead of almond butter. Didnt like it.
Oh my Lord. Amazing. Super decadent and delicious! Very hard not to just eat with a spoon :) Thank you so much for this recipe, made exactly as is and it’s soooo easy and yummy.
Can one freeze the frosting?
I’m not sure as I haven’t tried. Please let us know if you do!
I loved how it looks but the almond butter smell was overpowering, did not taste fudgy like it looked, maybe I was expecting too much…
This was great. I used tahini and a little peanut butter instead of almond butter and replaced the maple syrup with date syrup.
Fantastic! Thanks for the recipe
I made a cake, do you think I should wait to frost until I serve? Will this cake need to be refrigerated if it’s on top? Thanks! Tastes so yummy!!
You can frost it ahead of time and leave it at room temp or refrigerate it. It might harden a little when refrigerated but bringing it back to room temp should fix it. :)
Yum! Just made this with peanut butter and cacao powder instead of cocoa. Sooooo good! Way thicker then the pictures- more of a spreadable frosting for between layers of cake not one for piping. Perfect for a shmear on top of my vegan vanilla cupcakes
This was delicious! I used it to frost a gingerbread cake. So simple and healthy!
This was delicious, thank you! I was wondering though, why does it only last 3 days in the fridge ?
Sorry, I should have put a minimum of 3 days. The time it will last ultimately depends on the conditions of your refrigerator/home environment. So it could last up to 1 week or longer. Hopefully that makes sense. :)
Hi! Could I use canned pumpkin instead of the butter?
The texture would certainly be different but it could work! Let us know if you give it a try :)