Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Make sure one of the racks are in the center of the oven.
Prepare 2 baking sheets by greasing it or adding a sheet of parchment paper. You could almost fit them all on 1 sheet but I prefer to 2 to make sure the cookies don't run into each other.
In a medium bowl, combine dry ingredients- grain-free flour, sea salt, gelatin powder, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves. Set aside.
In another medium bowl (or stand mixer), combine the wet ingredients: palm shortening, maple syrup, vanilla extract, and orange zest.
Use electric mixer (or whisk/spatula) to mix the wet ingredients together. *Note- it ill look a bit lumpy and weird until you add the dry ingredients. This is normal.
Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients while mixing. Mix until smooth.
Spoon about 1 tbsp of dough onto the baking sheet for each cookie. Leave at least an inch (maybe 2inches) between cookies as they do spread. Continue this process until you use all the dough. You should have about 18-20 smallish cookies when done.
Bake for 13-15 minutes on the middle rack(s). Allow to cool completely- at least 15-20 minutes before adding frosting. *They will be very soft and fragile until completely cool. Then they're be easy to handle.
Orange Frosting
Combine palm shortening, maple syrup, orange juice, and orange zest in a medium bowl or stand mixer bowl. Mix on medium speed with an electric mixer for about 30 seconds. You can mix by hand with a whisk if needed. It will be lumpy and weird until you add the dry ingredients- no worries, this is normal.
Add in the tapioca starch and gelatin powder. Continue mixing until smooth and thick. If for some reason it's too thin, add a little more arrowroot starch. If it's too thick, add a little orange juice.
Frost the cookies. You can do this with a butter knife or spatula. Or if you want to get fancy, you can use a piping bag.
Optional: Garnish with additional orange zest.
Notes
The amount of frosting in this recipe is pretty generous and enough for a thick layer on each cookie and you may have some left over. If you just want a thin layer of frosting on each cookie, you could probably get away with cutting the frosting recipe in half.If you want to use a piping bag but don't have one, you can cut the corner of of a gallon size ziplock bag and use that.Substitutions:If you want to substitute an egg for the gelatin powder, reduce the pumpkin by 1- 1 1/2 tbsp. Try to use a smallish egg if possible. Or if it's a large egg, whisk it, then just just 1/2-3/4 of it.Try to use maple syrup if possible. You can substitute honey if needed but it will change to texture of the cookies quite a bit- they spread more and they're much thinner/softer which makes them a bit less sturdy for adding frosting. Also, note if you do use honey, they will be extremely soft when they come out of the oven but will firm up within about 30 minutes. Just let them sit.