Have I got a cookie recipe for you!! I originally published this recipe in 2014 but just had to update it in 2020 with recipe improvements and new photos. These cookies deserved it. Just as well, because this Browned Butter Toffee Chocolate Chip Cookies recipe has gone completely viral. It’s been featured on Good Morning America, and TikTok videos of people making this recipe have gotten millions of views.
In fact, my recipe photographer Ashley, who shot all 50 recipes in my cookie cookbook, said this may just be my BEST COOKIE RECIPE yet. People have been known to fight over these cookies. Yes, they’re that good.
This Browned Butter Toffee Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe is kind of a mouthful to say. But when you actually have a mouthful of one of these cookies, I think you’re going to love me.
These are one of the most flavorful chocolate chip cookies I’ve ever tasted, and the texture is absolutely perfect. You NEED to try this recipe. If your friends and family are anything like mine, they plead and beg you to make it again and again.
Yes, this recipe is a little extra work. But the best things in life usually are.
You may even want to make a double batch so you have plenty of dough to freeze when the craving hits. Trust me… it WILL hit!
How to Make Browned Butter Toffee Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients you’ll need:
- All-purpose flour AND bread flour – this combination makes a thicker, chewier cookie thanks to the extra protein bread flour contains. Make sure to weigh your flour accurately. If you add too much flour, your cookies may end up dry, dense, or crumbly and barely spread.
- Baking soda and Baking powder – we wanted the best of both worlds with these cookies! Check out my Baking Soda vs. Baking Powder article to learn about the differences between these two leaveners, and learn how to test that your leaveners are still fresh!
- Fine sea salt – so important to balance the sweetness!
- Unsalted butter – it’s important that your browned butter and sugar mixture is cooled completely to room temperature before adding the other ingredients. Too warm and it will affect the outcome of your cookies, regardless if you plan to chill your dough. This will lead to flat, sad puddly cookies.
- Granulated sugar – for sweetness, spread, and preserving the cookies, so they stay fresh and soft longer.
- Dark brown sugar – for a butterscotch flavor that can’t be beat! The molasses in the brown sugar draws in more moisture, making the cookies thicker, softer, and chewier. You can use light brown sugar instead, but you may lose some of the additional flavor.
- Espresso powder – this is optional, but I really like the way the bitter espresso plays off the sweetness of the toffee and the nuttiness of the browned butter. (you can slightly taste it in the cookies, so leave out if you’re not a fan)
- Whole Eggs + a yolk – eggs are essential to forming a beautifully pliable dough and cookies that stay soft for days – and we’re adding an extra yolk for extra richness and added chewiness. Eggs should be at room temperature when beginning your dough, but separate the one yolk from its white while cold for best results (yolks are more fragile and tend to break more easily when warmer).
- Vanilla extract – no cookie recipe is complete without vanilla extract!
- Chopped chocolate – I like to use semisweet Ghirardelli baking bars and chop them up coarsely for this recipe!
- Toffee bits – use Heath toffee bits, or try making your own. It takes just 15 minutes and tastes so much better than store-bought!
- Flaky sea salt – Optional, but highly recommended to top your cookies! Flaky sea salt pairs perfectly with chocolate chip cookies. Bonus, it looks amazing, too!
How to brown butter:
Use a stainless steel sauté pan for best results. Nonstick prevents the butter from browning completely and prevents you from being able to visually see how browned it’s getting. Same with the dark color of cast iron. Something with a wider surface area, like a sauté pan over a saucepan, encourages more browning more quickly.
Don’t step away from butter that’s browning after it’s melted. It can go from browned to burnt quickly. At the same time, don’t be afraid of letting that color develop. It should become a rich and fragrant amber. Scrape all the brown bits into the mixing bowl – that’s where the flavor lives!
Do I really need to use bread flour?
You don’t absolutely have to use bread flour, but it adds a ton of chewy texture to these cookies that’s worth the extra trip to the store. If you don’t have bread flour, then use a total of 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour in the recipe.
Why is there espresso powder in this recipe?
I really like the way the bitter espresso plays off the sweetness of the toffee and the nuttiness of the browned butter. It’s totally optional, if you don’t have it or don’t want to use it, feel free to simply omit.
Where to find toffee bits?
You can find them at many grocery stores in the Heath brand with the other chips in the baking aisle. If you can’t find them, I have a super easy recipe to DIY Homemade Toffee Bits which I used for these cookies here.
Do I really have to chill the cookie dough?
I know, it’s annoying. But I promise you it’s SO worth it, especially for this recipe which uses melted brown butter. You must chill at least until the dough is firm to ensure your cookies won’t spread too much. But the magic of letting your dough ‘marinate’ for up to 72 hours is detailed in this article here.
Can I make smaller cookies?
Yes, though I much prefer the crisp edges, chewy texture, and soft center 3-tablespoon-sized Browned Butter Toffee Chocolate Chip Cookies. If you want to bake smaller cookies, scoop into 1 1/2 tablespoon-sized balls and bake for 10 to 12 minutes.
Why use a cookie scoop?
Using a stainless steel spring-loaded cookie scoop when portioning out cookie dough is one of the KEYS to beautiful, uniform, evenly-shaped and evenly-baked cookies. My cookie scoop is one of my most frequently used kitchen gadgets. A spring-loaded scoop saves you *so much time* in forming the balls of dough. When using a scoop, you ensure each ball is evenly sized so the cookies bake evenly, meaning you don’t have any small overbaked cookies or large underbaked cookies. Learn more about Cookie Scoops and how to use them here!
Can I freeze this cookie dough?
Yes! After letting the dough marinate in the fridge for at least 24 hours, portion it into balls. Place dough balls on a baking sheet and freeze until solid. Remove frozen balls of dough to an airtight container and store for up to 6 weeks. Click here for my full guide on how to freeze and bake frozen dough.
Tessa’s Favorite Tools for This Recipe
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2
sticks (227 grams) unsalted butter
-
1/2
(100 grams) cup granulated sugar
-
1
cup
(200 grams) lightly packed dark brown sugar
-
1 1/2
cups
(190 grams) all-purpose flour
-
1
cup
(127 grams) bread flour
-
1
teaspoon
baking soda
-
1
teaspoon
fine sea salt
-
1
teaspoon
instant espresso powder,
optional
-
1/2
teaspoon
baking powder
-
2
large eggs plus 1 egg yolk,
at room temperature
-
2
teaspoons
vanilla
-
10
ounces
(283 grams) semisweet chocolate,
chopped
-
1
cup
toffee bits,
homemade or Heath
-
Flaky sea salt,
for finishing
-
In a medium stainless sauté pan set over medium heat, melt the butter. Swirling the pan occasionally, continue to cook the butter. It should become foamy with audible cracking and popping noises. Once the crackling becomes quieter, continue to swirl the pan or stir until the butter develops a nutty aroma and brown bits start to form at the bottom. Once the bits are amber in color, remove from heat and pour into a mixing bowl. Be sure to keep the brown bits at the bottom of the pan as well, they hold so much flavor!
-
Add the granulated sugar and brown sugar to the hot butter, stirring to combine. Set aside to cool to room temperature.
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In a medium bowl, combine the flours, baking soda, salt, espresso powder, and baking powder.
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To the cooled butter mixture, whisk in the eggs, yolk, and vanilla until combined. Gradually stir in the flour mixture with a rubber spatula. Stir in the chocolate chunks and toffee bits. Wrap dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 24 hours but no more than 72 hours.
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Let dough sit at room temperature just until it is soft enough to scoop, about 1 hour.
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Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
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Divide the dough into 3-tablespoon sized balls using a large cookie scoop and drop onto prepared baking sheets. Dough may be slightly challenging to scoop.
-
At this point you can portion the dough, place it on a baking sheet and freeze until solid. Remove frozen balls of dough to an airtight container and store for up to 6 weeks.
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Bake for 12 to 14 minutes, or until golden brown. Remove from oven and sprinkle flaky sea salt on top of the cookies, if desired. Let cookies cool for 2 minutes before removing to wire racks to cool completely.
-
Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
This post was originally published in 2014 and updated in 2020 with recipe improvements, more tips, and new photos. Photos by Ashley McLaughlin.
November 2022 Baking Challenge
This recipe was one of two November 2022 chocolate chip cookie selections for our monthly baking challenge! Every month you can join the challenge by baking the recipe and snapping a photo for a chance to win prizes! Learn more about my monthly baking challenges here. Check out everyone’s cookies:
I’ve made these 3 times now! I was on a cookie kick, but now if I make cookies, people always ask if I’m making “the” cookies. I usually make a double batch, and also make the homemade toffee bits too (worth it!)
If you’re questioning the chill time – it’s worth it! At the insistence of my partner I made a few cookies when the very first dough was mixed – but the dough itself didn’t have too much flavour. While the warm gooey cookies were nice, I’m so glad I reserved most of the batch for the fridge! 24 hours later the dough had so much delicious flavour, and the cookies were phenomenal. An absolute crowd favourite.
My partner and I tried them after the chill and we just looked at each other and laughed – because we knew no other chocolate chip cookie could ever top this.
Hi, question!! What is bread flour??
I live in New Zealand and we have plain flour, self raising and high grade flour. High grade is usually used to make bread… would this be what you used??
(We don’t have cake flour)
Hi Andrea! While I cannot speak to your varieties of flour available, I can tell you that the key differentiating factor between bread and all-purpose flour in the US is protein content. Our bread flour has 12-14% protein. Check the labels of your flours at your local grocery store (or specialty kitchen supply store, if possible!) and pick the highest protein content (preferably around 12-14%) for best results. If you cannot find anything close to this, check out the tips Tessa included in the pink tip box (above the recipe) for how to substitute, and tons of other great tips! Happy baking 🙂
I made these and they were absolutely amazing, but I did have a small question. I followed your toffee recipe but it seems all the toffee melted into the cookies during the bake and make them spread a ton- what would be your remedy to this issue? Use store bought next time? Or marinate the cookies in the fridge for longer (I did 24hrs) so they’re super cold and bake them with no sit out time?
If I only have salted butter on hand, would I omit the salt required for the recipe? Or maybe take out half? Also, would instant coffee work in replacement for the espresso powder? Thank you!
Hi Ashley! Yes, just omit the salt if using salted butter 🙂 As for the coffee, instant coffee may work, but we haven’t tried that to verify! It will likely just give a much more subtle coffee flavor. Feel free to omit it if you’re unsure. Let us know what you think once you’ve given these cookies a try! 🙂
Hi! I am so excited to make these. If we made these into minis (1 tablespoon size ball) would you still say to cook them at 350? How many minutes?
Hi Aimee! 350°F is still just fine to bake smaller cookies, I can’t tell you exactly how long they’ll need in the oven, as we haven’t tried these as mini cookies! I would recommend baking one for 8-10 minutes, and checking to see how that goes, to give you a guide for the rest of the batch. Please also note that smaller cookies often have a slightly different texture than larger cookies, and may not develop the slightly crisp exterior and chewy middles we all enjoy in the larger cookies. I hope that helps! Happy baking!
hi, i made these and it turns out to sweet, can i reduce the amount of sugar? or what should i do to make it less sweet? thanks!
Hi Sarah! We really recommend sticking with the original quantity of sugar in any recipe for many reasons. Sugar doesn’t just sweeten baked goods; it moistens, provides tender structure, assists with gluten formation, extends the shelf-life (meaning it will be fresh and moist longer), and assists with texture – just to name a few things! Reducing the sugar content in a recipe doesn’t just lower sweetness; it messes with the recipe’s chemistry and creates a totally different baked good. Of course, feel free to lower it a little to experiment, if you wish – but know that it will change the texture of the cookies. Alternatively, you can try using a dark, bittersweet or even unsweetened chocolate, adding a little more salt, and topping the cookies with flaked sea salt after baking, to help balance the sweetness. I hope that helps! Happy baking!
hi, i made these and they are SO deliciousssss, i have 1 question ,if i made these smaller like 45grams each, should i higher my oven temperature or keep it at 350° still? thank you
Hi Daren! 350°F is still just fine to bake smaller cookies, but it may take a little tinkering to perfect the amount of baking time they need, as it will be a much shorter bake time. Please also note that smaller cookies often have a slightly different texture than larger cookies, and may not develop the slightly crisp exterior and chewy middles we all enjoy in the larger cookies. I hope that helps! Happy baking!
I read the recipe wrong and put my dough in the freezer instead of the fridge!! It’s been in there for just under 24 hours and I’ve just moved it to the fridge. Will this ruin the dough??
Hi Ali! No, it won’t ruin the dough, you just technically skipped out on the marination process! Go ahead and bake them from frozen, and they’ll still be delicious.