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Tessa’s Recipe Rundown
Taste: These cookies are packed full of peanut butter flavor and plenty of gooey chocolate chips studded throughout.
Texture: Thick, chewy, soft, melty, and wonderful.
Ease: Very simple, made with pantry staples, no mixer, and ready in 30 minutes.
Why you’ll love this recipe: These are the perfect PB Chocolate Chip Cookies!
These Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies are one of my absolute favorite desserts on the planet. I’ve always got a batch of these sitting in my freezer, ready to bake off whenever the craving strikes!
I’ve loved the flavor combination of chocolate and peanut butter since before I could remember. And these cookies showcase that combination perfectly.
These cookies are ridiculously thick and chewy yet soft, and are heavenly with a glass of cold milk.
The best part? These Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies are so quick and easy to make – you don’t even need a mixer!
Absolutely delish!! I made them a bit larger (18 total instead of 24) and they are amazing!! I made them for Father’s Day, but the whole house approved. This is by far my favorite texture I’ve ever seen in a cookie. Perfectly crunchy on the edges, soft and chewy insides.
If you’re cookie-obsessed like me, you’ll love making cookies that’ll rival your favorite bakery (just like these!) with my second cookbook, The Ultimate Cookie Handbook: Your Guide to Baking Perfect Cookies Every Time – now available on Amazon!
Key Recipe Ingredients
Peanut Butter: I prefer natural peanut butter (well-stirred with no oily or dry bits) for a bolder peanut butter flavor, but conventional peanut butter (like Skippy or Jif) works too. Check out my peanut butter experiment here!
Dark Brown Sugar: Helps create a chewy texture and adds rich flavor. You can substitute light brown sugar if it’s all you have, but the color, texture, and flavor will be different.
Egg Yolk: The extra yolk contributes to a rich, chewy cookie.
Chocolate Chips: Semisweet is my favorite, but you can substitute milk chocolate, dark chocolate, chocolate chunks, or peanut butter chips for even more peanut butter flavor.
Sprinkle of Science (open me!)
- Brown sugar and an extra egg yolk help create a rich, chewy, and thick texture with lots of flavor.
- Be sure to measure your flour correctly (by weighing with a digital scale or the spoon and level method) to avoid cakey, dense, or tough cookies that don’t spread.
- If You Don’t Measure Your Flour Correctly, you may end up with crumbly dough and dry, hard cookies lacking flavor. Just check out the image showing the difference between correctly and incorrectly measured chocolate chip cookies.
- I ALWAYS use an unlined aluminum half-sheet pan for baking cookies.
- Additionally, I always use parchment paper for baking cookies. I find silicone baking mats produce less of a crunchy exterior crust and are just one extra thing to clean.
- Never use dark-colored pans to bake cookies, as they tend to overly brown or even burn the bottoms of the cookies.
- Check out my Best (and WORST) Baking Pans article here for more details on the science of baking pans.
Although not required for this recipe, I highly recommend chilling the cookie dough for 24-72 hours before baking. You can always bake off a few cookies right away and chill the rest. Here’s why:
- Chilling cookie dough is very similar to marinating meat – things just get so much better!
- The texture becomes chewier and thicker, and the flavor intensifies. It also improves the golden brown exterior as the cookies bake, for crisp edges.
- You can either scoop first and chill (make sure to wrap in plastic) or chill the entire mass of dough, let it come to room temperature, then scoop.
- Learn more about why chilling cookie dough matters here.
Storage & Make ahead
Storing Baked Cookies: Keep in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
Make-Ahead Dough: Portion the dough, freeze the balls until solid, then transfer them to a freezer bag for up to 6 weeks. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator or for about an hour at room temperature before baking.
Baking from Frozen: This is possible, but the cookies won’t spread as much. Get all of my tips for freezing cookie dough (and baking from frozen!) here.
Frequently Asked Questions
Peanut butter in cookie recipes prevents normal spreading, so flattening the balls with the palm of your hand before baking helps encourage them to spread more while they bake.
If you’d like an even stronger peanut butter flavor, try using very well-stirred natural peanut butter and swapping some of the chocolate chips for peanut butter chips.
I haven’t tested this, but many readers have successfully swapped in King Arthur gluten-free measure for measure or Bob’s 1 to 1 baking flour.
Yes! For about 12 medium cookies, use a medium cookie scoop to make 1 1/2-tablespoon portions and reduce the baking time by about 2 minutes.
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Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups (318 grams) bleached all-purpose flour, measured correctly*
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1 stick (113 grams) unsalted butter
- 3/4 cup (202 grams) creamy peanut butter**
- 1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated sugar
- 1 cup (200 grams) packed dark brown sugar
- 2 large eggs plus 1 egg yolk, at room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 2 cups (340 grams) semisweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350ºF. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
- In a large heat-safe bowl, microwave the butter until melted. Vigorously stir the peanut butter into the hot butter until well combined. Stir in the granulated sugar and brown sugar until well combined. Add the eggs and yolk, one at a time, stirring well after each addition. Add in the vanilla. Gradually stir in the flour mixture until just combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.
- Dough may be loose and slightly crumbly. It will not appear like normal chocolate chip cookie dough. If it's unbearably crumbly, that's likely due to discrepancies among brands of peanut butter and if you used unbleached flour. Add 2 tablespoons milk if that's the case.
- Divide the dough into 3-tablespoon sized balls using a large spring-loaded cookie scoop and drop onto prepared baking sheets. Flatten dough slightly into disc shapes with your palms. Dot each disc with a few extra chocolate chips for picture-perfect cookies.
- Bake for 12 minutes, or until golden brown. Let cool for 5 minutes before removing to wire racks to cool completely.
- Cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
Notes
This recipe was originally published in 2014 and has been updated with recipe improvements and new photos. Photos by Ashley McLaughlin.
Tessa, I was all mis-en-place all ready to scoop 24 cookies, till what to my wAndering eye should appear, but my trusty ol’ cast iron skillet…
My apologies, but I used semi-sweet chunks and dusted/tossed them with a bit of cinnamon before adding them to the batter. I love cinnamon.
Turns out that your indulgent batter does WONDERFULLY well in the holy embrace of buttered cast iron. I placed it on the lowest rack for about 12 minutes, then rotated 180° and placed it on the second highest rack for another 12-15 minutes; keeping an eye so as to catch it golden brown, slightly shiny toward the “inner circle”, slightly dry at the furthest edge. Ya gotta let it sit in its sacred vessel until the skillet is cool to the touch. Then you’re a flip and a slide away from plating the beast.
A bit of crunch at the edge nicely contrasts with the chewy, gooey goodness inside.From there it’s vanilla bean ice cream, whipped cream, and a prayer for my self control. I wish you could see this deep-dish Kookie Kong. It weighs 3.9 pounds…
Thanks!
Jason
Wow, this sounds delicious! I’ll have to try these cookies in a skillet sometime – thanks so much for sharing, Jason!
WHy can’t they dough be refrigerated for more Thank 72 hrs?
The dough will start to dry out after that! More tips on chilling your cookie dough here.
My household is filled with peanut butter lovers…..to our disappointment these are totally lacking in peanut butter flavor. They are sweet, look great, nice texture but “Where’s the Peanut Butter?!” If I were to make this recipe again, I would up the PNB to 1 1/4 cups. use 1 tsp vanilla and only 1 1/2 cups chips.
I love peanut butter and chocolate together, so I had high hopes for this recipe, but the cookies tasted only so-so.
Excellent cookies! thus recipe has been added to my favorite cookies.
So glad you enjoyed these cookies, Sue!
This recipe is a keeper!
These taste good, but i wouldn’t use this recipe again, the dough is too crumbly and (can’t believe I’m saying this) there are too many chocolate chips. It seems like most of the people reviewing this didn’t actually make the recipe and i wonder if the reviews are bought in some way and am interested to see if my review gets deleted.
I’m sorry this recipe didn’t turn out for you, it’s actually one of the most popular recipes on my site and is typically a huge success. Feel free to omit some chocolate chips if you prefer. Crumbly cookies are usually due to too little butter or eggs. Did you follow the recipe exactly as written and use a scale to weigh all ingredients?
It’s sleeting here in Oklahoma & I realize I don’t have any unsalted butter!
May I substitute salted butter & cut back on the fine sea salt??
Thank you, Wendi
It’s sleeting here in Oklahoma & I realize I don’t have any unsalted butter!
May I substitute salted butter & cut back on the fine sea salt??
Thank you
Yes, that should work!
These cookies are a hit! But….I did change the size to just spoondrops and changed the baking time to approx. 9 mins. They came out great! The whole family loved them!
These were excellent, quickly scarfed down by the whole family!
I just made these and they are so good! Crisp on the bottom with a thick,chewy centre.