Tessa's Recipe Rundown
Taste: The perfect amount of sweetness.
Texture: My favorite part, each bite is the ideal balance between soft and chewy.
Ease: Super easy 30-minute sugar cookie recipe with no chilling required.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe: Fun, simple, and perfect for holidays from Christmas to Valentine’s Day, even 4th of July. Everyone LOVES these cookies.
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Not to boast, but everyone who has tasted or made this sugar cookie recipe has said it became their instant favorite!! It took weeks of testing to get it just right.
These Soft & Chewy Sugar Cookies require NO CHILLING and are incredibly easy to bake up.
Reader Love
Delicious! Just made these with my 3 year old daughter. Easy to follow recipe and will be my go-to for sugar cookies! Only difference was adding rainbow sprinkles (the round ones) to the sugar to roll the balls in before baking.
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This recipe is perfect for your Christmas cookie boxes or just enjoying with a glass of milk. If it’s a warmer time of year, it also makes a great base for ice cream sandwiches!
Originally, I had created a recipe with cream cheese that was ultra-soft. However, I found that it would become claggy, and each bite would get stuck to the roof of your mouth.
After many rounds of recipe testing, I finally nailed an easy sugar cookie recipe that’s soft and chewy (and STAYS soft) and has that perfect sparkly crackled top.
Sprinkle of Science
Ingredients Notes
- All-purpose flour – Make sure to weigh your flour accurately. If you add too much flour, your cookies won’t spread at all and won’t be soft or chewy.
- Baking powder – This gives the sugar cookies lift, without adding too much spread or browning.
- Fine sea salt – So important to balance the sweetness!
- Unsalted butter – It’s important that your butter is at a cool room temperature (around 67°F), otherwise your cookies may spread.
- Granulated sugar – The star ingredient! Don’t reduce the sugar – find out why here and peek the image below.
- Eggs – One whole egg with an extra egg yolk lends richness and chewiness to the texture. Make sure they’re at room temperature.
- Vanilla extract – No sugar cookie recipe is complete without the flavor of vanilla extract.
Keys to SOFT Cookies
- The extra egg yolk helps to add more moisture and richness, for a soft and chewy texture.
- The other trick is found in the size of the dough ball…. a whole 3 tablespoons in each! This creates larger cookies that spread out perfectly with ultra-soft centers.
- Whatever you do, don’t overbake this sugar cookie recipe. They should still look ever so slightly ‘wet’ in the center when you pull them from the oven.
How to Prevent Cookie Spreading
To prevent flat sugar cookies that spread into little puddles, it’s important to make sure your butter is at a COOL room temperature.
Your sticks of butter should give slightly when pressed with your finger but still hold their shape. To be precise, your butter should be 67°F.
Crinkly Tops in Sugar Cookies
Besides rolling in sugar, baking powder is one ingredient that gives these cookies their characteristic cracks, so make sure your baking powder is fresh.
TIP: When the cookies are piping hot out of the oven, use a round cookie cutter to swirl around the edges of each cookie to re-shape into a perfect circle and enhance those crinkly tops.
The Best Baking Sheet for Cookies
The below photo features cookies from the same exact batch of dough, baked for the same amount of time at the same temperature.
2. Wilton Non-Stick: browned heavily with less spread
3. Walmart Mainstays: pale cookies, pan warped and rusted
4. Viking Ceramic Lined: cookies burnt on the bottom
5. Nordicware Unlined Aluminum: my favorite Goldilocks pan*
6. OXO Gold Nonstick: browned heavily with less spread
A light-colored aluminum half sheet pan is my favorite for baking cookies. Avoid dark nonstick pans altogether, they brown too much and may burn the bottoms of your cookies. Check out my Baking Pans 101 post for all the surprising details.
Do You Need to Chill the Dough?
It’s not required, baking immediately after mixing will result in absolutely delicious cookies.
However, if time permits, chilling the scooped dough in an airtight container for 24-72 hours does result in cookies that are thicker, chewier, and more flavorful. Roll in sugar after chilling otherwise the sugar will absorb into the dough. Learn more about chilling cookie dough here.
What Temperature and How Long to Bake
Bake at 350°F for 10 to 12 minute, or until the sugar cookies are set and are just beginning to brown around the edges, for classic thick & chewy sugar cookies.
The higher the temperature and/or the longer you bake, the crispier your cookies will be.
If you like really soft, almost dough-y cookies, bake at 325°F, adding a few minutes to the bake time.
How to Store Cookies to Keep Soft
Store sugar cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days. Store cookies with a tortilla, apple wedge, or piece of bread to keep them soft for longer.
Freezing
This sugar cookie recipe freezes beautifully. Freeze the uncoated, pre-portioned balls of cookie dough in a freezer-safe container, tightly wrapped in plastic wrap, or in a Ziploc bag. Allow them to thaw overnight in the fridge or for 30-60 minutes at room temperature, then bake as directed below.
FAQs
Yes! A hand mixer will work just as well as a stand mixer.
No, this sugar cookie recipe was designed for simple drop-style cookies. If you want cookie cutter sugar cookies instead, check out my Cut Out Sugar Cookie recipe here.
It makes quick and easy work of portioning the dough uniformly so no one fights over the biggest cookie. I love using a 3-Tablespoon size cookie scoop for this sugar cookie recipe. Learn more about Cookie Scoops and how to use them here!
Yes! Feel free to add 1/2 – 1 teaspoon almond extract for a fun twist.
Yes, either omit the salt entirely, or reduce the amount to 1/2 teaspoon.
This is totally optional, as these cookies are so pretty by themselves – but if you want to make them a more colorful treat, here some ideas:
-Roll the balls of dough in colored sugar before baking.
-Fold in 1/4-1/2 cup of multi-colored jimmies or holiday jimmies or sprinkles as a last addition to the dough.
-Use my Best Buttercream Frosting recipe for decorating.
-Another favorite is my Best Cream Cheese Frosting recipe!
I prefer parchment paper for cookies over silicone mats, it’s easier and quicker to clean up. Learn about parchment vs. Silicone mats here.
Whatever you do, never use nonstick cooking spray when baking cookies. This will lead to too much browning and spread (hello, burnt cookie puddles).
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Ingredients
- 2½ cups (318 grams) all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 3/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 2 sticks (226 grams) unsalted butter, at cool room temperature
- 1¼ cups (250 grams) granulated sugar, plus ¼ cup (50 grams) for rolling
- 1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt to combine.
- In a large bowl, use an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment on medium-high speed to beat the butter and 1¼ cups sugar until light and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the mixing bowl. Add the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla, and beat until combined, scraping the bowl down as needed. Slowly beat in the flour mixture.
- Place the remaining 1/4 cup sugar in a shallow dish. Using a large (3-tablespoon) spring-loaded scoop, divide the dough into balls, then roll in sugar to coat evenly. Place the dough balls on the prepared baking sheets, spacing 2 inches apart, and flatten slightly with the bottom of a measuring cup.
- Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, or until the cookies set and begin to brown. Cool for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely. Cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
I am replying to a question someone had for me regarding the best way to put different colored/festive sprinkles on the cookies:
Roll the cookie ball in all white sugar but leave about a nickel to a quarter size plain. That is the spot where you dip into colored sprinkles. They anchor in to the cookie better without the white sugar there first.
Taste was delicious but awful shape. Mine stayed domed and didn’t flatten out with the nice crinkle. I have an oven thermometer at it was at 350. Please help:)
Hi Jamie! Glad to hear that the taste was great, but the texture and appearance you describe sounds like one of two things probably went wrong here:
1. How do you measure your ingredients? By volume (using cups), or by weight (using a digital kitchen scale)? When measuring by volume, it’s so easy to mis-measure ingredients (particularly flour) and throw off the entire chemistry of a recipe – often resulting in domed cookies that don’t spread. Check out Tessa’s article here, where she talks about how to best measure ingredients to ensure accuracy every time.
2. How old are your leavening agents? If your baking soda/powder are not fresh, they won’t do their jobs – and in this case, your baking powder cannot help the cookies develop the texture they should have, and they won’t crinkle. Baking powder/soda can also lose their effectiveness long before the expiration date on the packaging. Tessa talks about the science behind leavening agents, and how to test for leavener freshness, in this article here.
I hope something here helps, and I hope you’ll give these cookies another try – they really are incredible! Be sure to check out the pink tip box (above the recipe) for more super helpful tips! Happy baking 🙂
Can you use this dough to make christmas cookie shapes?
Hi Nicole! No, these are drop-style cookies and they won’t hold their shape for cutouts – but try Tessa’s recipe for Easy Cut Out Sugar Cookies with Icing here instead 🙂
Delish!! Such an easy recipe too. Thank you
Hi there! Just wondering if you know the nutritional facts for these ?
I made them and they are delicious but just wondering
Hi Dorothy! So happy to hear that you enjoyed these cookies! We don’t have nutritional information for our recipes, as we believe that dessert should be an indulgence! You should be able to find a nutritional calculator online to assist with this, if you wish! 🙂
my husband and boys said best cookies I’ve made! wonderful recipe thank you!!
They are good! Nice and soft I feel like they were missing something tho, but I loved them.
Hi Izzy! Feel free to add a little more vanilla extract, or a 1/4 teaspoon of almond extract, to mix it up next time. Alternatively, feel free to experiment with using some light brown sugar in place of the granulated sugar, for a slightly more butterscotch-y flavor that’s especially delicious this time of year. I hope that helps! Happy baking 🙂
I make these cookies at least 2x’s a month, as my family eats them quite often. However, I’ve reduced the baking powder to 1.25-1.5 teaspoons and upped the vanilla to 2 teaspoons.
Don’t skip the sugar rolling after you’ve made the balls!
Tip- if you’re decorating the tops with pretty sugar sprinkles: 1st- grab two little plates and put 1/2 cup white sugar on one plate and 1/4 cup of your pretty sprinkles on the second plate. 2nd- leave the top of your cookie free of any white sugar and dip that section in your colored sugar/sprinkles. It helps them stick much easier.
Pamela, I want to understand your comment. You say to get two plates: One with white sugar and one with sprinkles. then you say to leave the cookie free of any white sugar. so what was the purpose of getting two plates and putting sugar on one?
I plan on using colorful sugar, so im trying to understand this
I made these this morning to bring to Thanksgiving dinner today–HUGE HIT!! My grandchildren loved them, the adults loved them-just a wonderful and easy cookie recipe!
This recipe is delicious!! Great tips, too.
I made these once for my family and they absolutely loved them! Super soft and chewy. Wondering if there are any tips for doubling the recipe, I want to bring them for thanksgiving!
So thrilled to hear that these were a hit, Jadyn! No need for any adjustments for doubling the recipe – simply double all ingredients! Enjoy and Happy Thanksgiving 🙂
This is the best sugar cookie recipe I’ve ever made or tasted. My husband’s favorite cookie is the sugar cookie. I made these one night on a whim.
I followed the recipe exactly. However, mine needed to bake in the oven about 10-15 min longer, but I pulled them just as they started browning as instructed.
They were perfect warm or cooled. The consistency is chewy throughout the entire cookie. They are still moist days later.
My husband said they are the best cookie he’s ever had and has fallen in love with me a little more because of them lol. As a result, I have saved this recipe permanently in my collection.