Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe (2024)

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Cooking Notes

pyk

Can you use natural peanut butter, or are commercial brands (Skippy, Jif, etc.) best?

Heidi

I make cookies very much like these, but the trick for supercrunchiness is to bake them twice, first for about 10 minutes, then you let them cool completely and finally bake them for another few minutes until the edges begin to brown. Then, as directed in the recipe, let them cool on a wire rack.

Patricia

P.S. Rather than making dozens of cookies at one time,I put about half of the cookie dough into a freezer zip lock bag and freeze for one of those days where you want cookies without all of the work,thaw in the refrigerator and proceed with the recipe for baking. Works for many cookie dough recipes. I date and put time needed to bake along with oven temp on the outside of each. Often a lifesaver for a quick dessert or gift.

Celeste

While both my daughter and I definitely prefer the taste of natural peanut butter in most cases, many experiments over the years with various peanut butters for making cookies resulted in our agreeing that, at least to our tastes, Jif results in the best cookies.

Pamela Palmer

Aha--one of the bestess recipes ever. When our jar has only 3 or 4 left we are in "crisis mode" and more must be made urgently. A footnote that is essential to this recipe is that Cook's highly recommends using Jif Extra Crunchy Peanutbutter. I LOVE it when it is on sale and grab 3 or 4 then. For our family, I have changed the sugar amounts to: 1 cup light brown sugar and 3/4 cup granulated sugar. Lessening the sugar BUT not the taste!

LMK

I haven't used this particular recipe but one with very similar proportions of flour, PB, sugar and butter. I've cut the sugar by 1/4 to 1/3 and it tastes fine to me (that is, 1-1/2 cups sugar to 2-1/4 or 2-1/2 c. flour).

John Bridges

As recommended, used double the peanut butter, didn't change anything else. Results: SHOCKINGLY delicious cookies. Like Ultra-peanut shortbread. I will never make another kind of peanut butter cookie. EVER.

Upstate NY

If you want to make these gluten free, use just three ingredients - 1 cup crunchy peanut butter, 3/4 sugar and 1 egg. You can add 1/4 chocolate chips if you desire. Mix everything together and bake for 11-14 minutes at 350.

Elizabeth

Golf-sized doughs a bit too big. They came out massive after baking.

"They will not look completely baked" very true. The cookies came out soft on the top but when cooled they harden just enough. I put them back in the oven for another 3-4 minutes to make them extra crispy.

A bit too much sweet for me though. Could cut sugar by 1/4.

But nice recipe!

Ttrockwood

Chill the batter for an hour or more before scooping and baking and they will spread less

Will In Pittsburgh

Re: choice of peanut butter—natural peanut butter lacks added oil and results in dry cookies. Jif makes style called"Simply Jif" with less added sugar and salt. It seems to have a pronounced peanut flavor and is my choice for peanut butter cookies.

Lindsay

Used half whole wheat flour
1/3 c white 1/3 c brown sugar
Added 1/2 cup oats and cc's

Katie

I'd recommend adding an extra 1/2c peanut butter if you are a big peanut butter fan.

Will In Pittsburgh

You need to keep your fork *really* wet to make clear fork marks. Don't worry about over hydrating the cookies: there's so much fat in the dough that it won't absorb any water from your fork.

James Jones

To decrease the sodium content, I used unsalted butter and unsalted raw peanuts. Delicious!

Joamamma.

I'm now being that person that ingredient swaps and raves about it. Swap the crushed peanuts with mini dark chocolate chips. Delicious.

nursing a cooking addiction

Not as soft as I was expecting

Fran Gage

5. 6 oz ap2.5 oz dark brown sugar185 g smooth peanut butter

Name fran gage

5.6 oz ap2.5 oz dark brown sugar185g smooth peanut butter

Veronica HP

Lazy version turned out great! Whole Foods creamy-style PB untoasted pecans (aka what I had on hand) were perfectly delicious. Taking the time to really let that butter-sugar mix fluff-up created a rich-tasting cookie that was also light in texture.

Bea

These are the best peanut butter cookies I’ve ever had. Chewy, crunchy, crispy. They melt in your mouth and are loaded with peanut butter flavor. I followed the recipe exactly as written.

patsy

made them just as directed- 100% AWESOME

JenReady

Baking for 12 mins worked perfectly for me! I’m at sea level.

Janet

I made this with tahini and it was sort of halvah-ish. My Much better modification was using almond butter and extra almonds…YUMMY

Martha

Ok, the notes to double bake, popping the cookies back in for a few minutes after cooling, are spot on. The extra crunch at the edge is delicious. This time I used 3/4 cup white sugar. Next time I would try 1/2 cup white sugar and still keep the full 1 cup dark brown sugar. These are worth the calories!!

Scarlett Carhart

Why isn't this in metric? A baking recipe?

ginger tomato rice chicken…good, easy dws comfort food.

Outstanding, but sweet…cut sugars back next time. Maybe 3/4c…

Philtang

I'll be a little less scared of overbaking them as I usually am with cookies as they don't have to be soft in the middle like many others. I substituted the peanuts with cashews (worms in peanut bag..) and it was still peanuty from the peanut butter. Delicious without being something I have to do again often.

Margaret H.

Great recipe. Take out of oven just shy of looking fully baked. They will cook through in the next few minutes while on the cooling rack and will be nice and chewy.

Margaret

Best Peanut Butter cookie recipe I have ever tried. I followed the suggestion to reduce sugars by 25% and left the peanuts coarsely chopped because I like the pieces of peanut.

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Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What are the basic ingredients for peanut butter cookies? ›

Should you refrigerate peanut butter cookie dough before baking? ›

Refrigerating the dough will give it more structure so the cookies spread less and hold their fork marks through baking. Cooling the dough also ensures that all of the ingredients are the same temperature: they'll bake more evenly and the flavors will meld beautifully. Heat oven to 375°F.

Why do they put fork marks in peanut butter cookies? ›

The reason is that peanut butter cookie dough is dense, and unpressed, each cookie will not cook evenly. Using a fork to press the dough is a convenience of tool; bakers can also use a cookie shovel (spatula).

Why do you put Criss Cross on peanut butter cookies? ›

So it looks like that there are utilitarian reasons for the cross-hatching—to allow for even cooking—but it might have been passed along for nearly a hundred years for primarily aesthetic reasons, where the cross-hatching is more to identify the cookies as peanut butter ones, rather than to cook them well.

Why are my peanut butter cookies always hard? ›

the more the gluten develops and they become hard and dry and an unfavorable texture. reason no 3 you're over baking them. make sure you take them out when they're just slightly golden brown. and then they'll continue to cook a little bit on the counter at room temperature.

Why do my cookies get hard after they cool? ›

Cookies become hard when the moisture in them evaporates. This can be caused by leaving them out in the air for too long, baking them for too long, or storing them improperly. The lack of moisture makes the cookies hard and dry, which makes them difficult to enjoy.

What happens if you don t refrigerate cookie dough before baking? ›

Popping your dough in the fridge allows the fats to cool. As a result, the cookies will expand more slowly, holding onto their texture. If you skip the chilling step, you're more likely to wind up with flat, sad disks instead of lovely, chewy cookies. Cookies made from chilled dough are also much more flavorful.

What is the best peanut butter for baking? ›

The most common mistake with peanut butter cookies is using the wrong type of peanut butter. The BEST peanut butter for today's cookies is a processed creamy peanut butter, preferably Jif or Skippy.

What happens if you don't flatten peanut butter cookies? ›

If you don't flatten the cookies first, then the fork does double duty – it performs both functions. One very subtle result of creating the pattern is that the little tips of dough bake up crisper than the rest of the cookie, giving you both a bit of additional texture and deeper taste where the dough is more baked.

Why are my peanut butter cookies crumbling and falling apart? ›

Overmixing the dough

If you overmix the dough, the cookies will be dry and crumbly. The best way to fix this is to add more liquid to the dough. This can be done by adding milk, water, or even melted butter. You may also need to add more flour to the dough if it is too wet.

Why do you smash peanut butter cookies? ›

Peanut butter cookie dough is denser than a lot of other cookie doughs. Putting the hash marks in the cookie dough balls actually flattens them for more even baking. Without being pressed, the cookies will not cook evenly.

Should I let peanut butter cookie dough rest? ›

Another Success Tip: Chill the Cookie Dough

The dough is incredibly creamy, almost like peanut butter frosting, and you'll have a heck of a time trying to roll and bake such a soft dough. Set aside 1–2 hours for chilling, or do yourself a favor and make the dough the night before.

How do you know if peanut butter cookies are done? ›

How to tell when the cookies are done? Peanut butter cookies are done when the top of the cookie is light brown, they will still be soft to the touch when the are taken out of the oven, but they will firm up as they cool. Let them rest 5-10 minutes on the cookie sheet then move to a wire rack to cool completely.

Why are my peanut butter cookies so oily? ›

You baked your cookies and they came out an oily greasy mess. Urgh, what an awful feeling! If you've had this happen to you, odds are you made one of two mistakes: either you didn't allow the ingredients to thoroughly mix during the creaming process or you didn't allow the dough to rest enough before baking.

What are the ingredients in most peanut butter? ›

Roasted Peanuts, Sugar, Contains 2% Or Less Of: Molasses, Fully Hydrogenated Vegetable Oils (rapeseed And Soybean), Mono And Diglycerides, Salt.

What are the 4 main ingredient in baking cookies? ›

While there may be countless variations, each cookie at the core has four ingredients – butter, sugar, flour & eggs. The proportions of ingredients and the methods of mixing are what define our cookies. Dough spreads – Inside the hot oven, the butter starts to melt and the dough gradually starts to spread out.

What are the ingredients in Girl Scout peanut butter cookies? ›

INGREDIENTS: ENRICHED FLOUR (WHEAT FLOUR, NIACIN, REDUCED IRON, VITAMIN B1 [THIAMIN MONONITRATE],VITAMIN B2 [RIBOFLAVIN], FOLIC ACID), SUGAR, WHOLE GRAIN OATS, SOYBEAN AND PALM OIL, PEANUT BUTTER (PEANUTS, HYDROGENATED PALM OIL), DEXTROSE, INVERT SUGAR, CONTAINS 2% OR LESS OF WHEY, SALT, LEAVENING (BAKING SODA, ...

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