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? ›

Image of What are the basic ingredients for peanut butter cookies?
Peanut butter is a food paste or spread made from ground, dry-roasted peanuts. It commonly contains additional ingredients that modify the taste or texture, such as salt, sweeteners, or emulsifiers.
Wikipedia

Why are my 3 ingredient peanut butter cookies falling apart? ›

There are a few reasons why your cookies are falling apart. The wrong ratio of ingredients, such as too little sugar or peanut butter will make them fall apart. The wrong type of peanut butter may cause them to fall apart. Or using old eggs may create crumbly cookies.

Why are my peanut butter cookies so hard? ›

Why did my peanut butter cookies turn out hard? This is most likely to happen from over-baking your cookies. Make sure to take them out of the oven when they're still a bit soft in the middles, that way they can finish cooking on their cookie sheets outside the oven.

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

Basic reason..the dough is more dense than most cookie doughs, and the pressing with the fork tines helps the dough bake evenly. Secondarily, its pattern makes it easier to tell them apart from other cookies with similar appearance.

Why are my peanut butter cookies dry and crumbly? ›

If you're wanting to use natural (no sugar added) peanut butter, the cookies will be less sweet and they will likely spread out more. Using natural peanut butter will change the structure and texture of the cookies. Why are my cookies dry and crumbly? This is most likely a classic case of using too much flour.

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.

Can I use brown sugar instead of white sugar? ›

In most baking recipes, you can substitute brown sugar for white sugar in a one-to-one ratio. So, if your recipe calls for one cup of white sugar, swap one cup of brown sugar. The sweetness level will be the same, but the brown sugar may change the texture of your baked goods.

How do you make peanut butter cookie dough less crumbly? ›

To avoid this, try using as little flour as possible while preparing to roll your dough. Dry – “Dry” or “Crumbly” dough is a product of over-mixing or using too much of any ingredient during the mixing process. This can be reversed by adding one to two tablespoons of liquid (water, milk or softened butter) to your mix.

Should you refrigerate peanut butter cookie dough before baking? ›

Chill your cookie dough! The dough is extremely soft due to the creamy peanut butter, eggs, and butter and if it's not cold going into the oven, the cookies will spread all over your baking sheet. I chilled this cookie dough for 24 hours and my cookies were soft, thick perfection.

Is it better to use butter or shortening in peanut butter cookies? ›

Your other source of fat should be butter, not shortening. Butter will make your cookies taste buttery; shortening will make them taste suspiciously vacant, like Katy Perry's voice post-autotune. Yes, shortening yields chewier cookies than butter does, because butter contains water and shortening doesn't.

What kind of peanut butter is best for baking cookies? ›

Peanut butter: Creamy peanut butter is ideal for this recipe because crunchy peanut butter creates an overly crumbly cookie. You can use processed peanut butter such as Jif or Skippy, or natural-style peanut butter.

Why do my peanut butter cookies not taste like peanut butter? ›

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.

Why are my homemade peanut butter cookies falling apart? ›

One reason could be that you overcooked them. Another reason could be that you didn't add enough moisture to the dough. Finally, your peanut butter cookies might be dry and crumbly if you used a natural peanut butter that doesn't have any added oil.

Why are my peanut butter cookies going flat? ›

Oven temperatures are a crucial factor in baking. If your cookies consistently come out flat, you may have selected the wrong baking temperature. If you bake cookies using too much heat, the fats in the dough begin to melt before the other ingredients can cook together and form your cookie's rise.

What are the 7 basic ingredients in all cookies? ›

essential Baking Ingredients
  • Flour. Flour is a fine powder made from grinding grains, nuts, or other edible seeds. ...
  • Bread Flour. ...
  • All-Purpose Flour. ...
  • Cake Flour. ...
  • Sugar. ...
  • Leaveners. ...
  • Salt. ...
  • Eggs.

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.

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