Best Chocolate Chip Cookies

Why you’ll love this recipe

Taste: Butter, brown sugar, vanilla, a touch of salt, and lots of chocolate.

Texture: Crisp buttery edges, soft centers, and creamy chocolate.

Size: These cookies are big and chunky. Making them large helps to get the perfect texture.

No chill time: Cookies ready when you want them. After preparing the dough the cookies get baked right away.

Basic ingredients: This recipe is made with pantry staples.

What sets this recipe apart

There are one million chocolate chip cookie recipes out there. Here’s what makes this one better than others:

Cold butter: This cookie recipe does not use softened butter. Use butter straight from the fridge. This ensures that the cookies bake up with the perfect thickness every time. None of the inconsistencies that come with over softened butter (like cookies that spread too thin).

More brown sugar than white sugar: This recipes uses mostly brown sugar which adds color, chewy texture, and an underlying caramel flavor.

Cornstarch: Adding cornstarch to the dough helps to create a cookie that has a nice soft texture.

Large dough balls: When portioning the dough make large dough balls. This ensures that the cookies have a nice thickness with crisp edges and soft centers.

Chocolate: Try one or more of the following for getting the perfect chocolate-cookie ratio.

• Use chocolate chunks instead of chips. This creates large pockets of chocolate all throughout each cookie. Our favorite are semisweet chunks from Trader Joes.
• Coarsely chop a few tablespoons of chips/chunks so that little shards of chocolate disperse all throughout the dough.
• Use a combination of different chocolates. Mix dark, semisweet, and/or milk chocolate chips/chunks.

Ingredients needed

• All purpose flour
• Baking soda
• Kosher salt
• Cornstarch (don’t skip this – it helps make the cookies soft)
• Unsalted butter (salted butter can be used, just reduce the added salt by half)
• Brown sugar (light or dark, make sure it’s fresh and soft)
• Granulated sugar
• Egg
• Vanilla extract
• Chocolate chunks or chips
• Walnuts (optional)

Recipe overview

Combine dry ingredients: flour, baking soda, salt, and cornstarch.

Using a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter and sugars.

Add egg and vanilla extract. Beating until well combined and scraping the sides and bottom of the bowl as needed.

Beat in the dry ingredients.

Mix in chocolate chunks and nuts (if using).

Scoop the dough into ¼ cup portions and place on parchment lined baking sheets. Bake for 9-11 minutes.

Recipe tips

• This dough comes together easiest with a stand mixer. Since we’re using chilled butter the stand mixer helps break down the butter easier than a hand mixer.
• Line your baking sheets with parchment paper. This helps the cookies bake evenly and prevents them from spreading too much. Bonus: it also makes cleanup a breeze!
• Use a cookie/ice cream scoop for evenly sized cookies. 
• Add a few extra chunks/chips on top of the cookies right before baking.
• For thicker cookies leave the dough balls mounded, for slightly thinner cookies flatten the dough balls just a bit.
• Under bake the cookies. You should remove these cookies from the oven when they are just starting to turn light golden brown but they are still undercooked. They should be so soft that you cannot pick them up off the baking sheet without them falling apart. They will firm up as they cool on the baking sheet.
• This recipe (with a few modifications) was also used for our Nutella-Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookies, Cookie Cups and Malted Chocolate Chip Cookies. Try those, too!

How to get perfectly round cookies

Immediately after the cookies come out the oven place a round glass or bowl (larger than the cookie) upside down over the top of the cookie and gently but quickly swirl the glass/bowl in a circular motion. The edges of the cookie will bump against the inside of the glass creating a perfectly round shape. Note: This only works when the cookies are hot, straight from the oven, and still on the warm baking sheet.