Classic Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe - Top Recipes (2024)

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Calling all peanut butter cookie lovers! This recipe is for you. Imagine a cookie, soft on the inside, crunchy on the outside, that melts in your mouth while you’re eating it.

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This peanut butter cookie recipe will always be the only recipe you’ll use. These cookies, which you can prepare very easily with few ingredients and will be ready to eat in just 8 minutes, will become your new favorite.

Ingredients you’ll need:

You can make these easy peanut butter cookies in minutes with very simple ingredients that we all have at home.

  • Peanut Butter: It is the indispensable ingredient of peanut butter cookies. I used JIF’s creamy peanut butter in this recipe.
  • Butter: I prefer to use unsalted butter. Remember to pay attention to the amount of fat, as peanut butter is also high in fat. Make sure the butter is at room temperature but not melted.
  • Brown Sugar: I used brown sugar to make the inside of the cookie fluffy and chewy.
  • Flour: I used all-purpose flour for this recipe. The amount of flour is important for making the best peanut butter cookies.
  • Egg: It will help hold your dough and add softness. Make sure it is at room temperature.
  • Milk: Makes for a soft-textured cookie.
  • Baking soda: It will help your cookies to rise and they will be chewy.
  • Salt: Every recipe needs salt. This will enhance the flavor of the cookies.

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How to Make Peanut Butter Cookies From Scratch?

As I mentioned before, preparing this old-fashioned, easy, and best-ever cookie recipe will only take you a few minutes. Just follow these easy steps:

  1. Preheat your oven to 375 F (190 C). Place the butter, peanut butter, sugar, milk, and vanilla extract into a mixing bowl, and with the help of a handheld or stand mixer, mix everything until well combined.
  2. Add the egg and continue mixing. Then, add flour, salt, and baking soda and continue beating at low speed just until combined.
  3. Using an ice cream scoop, scoop dough balls and roll them in the palm of your hand. Arrange them evenly on the baking tray. Crisscross the top with a fork and bake in the oven for 7-8 minutes.
  4. Take them out of the oven and let them cool down for 2 minutes then transfer them to a cooling rack to cool down completely.

What Kind of Peanut Butter Should I Use?

Which peanut butter you use for making this recipe depends on your preference, but of course, the result will also differ.

I preferred to use JIF’s Creamy Peanut Butter for a smoother and softer result. You can also use natural peanut butter, but it will have a slightly drier and crumbly texture. Also if using natural peanut butter, don’t forget to mix it before adding it to the dough.

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Tips For the Best Peanut Butter Cookies:

  • Do not overcook: Cookies can overcook easily and become dry and discolored, so keep an eye on them, Don’t forget that the cookies that come out of the oven continue to bake for a while, so it’s best to take them out of the oven when they are still slightly undercooked.
  • Do not overmix: As in every recipe, overmixing destroys the structure of the product, so be careful not to overmix your dough. It may become too soft because of the butter in it.
  • Measure the flour properly: If you want to get soft and chewy cookies, you should pay attention to the amount of flour. If you add too much flour, your cookies will not come together and will fall apart like crumbs. Even if you put less, you will have runny dough and you will have difficulty shaping them, and they will spread too much while baking. That’s why it’s important to measure your flour properly at this step.
  • Scoop the Dough: It is important that all cookies are baked evenly while baking. We don’t want one to cook more or less than the other. Here, I recommend you use the ice cream scoop to make all cookies the same size, which will help them bake evenly.
  • Chill the Dough: Many people say that the dough should not be refrigerated, but in my experience, I think keeping it in the refrigerator for 15-20 minutes will help you work more easily with it and it will not spread much while baking. If you want large spread cookies, put them in the oven without keeping them in the fridge.

Can I Make The Dough In Advance?

These classic peanut butter cookies are very easy to prepare and your dough is ready in just 5 minutes. But if you want to prepare the dough in advance, you definitely can.

After preparing the dough, wrap it in plastic wrap and store it in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. take them out, shape them, press them with a fork and bake them.

Freeze Peanut Butter Cookies:

After cooking and cooling the peanut butter cookies, you can store them in the refrigerator for up to 3-4 days in a sealed container. If you wish, you can freeze them for up to 2 months in an airtight container.

Place wax paper between each cookie for easy removal. When ready to serve, let them thaw and come to room temperature.

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Classic Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe

Yield: 20 Cookies

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 8 minutes

Rest time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 33 minutes

Calling all peanut butter cookie lovers! This recipe is for you. Imagine a cookie, soft on the inside, crunchy on the outside, that melts in your mouth while you’re eating it.

Ingredients

  • 3/4 cup Jif® Creamy Peanut Butter
  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 1 1/4 cups firmly packed light brown sugar
  • 3 tablespoons milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
  • 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
  • 3/4 teaspoon salt

Instructions

  1. Preheat the oven to 375ºF (190ºC).
  2. In a large mixing bowl, add the butter, peanut butter, brown sugar, milk, and vanilla extract.

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  3. Mix them at medium speed with an electric mixer until well combined.

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  4. Add the egg and continue to mix until combined.

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  5. Combine the dry ingredients with the creamed mixture and mix at low speed. Just until everything is well incorporated.

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  6. Scoop the dough with an ice cream scoop and roll it in the palm of your hand. Arrange them evenly on the baking tray.

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  7. Crisscross the top of the cookies with a fork.

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  8. Bake in the oven for 7-8 minutes until the color starts to turn golden brown.

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  9. Let them cool for 2 minutes. Then, transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.

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  10. ENJOY

Did you make this recipe?

Please leave a comment on the blog or share a photo on Pinterest

Classic Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe - Top Recipes (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

Should you refrigerate peanut butter cookie dough before baking? ›

Prep your Peanut Butter Cookie recipe up to 24 hours in advance, cover it and refrigerate it so you are ready to bake at a moment's notice. The kids can even help you scoop, roll and flatten the cookies. If the dough is too firm to scoop, let it stand at room temperature for about 30 minutes.

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 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.

What are the 4 basic dry ingredients that are mainly used when 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.

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.

Why do they use Criss Cross 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.

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

The colder your dough is before it heads into the oven, the less it will spread during baking, which makes for loftier cookies. The chilling phase also gives the flour in your dough time to hydrate, just like pie dough, which translates into a cookie that's more chewy than cakey.

What happens if you don't chill peanut butter cookie dough? ›

The most important part of today's recipe? 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.

What are the 3 types of peanut butter? ›

The grocery store shelves are dominated by three varieties of classic peanut butter: crunchy (chunky) peanut butter, creamy (smooth) peanut butter, and natural (organic) peanut butter.

Can you bake peanut butter cookies without parchment paper? ›

Yes, you can bake cookies without baking paper. I've been in the same situation before. Instead of baking paper, you can use greased aluminum foil or simply grease the baking tray directly. Just ensure the surface is well-greased to prevent sticking.

Why are my peanut butter cookies always hard? ›

If your peanut butter cookies are hard, you likely cooked them for too long. They should not be baked for more than 8 or 9 minutes.

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 ingredients should I look for in peanut butter? ›

The best choice is a peanut butter with one ingredient listed: peanuts. If the peanut butter is made only with nuts, the oil will rise to the top of the jar.

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