Chewy Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies

4.80 from 5 votes

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My chocolate peanut butter cookies are soft and chewy, with loads of dark chocolate chunks. This recipe is perfect for Christmas cookies!

closeup: chewy chocolate peanut butter cookies


Grow your Christmas cookie recipe collection in a snap!

Are you baking Christmas cookies this year? I don’t normally bake a lot, but when December rolls around, I get the baking bug. This month alone, I’ve shared enough cookie recipes with you to last you straight through the holiday season.

Chocolate cookie lovers will go crazy for my mom’s recipe for rocky road cookies, my Mexican hot chocolate cookies or these amazing chocolate meringue cookies.

If you’re baking for a holiday cookie purist, be sure to make some Mexican wedding cookies and gingersnap cookies. They’re both traditional favorites! Speaking of traditional cookies, these chewy peanut butter cookies are a definite must-bake!

Chewy chocolate peanut butter cookies

Simply put, this is my favorite peanut butter cookie recipe. First of all, big chunks of dark chocolate? Yes, please!
The other kicker for this simple recipe… muscovado brown sugar. It has a higher molasses content than refined brown sugar, so it impart a fantastic depth of flavor.

What’s even better is that this recipe makes a batch of 48 chocolate peanut butter cookies. That’s plenty to have extras to give away to friends, or that nice delivery person who you’ve been meaning to thank.

close up: stack of peanut butter chocolate chip cookies on cooling rack

Ingredient notes and substitutions

  • Peanut butter– Feel free to use any brand of crunchy or creamy, no-stir peanut butter. Unfortunately, natural peanut butter has a tendency to separate during baking, and that causes the cookies to be very greasy on the bottom.

    If you have a peanut allergy, any nut butter or sunflower seed butter can be substituted for peanut butter.
  • Muscovado brown sugar– Traditional brown sugar is simply refined white sugar with molasses added back after processing. Muscovado is unrefined (raw) sugar, so it has its natural molasses component.

    Molasses adds an extra depth of flavor, and it also provides moisture. This means your chocolate peanut butter cookies will be very chewy and moist.

WHERE TO FIND IT
Most natural food stores and many health stores stock muscovado brown sugar. It comes in light and dark varieties. and either variety will work fine in this cookie recipe

  • Chocolate chips or chunks – Either dark chocolate chips or chunks are fine. Dark chocolate has a richer, deeper flavor than semi-sweet chocolate, not to mention, it’s higher in antioxidants. If you’d rather use semi-sweet chips, that will be fine, too.
stack of homemade peanut butter christmas cookies on cooling rack

Recipe tips for soft and chewy chocolate peanut butter cookies

  1. Use an electric stand mixer or hand mixer if possible.

If you’ve ever struggled with cookies that don’t puff up in the oven, one reason could be that the butter and sugar weren’t properly combined. It’s very important to cream them together on high speed for at least 5 minutes.

Why not just combine the dough with a spoon? Well, because combining butter and sugar at a high speed incorporates air into the mixture. As a result, the trapped air helps the chocolate peanut butter cookies to rise in the oven.

Beat the butter and sugars on high speed for several minutes, until the mixture is pale yellow in color and fluffy in texture. This step is crucial, do not skip it. Beating the butter and sugar to the right consistency will help ensure a well-risen and tender finished cookie.

  1. Sift the dry ingredients.

Sifting the flour and other dry ingredients helps them to incorporate with the wet ingredients. It also ensures that you don’t have any hidden clumps of flour in your peanut butter cookie dough.

  1. Add the eggs one at a time.

If you add the eggs to the creamed butter and sugar mixture all at the same time, the weight is likely to collapse the air.

stacks of muscovado sweetened cookies on cooling rack
  1. Use a gentle hand when incorporating ingredients.

When it’s time to add in the dark chocolate chips, be careful not to over-stir. Be gentle; you need to incorporate them thoroughly into the cookie dough, but if you over-stir, the chocolate peanut butter cookies will be very dry.

If you are a peanut butter and chocolate fan, these are for you. Soft, moist peanut butter dough with dark chocolate chips riddled throughout. Chewy peanut butter chocolate chip cookies are the perfect treat, bite after bite.

If you have any cookies left over from the initial mass munching, store them in a airtight container for future snack attacks. They’ll keep well for several days, or freeze them for longer storage. They’ll keep in the freezer for about 3 months.

overhead: freshly baked homemade cookies on cooling rack

Enjoy!

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This post, originally published on Kevin is Cooking Apr. 20, 2015, was last updated with new content on Nov. 22, 2021.

closeup: chewy chocolate peanut butter cookies

Chewy Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies

4.80 from 5 votes
My chocolate peanut butter cookies are soft and chewy, with loads of dark chocolate chunks. This recipe is perfect for Christmas cookies!
Servings: 48 servings
Prep: 15 minutes
Cook: 9 minutes
Total: 24 minutes

Ingredients 

Instructions 

  • Preheat the oven to 350°F.
  • Place the butter and sugars in a large bowl and mix with an electric hand mixer on high speed for several minutes until pale in color and fluffy in texture. This step is crucial, do not skip it. Beating the butter and sugar to the right consistency will help ensure a well-risen and tender finished cookie.
  • Add the peanut butter and beat for a few more seconds until incorporated. Next add the eggs and vanilla extract; beat another few seconds until combined.
  • In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Add the flour mixture to the wet mixture and gently fold to combine with a spatula. Mix in the dark chocolate chips, being careful not to over-stir; keep it light, but thoroughly incorporated.
  • Using a small scoop and form the dough into 1-inch balls and place them on a non-stick cookie sheet. Bake for 9 minutes. Let the cookies cool on the cookie sheet completely.

Notes

  1. Feel free to use any brand of crunchy or creamy no-stir peanut butter. I use Jif crunchy.

Nutrition

Calories: 163kcal | Carbohydrates: 18g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 9g | Saturated Fat: 5g | Cholesterol: 17mg | Sodium: 133mg | Potassium: 106mg | Sugar: 11g | Vitamin A: 130IU | Calcium: 35mg | Iron: 0.6mg

The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.

Course: Desserts
Cuisine: American
Have You Made This Recipe? Let Me Know on InstagramTag @keviniscooking or tag me #keviniscooking!
titled image: peanut butter chocolate chip cookies on cooling rack

Kevin

Whether in the kitchen or on the grill, you’ll find me cooking American favorites with a love for BBQ, Mexican and Tex Mex. I’m passionate about making tasty food because life’s too short to be bland!

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20 Comments

  1. 4 stars
    I couldn’t find muscovado sugar and had to use normal dark brown sugar. Mine turned a bit crunchy and hard. I might have overcooked them or something but I’m not sure. They are still good though!

    1. Hi Hannah, they are simply delicious. Give them a try and let me know how you like them. Thanks for visiting the site, too!

  2. Must. make. these. immediately. They sound incredible! What’s not to love about chocolate with PB?! And loving the muscovado sugar add-in!

  3. 5 stars
    Just shoot me now. This is PURE torture looking at these.

    And one batch makes 48? I think you are my hero. 🙂

    1. Yep, 48 of these bad boys, so 24 of them went into a freezer bag for another bake session or I’d have been called a cookie abuser. The batter is so fluffy and they bake just tender enough to hold together and the flavors are so darn good.

      Like Nicole said to me the other day, “wouldn’t it be great if we all lived near each other to sample one another’s posts daily? LOL

  4. 5 stars
    Oh my gosh. These look absolutely PERFECT. I need to get my hands on some muscovado sugar and make these STAT!

  5. 5 stars
    Like Dorothy, I don’t like straight up peanut butter but I love its flavor when it’s baked into cookies. My mouth is watering just reading the post!

    1. Thanks Nicole, your Spice Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting and Bourbon Sauce the other day had me doing the same! Luckily I froze half of this dough for another bake session later or I’d, I mean we, would have eaten them all. 😉

  6. Hey Kevin! I love peanut butter cookies, cake, candy – but I don’t like straight up peanut butter. I think it’s more the texture or the fact that when I was young and babysitting during the summers for a family with three kids, their mother always had me feed them PB&J sandwiches for lunch, which meant that’s what I had. I will definitely be making these (and I am sure Nagi will too)!

    1. Hi Dorothy! I’m a huge peanut butter fan, but it’s gotta be chunky if it’s on my toast! As for mixing it into other foods, it’s so versatile and these are no exception.

  7. 5 stars
    These are my kind of cookie! I just cooked the last of the cookie balls I had in the freezer – trying these next!

    1. I do the same thing, freeze half the dough for another time otherwise, and this is just me, I would eat them all. 🙂

  8. Kevin, could you please box some up and ship them stat?! I bet that really dark brown sugar in this recipe adds so much flavor, and peanut butter is my absolute favorite cookie! I know I would love these!

    1. You can make these in minutes… just think, by noon you could be snacking on fresh from the oven cookies! 🙂

  9. My mouth is literally watering right now, Kevin. I love muscovado brown sugar, and then you went and combined that with chocolate + peanut butter. This sounds like my heaven in cookie form right here. Well done! Oh, and I hope you guys enjoyed your trip out East! #WolfpackTravelingCookieShow

    1. DC and Baltimore were fantastic, albeit it was too quick of a trip. It was my first time officiating a wedding, so that was a first, too! As for these cookies, I am glad I used the muscovado as it just added another layer of flavor here that worked so well. Also, been loving your #Wolfpack… hashtags!