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–+ servings
Chewy peanut butter cookies cooling on a wire rack, surrounded by unshelled peanuts and a pink cloth, ready to enjoy.

Truly Chewy Peanut Butter Cookies

Yield: 10 cookies
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Chill Time: 2 hours
Total Time: 2 hours 40 minutes
These peanut butter cookies are truly chewy. They have a slight crisp around the edges with a soft and chewy middle. If you're looking for a chewy peanut butter cookie, this is your recipe.

Ingredients

Instructions 

  • In a medium-sized bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt.
    1 ¼ cups all purpose flour, ½ teaspoon baking soda, ½ teaspoon salt
    image for recipe instruction: A metal whisk rests in a glass bowl filled with flour on a light-colored countertop, ready for mixing up a batch of chewy peanut butter cookies.
  • In a large mixing bowl, cream the brown sugar and butter using electric beaters for 1 minute, until creamy. Add the peanut butter, egg, egg yolk, and vanilla and beat until just combined.
    1 cup brown sugar, ½ cup unsalted butter, ½ cup unsalted peanut butter, 1 large egg, 1 egg yolk, 1 teaspoon vanilla
    image for recipe instruction: A glass bowl containing creamy brown batter for Chewy Peanut Butter Cookies is being mixed with an electric hand mixer on a light countertop.
  • Add the dry ingredients and beat just until there are no streaks of flour - do not overmix the dough.
    image for recipe instruction: A glass bowl filled with dough for chewy peanut butter cookies is being mixed by a hand mixer on a marble countertop.
  • Cover the dough with a piece of parchment or wax paper pressed into the top then put the bowl into your fridge for 2 hours. Do not skip this step - see notes.
    image for recipe instruction: A glass mixing bowl lined with crumpled parchment paper contains a pressed layer of crumb mixture—perfect for creating the base of chewy peanut butter cookies—on a white marble surface.
  • Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Use a large cookie or ice cream scoop (¼ cup) to portion the dough into five large balls and space them evenly on a cookie sheet. Do not roll them or press them down.
    image for recipe instruction: A metal baking sheet with five scoops of chewy peanut butter cookie dough and a metal ice cream scoop placed on the right side.
  • Bake the cookies for 15-16 minutes, then remove them from the oven and let them cool for 10 minutes on the baking sheet before moving them to a cooling rack. Repeat with the remaining dough, adding it to a cool baking sheet.
    image for recipe instruction: Five round Chewy Peanut Butter Cookies are evenly spaced on a silver baking sheet placed on a white marble surface.

Notes

Chilling the dough: This is an important step—do not skip it. If the dough is baked right away, it will be very soft, difficult to work with, and spread too much in the oven. For the best cookies, let the dough rest for at least 2 hours. 
Peanut butter: Processed peanut butter is one of the few foods I can't stand, so I don't keep it in my kitchen. This recipe was tested with a few different brands of smooth, natural peanut butter. It turned out well with all the brands, but Earth's Choice peanut butter made the chewiest peanut butter cookies. 
Size matters! I tested various-sized cookies, and ¼ cup portions made chewy cookies. Smaller ones taste great, but they aren't as chewy.
Serving: 1 cookie, Calories: 313kcal, Carbohydrates: 37g, Protein: 6g, Fat: 17g, Saturated Fat: 8g, Polyunsaturated Fat: 2g, Monounsaturated Fat: 6g, Trans Fat: 0.4g, Cholesterol: 62mg, Sodium: 189mg, Potassium: 130mg, Fiber: 1g, Sugar: 23g, Vitamin A: 337IU, Calcium: 35mg, Iron: 1mg