The Easiest Peanut Butter Cookies
This recipe for the easiest peanut butter cookies you'll ever make involves one bowl, melted butter, no mixer, and no chilling. It delivers soft, intensely flavored peanut butter cookies every time!
Servings 20 cookies
Ingredients
- 6 Tablespoons (85g) unsalted butter
- ⅔ cup (132g) brown sugar (packed)
- ½ cup (130g) peanut butter*
- 1 large egg (50g)
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 1/4 cup (156g) all-purpose flour**
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.
- In a large microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter and peanut butter together (this takes about 45 seconds to 1 minute in my microwave). Stir until there is one homogenous melted butter-peanut butter mixture, then whisk in brown sugar. My whisk of choice is actually a fork, but a normal whisk works too.
- Whisk in egg and vanilla until mixture is well-combined. Add the salt and baking soda, and whisk until fully incorporated.
- Add the flour and stir with a fork or spatula until a fairly stiff dough is formed. You may need to put in some elbow grease with the spatula or your hands to get it to come together, but it will.
- Scoop dough using a tablespoon cookie scoop, then roll it between your palms to create a smooth dough ball. Place on the cookie sheet then press down gently using the tines of a fork to form a criss-cross or hashtag pattern. Repeat with remaining cookie dough balls, spacing 2 inches apart on the cookie sheets. Sprinkle granulated sugar over the cookies before baking if desired.
- Bake for 10 minutes, until the cookies are slightly puffed and smelling amazing. Enjoy!
Notes
*Peanut butter: conventional or natural peanut butter both work. Natural peanut butter tends to produce slightly grainier cookies, but either result is delicious so pick your favorite. You could substitute any nut butter (like almond butter or cashew butter), or seed butter (like sunflower seed butter or tahini) in place of the peanut butter.
**Note on measuring flour: for best results, please make sure you either weigh your flour using the gram measurements OR if you don't have a kitchen scale, use the “spoon and level” method for measuring flour, rather than using your measuring cup to scoop flour directly from the bag.
Storage: Cookies will keep (and stay soft!), stacked in an airtight container at room temperature, for up to 5 days. You can tightly wrap and freeze baked cookies for up to 3 months. To freeze cookie dough for later, scoop, roll, flatten and then freeze the cookie dough on a plate or baking sheet for 30 minutes, then keep in a freezer bag and bake cookies directly from frozen, adding 2 minutes to the baking time.
Customizations:
- Add-ins: feel free to add 1/2 cup (85g) of chocolate chips or chopped nuts to the cookie dough; note this will make it difficult to do the criss-cross pattern but you can skip it! You could also make these into PB&J cookies by adding a swirl of jam on top of each cookie before or after baking.
- Make it egg-free: Pick one of the following substitutes: (i) one flax egg (1 Tablespoon (6g) ground flaxseed + 2.5 Tablespoons water, mixed and let sit for 5 minutes to form a gel), or (ii) 1/4 cup (63g) unsweetened applesauce, or (iii) 1/4 cup (56g) thick Greek yogurt. Use in place of the egg and whisk into the wet ingredients.
- Make it gluten-free: substitute an equal weight (156g) of gluten-free oat flour or a gluten-free all-purpose flour mix that contains xanthan gum. I’ve tested and like Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free 1:1 Baking Flour.
- Make it vegan: use vegan butter and one of the egg substitutes listed above.
