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These Brown Butter Bourbon Pecan Chocolate Chunk Cookies are crunchy, chewy, and SO flavorful! The perfect holiday cookie recipe. And a must try for bourbon lovers!
Brown Butter Bourbon Cookies
Yesterday I made a batch of blueberry bourbon hand pies and realized upon cleaning up that our bottle of bourbon was almost empty. It had less than 3 tablespoons left… so instead of putting it back on the bar cart, I decided to test a cookie recipe I’ve been dreaming about for a while now. Brown Butter Bourbon Pecan Chocolate Chunk Cookies! I figured I’d play around with the recipe and then share them sometime in the Fall, because let’s be honest… these beauties are holiday baking material! But the results turned out SO epic that I knew I couldn’t keep them from you all Summer.
Because cookies this good wait for no season! So without further ado, I present you with brown butter bourbon chocolate chunk pecan cookies!
Each bite is crunchy, chewy, flavorful, and lightly spiked with bourbon! And don’t worry… you’re not going to get a buzz from these beauties. But the bourbon does add a special flavor that really shines through! Everyone will want to know what the “secret ingredient” is!
Tips and Tricks for Recipe Success:
- First of all, let me ask you a question: do you know how to brown butter? If you do, feel free to skip this lecture. But if you don’t, I’ve got you covered! Browning butter is insanely simple and I’m going to walk you through each step! To brown butter you’ll need a skillet or saute pan, butter, and a little patience. You’ll melt the butter as normal, then continue to cook it over medium heat – stirring occasionally – until it reaches a golden brown color. Watch your butter closely as it browns, because it can burn easily! Once it’s nice and golden brown, remove it from the heat and pour it into a heatproof bowl – being sure to scrape all of the golden bits off the bottom of the pan. And that’s it! Easy, right?
- You can use any brand of bourbon you want. We use bulleit because it’s what we usually have on our bar cart.
- Make sure you finely chop your pecans before toasting them.
- For decoration, you can press a pecan on top of the cookie dough before they bake. You can also sprinkle the cookies with a little sea salt right when they come out of the oven for a sweet and salty flavor combo.
- Finally, be sure you don’t over bake these cookies! They only need about 12 minutes in the oven, and will firm up quite a bit as they cool. Over baked cookies will be dry and crumbly… not chewy like we want!
Sweet, salty, crunchy, gooey, and BOOZY… who says you can’t have it all!?
More Cookie Recipes:
- Bourbon Molasses Cookies
- Brown Butter Bourbon Butter Pecan Chocolate Chunk Blondies
- Butter Pecan Cookies
More Pecan Recipes:
- No Corn Syrup Pecan Pie
- Bourbon Pecan Brownies
- 6-Ingredient Butter Pecan Fudge
- Overnight Pecan Pie French Toast
Brown Butter Bourbon Pecan Chocolate Chunk Cookies
Ingredients
For the Buttered Pecans:
- 1 and 1/2 cups (170 grams) pecan halves, finely chopped
- 1 and 1/2 tablespoons (24 grams) unsalted butter
For the Brown Butter Bourbon Pecan Chocolate Chunk Cookies:
- 2 sticks (226 grams) unsalted butter, melted until browned
- 2 and 1/2 cups (300 grams) all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon (5 grams) salt
- 1/2 teaspoon (1 gram) ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 cup (213 grams) dark brown sugar, packed
- 1/2 cup (99 grams) granulated sugar
- 2 teaspoons (8 grams) vanilla extract
- 3 Tablespoons (42 grams) bourbon
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 8 ounces semi-sweet OR dark chocolate, roughly chopped into chunks
- 24 pecan halves, for decoration, optional
- 1 Tablespoon flaky sea salt, optional
Instructions
For the Buttered Pecans:
- Melt butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add in chopped pecans and cook, stirring occasionally, for 4 to 5 minutes, or until lightly toasted. Set aside until needed.
For the Brown Butter:
- In a saucepan, over medium heat, melt the butter. Continue to cook the butter. swirling the pan occasionally. Keep a close eye here. The top of the butter should become foamy. And you should hear tiny popping noises. The butter will develop into a rich amber color, with tiny brown bits at the bottom. And it will have a slightly nutty aroma. Once the butter reaches this stage, remove from heat immediately and pour into a large mixing bowl.
For the Brown Butter Bourbon Pecan Chocolate Chunk Cookies:
- In a large bowl combine flour, salt, cinnamon, baking soda, and baking powder; whisk well to combine then set aside until needed.
- In a large bowl using a handheld electric mixer, or in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine melted browned butter and both sugars and beat on medium-speed until well combined; about 1 minutes.
- Add in the vanilla and bourbon and beat until combined.
- Add in the eggs, one at a time, beating for 15 seconds after each addition. Turn mixer off. Using a wooden spoon or sturdy rubber spatula, gently fold in the flour, stirring only until the flour begins to disappear. Fold in the chocolate chunks and buttered pecans.
- Cover bowl and refrigerate for 4 hours.
To Bake:
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees (F). Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Using a large cookie scoop, divide the dough into 3-tablespoon sized balls and place onto prepared baking sheets, leaving about 3 inches between each ball of dough for spreading.
- Firmly press a pecan half on top of each ball of cookie dough.
- Bake, one tray at a time, in a preheated oven for 12 minutes, or until golden brown. If any edges spread out while baking, use a spatula and gently press them back in as soon as you remove the cookies from the oven.
- Press extra chocolate chunks and pecans pieces on top of warm cookies. Then sprinkle with sea salt.
- Allow cookies to cool on the pan for 15 minutes, then carefully transfer to a cooling rack.
Hi Ashley-
Huge fan, here! I’ve made these cookies before and once again, your recipe is a GEM the way it is… Question: I’m wanting to make up a couple of batches of these cookies and freeze for the holidays.
Any suggestions on the freezing method? Go ahead and roll them out into balls and freeze? I guess my biggest concern is the browned butter. I’ve frozen plenty of cookies before but none that have ever had brown butter in them.
Thanks for any advice you can give me!
-Mallory
Hi Mallory! You can totally roll these into balls and freeze them! I would just set them out on the counter as your oven preheats (this allows them to come to room temperature a bit), and maybe add an extra minute or two on the baking time 🙂
If you’re in the Boston area, i’ve got you covered. Email [email protected]
How mportant is it the butter is unsalted?
Just curious, what kind of chocolate do you use?
Lindt 70% Chocolate Bars.
I usually use Lindt chocolate bars, 70% cocoa 🙂
I cut one fifth of the sugars out because we like our sweets not “that sweet” and I had only salted butter (I also doubled the recipe) and this cookie recipe IS AMAZING!!!!! Next time I’ll add more burbon, too. But the cookies are outstanding! The browned butter sure has its influence. Compliments!
I’ve used brown butter in other cookie recipes and mixed it all up straight away but then refrigerated the final dough for at least 2 hours (up to 24, ideally). Could that be done here, too?
These are absolutely delicious… WITHOUT THE CINNAMON! The amount called for in this recipe is excessive and completely overwhelms the flavor of everything else. I made a batch without it and they were some of the best cookies I’ve ever made. If you feel you MUST add cinnamon, I seriously recommend that you use no more than 1/4 to 1/2 tsp.
These cookies are AMAZING!! Enough said. They do take some work but they are definitely worth it.
Hi Michelle! So happy you enjoyed these cookies as much as we do 🙂
My biggest critic. My mother said they were good. Just have to reduce the time to may be 7-8 minutes. 9 minutes in my oven was too long.
Thank you for the recipe
I am searching for cookies I can send to my Marine to share with his platoon and these sound amazing!
My plan is to freeze then vacuum-seal before I ship and since it’s overseas there will be a minimum of 10 days to get there.
Do you think these will make it?
Hi Laura! That’s such a sweet idea! I might suggest leaving the chocolate chunks out, as they could melt during the journey. Unless you’re adding some sort of cooling to the package.
When I sent cookies overseas to the middle east, the usps made me sign a form that said no alcoholic ingredients were to be included in the package. Just fyi.
the alcohol cooks out 🙂
Well as the wife of a sailor who did several deployments. if you put each cookie in a fold top sandwich bag they will travel well. As a bonus if it is hot where theu are its like they just came out of oven.
try packing them in real popcorn
I have always shipped my cookies in plane popped popcorn. The popcorn will absorb humidity/moisture and keep your cookie fresh without changing their flavor or texture.
Wow thanks for the tip!
Great idea! Thank you!
Yes. Send cookies to my Navy girls over seas and they have to fight for their own box. You will be the favorite Mom. I used zip sandwich bags.
Interested in this, the bourbon cooks out, correct? so just want to make sure I don’t get my son and his group in trouble 🙂
Alcohol will cook.out only leaving the flavor behind.
Alcohol doesn’t fully cook out. That is a myth to a certain extent. You’d have to cook them for a really long time for the alcohol to completely leave the cookie.
so, made these today–and they didnt relax. They stayed in a more mound shape…I used King arthur flour which may have more proten in it…but. The cookies didnt look like these. More of a scone shape. I used an exact scoop…375- 9 min.
I know they are Bourbon cookies, but I don’t drink at all, and I’d prefer to make them without alcohol. Is there a close substitute for bourbon? A way to mimic a similar taste with spices, etc.