Everyday Chocolate Chip Cookies are soft, chewy, and so delicious! Made with brown butter, they’re extra flavorful. Kids and adults love these chewy chocolate chip cookies!
Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe
Like many bakers, I’ve been searching for the perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe for years now! And finally, after months of testing and tweaking, my search is over! Because these cookies are the total package!
Best Chocolate Chip Cookies
Here’s what I love so much about these cookies:
- They’re made with basic ingredients most people have in their kitchens all of the time. No crazy expensive or hard to find ingredients for this recipe!
- The method is straightforward. Meaning bakers of all levels can bake these cookies! Yay!
- Brown Butter!!! AKA liquid gold. AKA my secret to the best chocolate chip cookies! And if you’ve never made brown butter before, don’t fret. It’s so easy and anyone can do it!
- No chilling the cookie dough! Although you do have to chill the butter. But once that’s done, you can roll and bake!
- They bake up thick, chewy, and exploding with gooey chocolate chips!!! And Did I mention the crispy edges and soft centers? Ooooooh, and the daintiest hint of sea salt that gives enough pop for developed palates but doesn’t freak out toddlers!? Yeah. It’s all there.
How to make Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients:
- butter: salted or unsalted butter will work. If you use unsalted, just add a tiny extra pinch of salt to the dry ingredients.
- all purpose flour: flour absorbs the wet ingredients. Just be sure not to pack the flour into the measuring cup. And I don’t suggest using whole wheat or any other type of flour for this recipe.
- baking soda: gives the cookies a nice little puff so that they’re not completely flat.
- sea salt: a small amount balances out the other flavors. If you don’t have sea salt, table salt will work.
- white granulated sugar and brown sugar: brown sugar makes the cookies moist and chewy, while the granulated sugar helps the cookies spread. I prefer dark brown sugar, but light brown will work.
- vanilla extract: enhances all of the other flavors in the cookies.
- eggs: add flavor, structure, and height to the cookies. Make sure your eggs are at room temperature before adding them to the cookie dough.
- and chocolate chips: I like using a combination of milk chocolate, semi-sweet chocolate, and dark chocolate chips. But you can really play around here! I’ve used all one variety. And I’ve even added white chocolate and peanut butter chips! Just don’t skimp on the amount! Use 2 and 1/2 cups.
Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe
- The first step is melting and browning the butter. Place the butter in a small saucepan and melt the butter. Continue cooking until the butter is lightly browned, and smells slightly nutty. Remove from heat and scrape the butter into a heatproof bowl. Place the bowl in the refrigerator and bring the butter back to room temperature. This will take about 2 hours! If you chill it longer than that, you may need to soften the butter a bit. You want it solid, but soft enough that when you gently press it with your finger it leaves an indentation. It’s so important that your butter is at the proper temperature before you begin baking. If it’s too warm, your cookies will bake up flat and spread all over the pan
- Once your butter is ready, it’s time to bake! Unlike most recipes where you preheat oven to 350, you’ll actually want to preheat the oven to 375 degrees (F).
- Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.
- In a large bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Set these dry ingredients aside until needed.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the brown butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Add in the vanilla and beat smooth. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. You can also use a large bowl and electric mixer for this step.
- Turn the mixer off and fold in the dry ingredients and chocolate chips.
- Roll cookie dough into balls. I like to make the cookie dough balls pretty big, about 3 or 4 tablespoons. But you can make them any size you want. Just adjust the time according to the size of your cookies. Big cookies will need more time to bake, while smaller cookies will need less.
- Place them on the prepared baking sheet and bake! About 10 to 11 minutes should do it! You’ll know the cookies are done when they’re golden brown at the edges but still soft in the middle. Let cookies cool for 10 minutes on the baking sheet before transferring to a wire racks to cool completely.
Pro Tip: If you’d like your chocolate chip cookies to look like the ones you see in my photos, simply press a few chocolate chips on top of each cookie right after they come out of the oven. You can also sprinkle them with sea salt! I love Maldon sea salt because it’s flaky and delish.
We brought these chocolate chip cookies to our beach house a few weeks ago and the kids (and adults!) finished them in a matter of hours. These chocolate chip cookies are teenager, toddler, and mother-in-law approved… and that is, well, that’s saying a lot! They’re so good with a big glass of milk! But you can also use them to make homemade ice cream sandwiches!
More Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipes:
- The Most Wonderful Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies Ever
- S’mores Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Bite-Sized Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Soft Batch Double Chocolate Fudge Cookies
Everyday Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients
- 14 tablespoons salted butter
- 2 and 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon flaky sea salt
- 1 cup + 2 tablespoons dark brown sugar, packed
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 cup milk chocolate chips
- 1 cup dark chocolate chips
- 1/2 cup bittersweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- Place the butter in a small sauce pan over medium-high heat and cook for about 2 minutes - stirring almost constantly - until the butter has completely melted and lightly browned. Remove from heat and scrape butter (and any brown specks) into a heatproof bowl. Place the bowl in the refrigerator and bring the butter back to room temperature; this will take about an hour to an hour and a half.
- Once the butter is at room temperature...
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees (F). Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside.
- In a medium sized bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda, and sea salt; set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, add the chilled brown butter and both sugars; beat on medium speed for about 2 minutes, or until light and fluffy. Add in the vanilla and beat smooth. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Turn the mixer off.
- Gently fold in the flour mixture with a wooden spoon, stirring only until the flour begins to disappear. Fold in chocolate chips.
- Roll 3 tablespoon sized balls of dough between your palms to form a ball (they should be big; almost a 1/4 cup), then place on prepared sheet (make sure to leave enough room in between each cookie for inevitable spreading). Continue this process until all the dough has been rolled. Place baking sheets in preheated oven - one at a time - and bake for 10 to 11 minutes, or until golden at the edges but still soft in the middle. Let cookies cool for 10 minutes on the sheet before transferring to a wire wrack to cool completely.
These are insanely good. Question, can i freeze the dough for big batches?
The best cookies I’ve eaten.
Just perfect OMG !!
Yay! So happy these were the perfect cookie for you, Debo 🙂
These are so stinkin good!
Seriously the best! The browned butter, 3 different kinds of chocolate, extra vanilla and salted butter makes these so good!
Mine came out perfect and I used gluten free flour.
* I just wanted to add I do not understand the person who said this was too many chocolate chips! Why are you making a chocolate recipe then? Go make sugar cookies.
These were really good and I would make again, but I don’t understand the point of putting the butter in the Refrigerator after it was melted. It only solidified and I had to melt it in the microwave later. I Would also only use 2 cups of chips next time. 2 1/2 was too many.
These are the best chocolate chip cookies ever! I normally do not eat cookie dough, but I can’t help it!! Any thoughts on making this a dip?
Ohhhh my goodness, these are delicious! I made them for a coworker’s birthday, and I’m going to have to make some more for my family! I was a little worried, because my butter did not seem to brown, and the finished cookies are more pale than your pictures, but, man! They taste perfect! Definitely done enough but still very soft, super chunky and rich, and huge! Will definitely make again!
I followed the recipe and my cookies didn’t spread upon baking and stayed looking like balls of dough. I was so disappointed. I don’t know what I didn’t wrong
Can you please tell me if it’s better to freeze the dough then bake cookies or freeze cookies after baking and cooling?
all I have is unsalted butter so will that work