Peanut butter cookies are humble, homey and old-time-y. They make me think of after school snacks – a plate of cookies and a tall glass of frosty milk – or the picnics my Mom used to pack for summer road trips to the lake, with everything wrapped in little waxed-paper packets, mysteries to be unwrapped.
And the aroma while they’re baking is like a soft warm blanket enveloping your senses.
This dough has a high flour content, relative to the amount of butter. This gives the cookies a shortbread-like consistency – tender and crumbly, a little bit sandy, they shatter in your mouth before dissolving on your tongue. IMO, the perfect texture for a peanut butter cookie. Because of this, though, be careful measuring the flour so you don’t go overboard. I always recommend weighing flour when baking (see the FAQ on my About page for more information on this) – and for these cookies it’s imperative.
Spoon out the dough in egg-sized balls, then use a fork dipped in sugar to gently flatten them and give them the classic cross-hatched pattern on top. I like to use my fingers to neaten up the edges after flattening them, so they don’t have misshapen, craggy borders.
Bake just until the edges look golden brown – don’t let them get too dark or they’ll have a burnt taste.
Making these ahead and what to do with leftovers:
- Peanut Butter Cookies will stay fresh for a week if stored in an air-tight container, so make them ahead or keep leftovers within that time frame. You can freeze them, however they’re fragile, so pack them carefully to avoid breaking them.
Peanut Butter Cookies
Ingredients
- 1¾ cup (7 3/8 ounces or 210 grams) all-purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon Diamond Crystal kosher salt (or ¼ teaspoon Morton’s)
- ½ cup (8 tablespoons, 4 ounces or 113 grams) unsalted butter (preferably European-style), softened
- ¾ cup (6¾ ounces or 190 grams) smooth peanut butter
- 1 tablespoon neutral oil, such as expeller-pressed canola oil
- ½ cup brown sugar
- ½ cup granulated sugar, plus additional for finishing the cookies
- 1 large egg, at room temperature
Directions
- Step 1 Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line two large baking sheets with parchment.
- Step 2 Combine the flour, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl.
- Step 3 In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter, peanut butter and oil together until well blended.
- Step 4 Add the brown sugar and ½ cup of granulated sugar and beat on medium speed until the mixture is light and fluffy. Beat in the egg. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula and beat briefly to make sure the mixture is thoroughly blended.
- Step 5 Add the dry ingredients and mix, pulsing the machine at first to keep the flour from flying out of the bowl, then increasing to low speed to mix just until the flour is incorporated.
- Step 6 Use a cookie scoop or soup spoon to scoop out golf-ball-sized balls of dough. Roll each ball of dough gently between your palms to form it into a smooth ball, and place the balls on the baking sheets, spacing them out evenly. Moisten a fork with water and dip it into granulated sugar, then use the fork to make a cross-hatch pattern on the top of each cookie, pressing gently. Gently smooth the edges of the cookies with your fingers to bring in any rough edges that would make the finished cookies misshapen.
- Step 7 Bake the cookies one sheet at a time for 15 minutes, or until the edges are light golden brown. Remove the baking sheet from the oven and let the cookies cool on the sheet for 5 minutes, then carefully transfer the cookies to a cooling rack to cool completely.
