These crisp peanut butter cookies are old-fashioned style with crunchy, crumbly edges and soft-baked centers.
Peanut butter lovers rejoice! This cookie is for you.
I made a huge batch of these classic cookies for the weekend. These peanut butter cookies will melt in your mouth. The edges are chewy, the centers are soft, the tops are crinkly.
This is a super basic recipe. A classic cookie, holding a top spot near chocolate chip cookies and sugar cookies. No frills, nothing fancy. No candy bar pieces, gooey caramel, chocolate chips, or sprinkles to take away from the massive peanut butter flavor. Trust me, you won’t miss any of that stuff! Just pure peanut butter. By the way, if you want EXTRA peanut butter flavor, you must make these very peanut butter cookies. Twice the peanut butter!
Today’s cookies are large with crisp crunchy edges and soft-baked centers. For a smaller cookie that’s completely soft, I recommend my regular peanut butter cookies. That dough serves as the base for other favorites like peanut butter blossoms and peanut butter chocolate swirl cookies.
The most important part of today’s recipe? Chill your cookie dough! The dough is extremely soft due to the creamy peanut butter, eggs, and butter and if it’s not cold going into the oven, the cookies will spread all over your baking sheet. I chilled this cookie dough for 24 hours and my cookies were soft, thick perfection. I recommend chilling the dough for at least 3 hours.
Crisp Peanut Butter Cookies
- Prep Time: 3 hours, 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 11 minutes
- Total Time: 3 hours, 30 minutes
- Yield: 30 cookies
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
These classic peanut butter cookies are always a hit. Easy to make, easier to eat!
Ingredients
- 1 cup (16 Tbsp; 226g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature*
- 1 cup (200g) granulated sugar
- 3/4 cup (150g) packed light brown sugar
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1 cup (250g) creamy peanut butter*
- 3 cups (375g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- optional: 1/3 cup (67g) granulated sugar, for rolling
Instructions
- Using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment, cream the softened butter and both sugars together on medium speed until smooth. Add the eggs and mix on high until combined, about 1 minute. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl as needed. Add the vanilla and peanut butter and mix on high until combined. Set aside.
- In a separate bowl, toss the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt together. Add to the wet ingredients and mix on low until combined. Dough will be thick, yet very sticky. Cover dough tightly and chill for at least 3 hours (and up to 2 days) in the refrigerator.
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
- Roll balls of dough (about 1.5 Tablespoons or 27-30g of dough per cookie) and roll into granulated sugar. Place 2 inches apart on the baking sheets. Press fork into the tops to create the criss-cross pattern. Bake for 12–13 minutes or until very lightly browned on the sides. The centers will look very soft and undone. Remove from the oven and let cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely. The cookies will continue to “set” on the baking sheet during this time.
Notes
- Make Ahead & Freezing Instructions: Cookies stay fresh covered at room temperature for up to 1 week. You can make the cookie dough and chill it in the refrigerator for up to 2 days. Allow to come to room temperature and continue with step 3. Baked cookies freeze well—up to 3 months. Unbaked cookie dough balls freeze well—up to 3 months. Bake frozen cookie dough balls for an extra minute, no need to thaw. Read my tips and tricks on how to freeze cookie dough.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand) | Glass Mixing Bowl | Whisk | Baking Sheets | Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Paper | Cooling Rack
- Room Temperature Ingredients: Make sure you have room temperature butter, not melted in the slightest. Do not soften in the microwave—that makes it sort of melty and greasy. Place out 1 hour before beginning. Room temperature eggs are preferred. Good rule of thumb: always use room temperature eggs when using room temperature butter.
- Peanut Butter: Chunky peanut butter works as well. I do not suggest using natural style, oily peanut butter. Brands such as Jif or Skippy work best.
- Be sure to check out my top 5 cookie baking tips AND these are my 10 must-have cookie baking tools.
Reader Comments and Reviews
Just want to say that I made 6 dozen of these at Christmas. Took them to work. They were gone by noon!!! By popular demand I’m making more for tomorrow hahaha. Rave reviews from co-workers. I think they had cookies for lunch…Thanks for this recipe!
Well my all time favorite cookie did not turn out perfect 🙁 I do think my mistake was leaving my butter out too long. I found that when mixing my sugars and butter, it stayed oily and gritty looking. After refrigerating overnight, I ended up with a “bready” texture or maybe a short bread cookie. Maybe my flour measurement was off? Could the too soft butter have been the culprit? Definitely did not end up with a soft chewy cookie.
I fear the butter was much too soft. You should have a creamy butter/sugar mixture after the creaming step. I would also pay attention to your flour measurement as well. Spoon and level; do not scoop your flour.
These were absolutely delicious! Soft, chewy, and perfect!
This is the first time I have ever made home made peanut butter cookies and I am so glad I found this recipe. They are so good. I don’t really care for crunchy cookies and thank goodness these turn out soft. Thanks for sharing the recipe 🙂
Can you use salted butter if you don’t put in the salt?
Yes, omit the salt.
My son LOVES these cookies with Butterscotch Chips inside. It is also yum with led butter and Moore PB, great recipe though. I passed over both Martha Stewart and Food Network in favor of this recipe because it most jogged my memory of my Mom’s old greasy, hand written recipe card:)
Hi Sally,
Hello from Sr Lanka. Love your blog. Tried these cookies and they came out perfect! Halved the recipe; chilled for a day ; used Jiffy creamy peanut butter. Thank you so much for everything you do and for sharing your passion with us!
These cookies are amazing!!! Thank you for all of your extra tips…room temp. eggs and butter and refrigerating the dough before baking 🙂 These were a huge hit with my family. I will definitely be making these again!
I made these for my husband’s birthday and coated one half of the cookie in chocolate with crushed peanuts. SO delicious and absolutely devoured. Thanks for another go-to cookie recipe.
I made a batch of these cookies and they were amazingly delicious!!! 😀 I never thought I could bake, and certainly not cookies, and then I came across your site and saw all of these delicious peanut butter recipes and have been hooked since! 😀 I’ve just tried the peanut butter cupcakes today with dark chocolate frosting and they were extremely delicious as well!! Thank you very much Sally for sharing these wonderful recipes (and in particular these delicious Peanut Butter recipes!!) 😀
Hi Sally, do you think I could add peanut butter chips?
Definitely– maybe around 1 – 1.25 cups.
OMG! Just made these and they are ah-mazing! I love soft cookies and these are super puffy and soft! Thanks for all of your recipes! I haven’t tried a bad one yet!!
I made these cookies last night and for some reason (even my husband said so) the taste of butter was SO over powering. Any ideas? I re-read the recipe three times to make sure I didn’t miss anything or skip a step, etc. Thanks Sally!
Hi! I love this recipe and mine turn out delicious every time but the criss crosses always inflate and become unrecognizable! This happens with every peanut butter cookie recvipe I have tried. Any suggestions would be appreciated. To me it isn’t a proper peanut butter cookie without the criss cross!
These look amazing! 🙂 I have a quick question though: all I have at home is a jar of natural peanut butter. The whole reason for making pb cookies is that I want to use it up, rather than going out to buy a brand new jar of the other stuff.
Would using the natural peanut butter after all affect the consistency of the dough or how long I should bake the cookie, etc.?
Jane, using an oily natural style peanut butter may either (1) make the cookies a little crumbly and/or (2) make the cookies spread too much. Without doing much testing with natural PB myself, I can’t say how to avoid any of this.
I very seldom go back and comment on a recipe but this one is a winner! Best PB Cookie recipe I’ve ever tasted. Husband is hard to get a reaction from but he was quite vocal on how good they are! Five stars!!!
Made these cookies today and they are absolutely delicious 🙂
hi sally!
i’ve made a BUNCH of your recipes already :] and going to make these peanut butter cookies for a thanksgiving potluck!
if i wanted to add chocolate chips to this recipe, should i make any adjustments?
thank you!
Hi Connie! Nope, just add the chocolate chips right into the dough after you’ve mixed the dry and wet ingredients together. I would go with 1 cup chocolate chips.
Hi Sally! I’m looking for a certain texture in a classic pb cookie … want a slightly crispy, crumbly cookie (not soft). I made this dough and baked up a few tonight after chilling it – I patted them a bit flat and then pressed down with fork tines. And baked for about 11mins; they were still a bit on the softer side. How do I make them crispier? Shall I try pressing them even flatter? Baking longer?
Faye, I suggest baking for 2 extra minutes to obtain that texture.
Just made these cookies for the first time. Great recipe, however I would suggest not chilling the dough. I made some last night before chilling because I was impatient. The dough wasn’t sticky and they turned out perfect. The dough that I chilled is very hard and I am now waiting for it it thaw enough to be rolled into balls. My refrigerator is not very cold, so I am surprised this happened. Would definitely make again without the chilling period.
Can I bake these in their ball shape without criss-crossing them on the top with the fork?
Yes
Best PB cookie recipe I’ve found yet! I make these bi-weekly and send them to my soldier who is overseas. He shared them with the other guys in his unit and they loved them! Thank you so much! 🙂
I would like to make these can I substitute almond butter for the peanut butter
Yes, that would be fine.
I have to admit, usually when I find recipes online I “kinda” follow them because I love to experiment in the kitchen. However, these looked so damn delicious that I wanted to replicate it. They were delicious!
On a side note, I was so impressed with the recipe that I did a little blog tour and I think it’s wonderful that you have a section dedicated to blogging tips for beginners!
I made these a few nights ago and they were AWESOME! I added some chocolate chips of course, and upped the amount of peanut butter because I’m obsessed with it (peanut butter should have its own food group ). They were the best cookies I’ve ever had, thanks for your awesome recipes! I’m always so excited to see what you post next (:
Sally- these are HANDS DOWN the best peanut butter cookies I have ever had!! I followed the recipe exactly as you have it (I baked for 12 min…my oven can be finicky) and they have come out perfectly. Soft and mouth-wateringly delicious! I’ve had to stop myself at 6 cookies. At least until after dinner. My 4 year old has also snuck at least 3 on top of the 2 I gave her already…Definitely signs of a SURE hit.
Like a fellow Canadian mentioned, I too used Kraft peanut butter and did not have any issues with the dough being dry.
Thank you thank you for such a hit and all the best with your upcoming wedding!
These were simply amazing and true to the original! It brought me back to my childhood when peanut butter cookies were the first cookies I used to bake. A favorite of my dad and I it just brought back sweet memories in my mom’s kitchen and the snack cart in Elementary school.
I have been searching for a recipe forever and have tried others and either they don’t taste like peanut butter or are too crispy not soft enough. I remember a peanut butter cookie should be soft yet a bit of crunch with a flavorful peanut butter taste and you nailed it.
This recipe can be baked any size and I even added some chocolate chips to the next day’s batch, yum! And included the criss cross accent of course!
I sent you the pic on Twitter I baked for my dad and he loved them!! Thanks for your sweet reply and thanks for being so super generous with your recipes. My faves so far are of course the Classic Peanut Butter, Oatmeal Raisinets, White Chocolate Macadamia Nut and Inside Out Cookies. Can’t wait to try your Snicker-doodle, Almond Raspberry Blossom and Peanut Butter Cup Blossoms!
You are a Baking Genius!
Hugs~
Made these yesterday, and so far have had some for breakfast, lunch and dinner lol! SO good….This is going to be my ‘starred’ peanut butter cookie recipe now 🙂
I have just baked these cookies for the 1st time and they are to die for. Thanks for a great recipe.
I made these today, however the dough turned out pretty dry, before putting the dough in the fridge it wasn’t very sticky. I just took them out from chilling the dough, and the dough is just crumbling. Any idea why that would’ve happened? So disappointed! :(. I didn’t change anything from the recipe, followed it exactly. Can you please let me know , as I’d love to try making them again.. Thanks so much!!
Lisa, what brand peanut butter did you use? That has everything to do with the result of your dough. I always use Jif creamy (not crunchy peanut butter). You may try to reduce the flour by 2 Tablespoons.