These oatmeal chocolate chip cookies are made with oats, butter, and brown sugar and are the softest, chewiest oatmeal cookies to come out of my kitchen. Use this perfect oatmeal cookie as the base for other add-ins such as raisins, dried cranberries, and nuts. Cinnamon and a touch of molasses add that little something extra.
I originally published this recipe in 2017 and have since added new photos and helpful success tips.
Today we’re mixing big chewy oats with the flavors of butter, brown sugar, a touch of molasses, a dash of cinnamon, and a mountain of chocolate chips.
One reader, Kelly commented: “These are hands down the best oatmeal choco chip cookies I’ve ever made! Soft and chewy, I followed the recipe exactly except for adding 1/2 cup chopped walnuts. Perfection. ★★★★★“
And another, Valerie, commented: “More compliments than I have ever heard from my family and friends, and I bake a lot! ★★★★★“
My Favorite Base Oatmeal Cookie Recipe
These soft & chewy oatmeal chocolate chip cookies start from my base oatmeal cookie recipe and it makes quite a few appearances in my cookbook, Sally’s Cookie Addiction. I’m a firm believer in having a handful of base recipes from which you can develop virtually hundreds of variations. For example: my standard muffin recipe. This chocolate cookie dough and this peanut butter cookie dough have both inspired quite a few spin offs as well.
The cookies have a slightly crisp edge with a soft center and enough chew that the cookie won’t immediately break when you bend it. A “slow bend cookie” as I like to call them—and this is the key difference between a regular oatmeal cookie and a really great oatmeal cookie.
They’re also:
- Supremely soft, buttery, and flavorful. Using more brown sugar than white helps guarantee a flavorful base.
- Super chewy thanks to old-fashioned oats. Thick whole rolled oats, not quick oats, guarantee a chewier cookie. Quick oats are finer; you simply don’t get the same texture.
- Loaded with chocolate chips. Lots of chocolate in every single bite. And for my fellow raisin lovers: try subbing in half raisins. The dough is pretty similar to my oatmeal raisin cookies.
- Taste just like grandma’s. I find the 1 Tablespoon of molasses is what makes these taste like grandma’s old-fashioned oatmeal cookies. I strongly encourage adding it.
About the molasses, one reader, Hannah, commented: “These cookies are FANTASTIC! I’ll admit, I was a little skeptical about adding the molasses, but it added a depth to the cookies that I wasn’t expecting. Bookmarking to use again for sure! ★★★★★“
Key Ingredients You Need & Why:
- Baking Soda: Baking soda helps the cookies rise and spread.
- Butter: Butter is the base of any delicious cookie recipe. Make sure you are using room-temperature butter.
- Brown Sugar & Granulated Sugar: Sugar is not only used for sweetness, but also for providing structure and tenderness. I like to use more brown sugar than white sugar because (1) it has incredible flavor and (2) it contains more moisture than white, which produces a softer cookie.
- Molasses: Molasses is my secret ingredient! 1 scant Tablespoon enhances all the wonderful flavors of these buttery, cinnamon-sweet cookies.
- Vanilla Extract, Cinnamon, & Salt: Each provide flavor. You can also top the cookies with a little flaky sea salt for more flavor.
- Oats: Oats provide a chewy texture, and there is no shortage in this dough! I use and recommend old fashioned whole oats here—just like I do for flourless peanut butter oatmeal cookies and big giant monster cookies.
How to Make Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
I especially love this recipe because the process is quick & simple—with minimal dough chilling.
Whisk the dry ingredients together. Just the flour, cinnamon, baking soda, and salt—you’ll add the oats later. Use an electric mixer for the wet ingredients, then add the dry ingredients and mix in the oats and chocolate chips.
The dough will be thick and sticky:
Chill the cookie dough. I recommend at least 45 minutes in the refrigerator, which helps prevent the cookies from overspreading.
How Large Do I Make the Cookies?
These are drop-style cookies, so scoop the dough and drop it onto the baking sheets. 1.5 Tablespoons (30g) for regular-size cookies, 2 T. (40g) for large cookies (pictured), or 3 T. (60g) for XL cookies!
Success Tip: Use a cookie scoop. Oatmeal cookie dough is super chunky and soft, and this one can get pretty sticky. A cookie scoop not only prevents a mess, it also helps ensure all cookies are the same size and shape.
The cookies are done when the edges are set and the centers still look soft. After baking, I like to lightly press a few more chocolate chips into the tops of the cookies while they’re still warm. This is optional and just for looks. I also add a light sprinkling of flaky sea salt, which, again, is optional.
Here are the 3 characteristics we should look for in oatmeal cookies: Slow bend, chewy goodness, and ultra soft. Check, check, check! Today’s cookies have it all.
And if you’re looking for a peanut butter version, try my peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies next! Or try the sweater-weather, festive-feeling cousin recipe, these big fat dark chocolate cranberry oatmeal cookies!
Print
Soft & Chewy Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Prep Time: 1 hour, 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 14 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour 24 minutes
- Yield: 32-35 cookies
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
With oats, butter, and mostly all brown sugar, you are guaranteed a soft and chewy oatmeal cookie. Use this perfect oatmeal cookie as the base for other add-ins such as raisins, dried cranberries, and nuts. Cinnamon and a touch of molasses add that little something extra. To prevent the cookies from over-spreading, don’t skip the brief dough refrigeration in step 4.
Ingredients
- 1 and 1/2 cups (188g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup (16 Tbsp; 226g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1 cup (200g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1/2 cup (100g) granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 Tablespoon (15ml) unsulphured or dark molasses (do not use blackstrap; I prefer Grandma’s brand)
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 3 cups (255g) old-fashioned whole rolled oats
- 1 and 3/4 cups (315g) semi-sweet chocolate chips
- optional: flaky sea salt for sprinkling
Instructions
- In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, cinnamon, baking soda, and salt together. Set aside.
- In a large bowl using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar together on medium-high speed until combined and creamed, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs, molasses, and vanilla and beat on high speed until combined, about 1 minute. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl and beat again as needed to combine.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix on low speed until combined. Beat in the oats and chocolate chips. Dough will be thick and sticky.
- Cover and refrigerate the dough for at least 45 minutes in the refrigerator (and up to 4 days). If chilling for longer than a few hours, allow to sit at room temperature for at least 30 minutes before rolling and baking because the dough will be quite firm.
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Line baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. Set aside.
- Use a medium cookie scoop to scoop the cookie dough, about 2 Tablespoons (40g) of dough per cookie, which is a heaping cookie scoop-ful, and place 3 inches apart on the baking sheets. Bake for 13–14 minutes or until lightly browned on the sides. The centers will look very soft.
- Remove from the oven and allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack to cool completely. While the cookies are still warm, I like to press a few more chocolate chips into the tops and sprinkle with flaky sea salt—both are optional!
- Cookies stay fresh covered at room temperature for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Make Ahead & Freezing Instructions: You can make the cookie dough and chill it in the refrigerator for up to 4 days. See step 4. Baked cookies freeze well for up to 3 months. Unbaked cookie dough balls freeze well for 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): Glass Mixing Bowl | Whisk | Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand) | Baking Sheets | Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Paper | Medium Cookie Scoop | Cooling Rack
- Molasses: 1 Tablespoon of molasses helps give these cookies incredible flavor. Be sure to use unsulphured or dark molasses (do not use blackstrap; I prefer Grandma’s brand). If you don’t have any, simply leave it out. Do not replace with anything else. Likewise, cinnamon adds flavor as well. Not necessary, but it sure is tasty!
- Different Size Cookies: Use 1.5 Tablespoons (30g) for regular-size cookies, 2 T. (40g) for large cookies (what is pictured), or 3 T. (60g) for XL cookies. The bake time will be a minute or so shorter for regular-size and a minute or so longer for XL cookies.
- Can I Add Raisins or Chopped Nuts? Yes, you can add either. I recommend 1 cup (180g) chocolate chips and 3/4 cup either raisins (110g) or chopped walnuts or pecans (100g).
Reader Comments and Reviews
These are delicious!!! Can I substitute the all-purpose flour with almond flour? I just bought a big bag at Costco for another recipe and I don’t want it to go to waste lol.
Hi Morgan! We don’t recommend almond flour as it has very different baking properties and is not always a 1:1 swap. We haven’t tested it, but you might have success experimenting with a gluten-free all-purpose flour like Bob’s Red Mill or Cup4Cup. If you give anything a try, we’d love to know how it goes for you!
I have a recipe for granola clusters that calls for almond flour, but I keep forgetting to buy some. Maybe you could make something like that.
I just made these, they are awesome. I did make them smaller and didn’t add extra chips.
These were delicious. Wish there was a nutritional panel, specifically calories and fat for one cookie. It wouldn’t ruin it for me. I just like to know.
Hi Marie, we’re so glad you enjoyed the cookies! We don’t usually include nutrition information as it can vary between different brands of the same ingredients. Plus, many recipes have ingredient substitutions or optional ingredients listed. However, there are many handy online calculators where you can plug in and customize your exact ingredients/brands. Readers have found this one especially helpful: https://www.verywellfit.com/recipe-nutrition-analyzer-4157076
Made these Oatmeal Chocolate Chip cookies with raisins. The flavor and textures are PERFECT! Half of the batch turned out rather flat though. I’m wondering if chilling them before baking or trying a slightly higher baking temperature would’ve helped avoid spreading out? I used real butter, fyi-and parchment paper, and followed all of the directions exactly. The second half of the batch, I rounded the dough scoops more intentionally, and that did seem to improve their shape.
Hi Pamela! We’re so glad you enjoyed these. It sounds like your butter may have been a bit too warm to start with. Chilling the dough again before baking would definitely help prevent spread. This post on how to prevent cookies from spreading will be helpful to review, too. Hope this helps for next time!
Awesome recipe!!! I used chopped walnuts and caramel chips and my cookies were outstanding.
Made your cookies today. Followed the recipe without making any changes. They turned out great. Delicious. If you follow the recipe as shown you should not have any problems with they way they turn out. Thank you. On my schedule to make again very soon.
This is my now go to recipe for chocolate chip cookies.
Hi. I love your site and have tried many recipes. Question: for cookie dough that needs to be chilled….is there a reason why I shouldn’t scoop the dough into the appropriate portion before chilling? Wondering if I can save some time by portioning the dough while it’s soft first and then baking.
Hi Es, some doughs (like this one in particular) can be quite sticky and benefit from chilling before rolling. However, if you don’t mind a bit of stickiness, you can certainly roll them prior to chilling. You may need to clean off your hands and scoop a few times while doing so, but it certainly works!
Umm… I don’t think there’s rolling involved. Did I miss something?
Hi Kate! We’re referring to rolling out the cookie dough balls.
I have made these cookies several times. I use margarine instead of butter and add an extra 4 tbs of flour, just trying to limit the animal fat we eat. For a special occasion I used macadamia nuts. I think pecans would have been as good and less expensive. They are always enjoyed!
Fantastic recipe! Filled with buttery, oatmeal and chocolate flavor! They are large and chewy and just plain delicious AND easy to make. Only baked half of the recipe. Looking forward to baking up the rest to share with friends!
This is an excellent cookie with a wonderful flavor!
The recipe was amazing easy to follow.
Wonderful cookies with great texture! I also recommend the peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.
These are so addictive. Such a good chew and they tasted caramel-ly. I didn’t have chocolate chips or raisins so I added about 1/2 cup of diced dried prunes. So good!! Only problem: my butter was cold so I defrosted it in the microwave (a little melted) and I also only chilled the batter for 30 mins, so the cookies spread and were very thin. My bad, but I still had no problem eating them!
The second time I made these, the butter was not melted at all and was a little cold. I also left the batter in the fridge for a few hours. The cookies still spread way too thin and we’re so gooey that they fell apart in your fingers and wouldn’t stay together. I am going to try adding 2 T. of flour to the remaining half of the dough and see if it improves.
BEST oatmeal chocolate chip cookies I’ve ever made, and I’vev made many different types?
Hi, my oatmeal cookies turned out really great except that it spread more than I expected. I was wondering, is there anyway I can avoid the edges being too crisp?
Hi Arlou, thank you for giving these cookies a try. If you’re interested in trying again, these 10 tips to prevent cookies from spreading will be a helpful resource!
These cookies are fabulous. Can I I add chopped pecans? And should they’ve toasted first?
Hi Barb, we recommend keeping the total amount of add-ins to 1 and 3/4 cups. You could try 1 cup of chocolate chips and 3/4 pecans for a total of 1 and 3/4 cups. You can toast them if desired. Enjoy!
This was the first recipe I’ve found where the cookies do not flatten out into wide thin frisbees. They taste amazing and are not difficult at all. I did have to increase baking time to 19 minutes though. All-in-all, a wonderful cookie.
I love this recipe and have been using it for a couple years now! I’ve made a couple alterations for variety and they turn out amazing every time. I occasionally omit the chocolate chips, add dried cranberries and drizzle with white chocolate. Absolutely amazing!!
Recipe is too “ floury”. Not soft and chewy. Disappointed
Hi Kris! How did you measure the flour? Make sure to spoon and level (instead of scooping) to avoid packing in too much flour into your measuring cups – or use a kitchen scale. You can read more about properly measuring baking ingredients in this post.
This recipe is incredible! I used dark chocolate chips and marshmallows with a dash of cinnamon and ginger yum!
This recipe is AMAZING. I didn’t have molasses, so I omitted that and to be honest my phone died while mixing so I totally missed the chilling the dough in the fridge, so I skipped that part, and they turned out great. What does chilling do to the dough?
Hi Emily, we’re so glad they were a hit! Chilling helps the dough from over spreading while baking, keeping the cookies nice and thick.
I’ve always loved your recipes! Tried this today, the taste was awesome. However, I couldn’t get my cookies to look like yours even after measuring the ingredients per recipe and chilling the dough in the freezer for 45mins. They started out in the oven looking promising, but by the time they were done, I them too flat and doesn’t look as thick and hearty like yours. Should I have added more oatmeal and chocolate chips to “beef” it up?
Hi Kim, Thank you for giving this recipe a try! It’s possible that your butter was perhaps too soft, which is usually the culprit for overspreading cookies. Here is more on what room temperature butter really means, and here are 5 tips to improve your next batch of cookies — see #2 there for more on how to prevent excess spreading.
This is sooo good the molasses is the perfect touch. They are not to sweet just right. I have a batch in the fridge. I use chocolate chips and peanut butter chips sometimes I add toffee chips. Yummy I want to thank you for these recipes I have made several of your recipes well more than several. Thank you again
I have tried so many oar oatmeal cookie recipes. I have finally found the one I like the best!
Hi Sally! I’m thinking of making these as part of a care package for a friend deployed overseas. Can you recommend these? Do they keep well for weeks? I have no idea how long it will take to arrive. What other cookies do you recommend? Thanks so much. Huge Sally Fan!
Hi Laura, thanks so much for your kind comment! We find these stay fresh at room temperature for about a week, although an extra day or two should be fine. This post on how to ship cookies has some other favorites for making and sending. Hope they’re a hit with your friend, and thank you for making and trusting all our recipes!
Thanks so much! And yes, I do sandwich them when shipping. I send often to my son in college. Great cookie ideas though on that link…awesome!
These cookies are great. I left out the granulated sugar and substituted 2 tablespoons of maple syrup for the tablespoon of molasses. Didn’t miss the white sugar. Also did 50/50 wheat/white flour.
Absolutely love this recipe- though I never truly follow a recipe per se. I have to double batch everything or cookies won’t last the day with anyone I’ve introduced the cookies to! I swap all the sugar for Splenda (the ‘like sugar’ one), unless I’m having a guest who usually doesn’t like the taste of Splenda over, then I make it half sugar and they can’t taste the difference. I use grandmas molasses and just add until the dough becomes a color I expect, rather than using brown sugar directly. I don’t have enough cookie sheets and they wouldn’t fit all in the oven anyways, so I also make loaves! Just have to either give a tiny loaf pan the same amount as you would for the cookies, or for larger ones, you make the dough a thin sheet on the bottom, whole different texture. They also make lovely muffins, which are somehow a different texture all over again. The many ways you can use the dough is awesome, makes it much harder to get tired of them! Recently started substituting part of the flour for green banana or banana peel flour, about a third of the flour. The banana taste is almost invisible, but ups the nutrition content (also tends to create a tougher dough. I offset it this time using bread flour instead of all purpose). I’m also looking forward to adjusting the recipe and trying to make it into a sweet bread!! Really can’t go wrong with this recipe, even if you take loose inspiration for everything but the baking soda like I do. (Peanut butter chips are pretty fire in this tbh)
Hi Sally! I’ve been making these cookies (with a few personal preference changes) for my family for years now and they’re ALWAYS a hit! I’m coming to you with a question I’ve been wanting to ask for months now but have been too scared to.
We found out my daughter is highly allergic to eggs, so I’m wondering if you have any recommendations on substituting in this recipe? I’ve been doing yogurt for cakes and muffins, but I just don’t know what to do for these AMAZING cookies without risking their integrity and flavor!!! HELP PLEASE!
Hi Ashley! Other readers have reported using a “flax egg” substitute in this recipe with success. Let us know if you try it!
My go to cookie recipe to have on hand for everything. I double the batch and keep the balls in the freeze to bake fresh cookies when people are over.
Delicious! Always make during fall! They’re good if you like molasses.
This is the best recipe I’ve found for Oatmeal Cookies, by far! Thank you!