Peanut butter and chocolate lovers rejoice! I’ve combined at least 3 delicious cookies into 1 mouthwatering recipe with my big fat peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. Consider yourself warned: these cookies are exploding with flavor, unapologetically thick, and hopelessly irresistible. They’re guaranteed to satisfy almost every cookie craving.
A cookie to end all cookies, these big fat peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies are a mouthful. I was inspired to try these decadent treats after seeing the cover of my cookbook, Sally’s Cookie Addiction, for the first time. The glorious monster cookies gracing the book cover are loaded with M&Ms and can be found in Chapter 2 and have recently been added to my website.
This recipe, however, skips those rainbow candies and focuses instead on a flavor relationship like no other. Chocolate chips and peanut butter. It’s a match made in cookie heaven! In this recipe, we’re combining that perfect pairing with textured oats to achieve the thickest, richest, and most satisfying cookie.
Tell Me About These Big Fat Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Texture: Loaded with so many delicious add-ins, these cookies have chewy edges, soft centers, and are unbelievably thick. (I’m always shocked by how thick they turn out.) If you want to go even bigger and thicker, try these big fat dark chocolate cranberry oatmeal cookies next!
- Flavor: Ordinary chocolate chip cookies are buttery sweet on their own, but the peanut butter-chocolate pairing here brings a delicious decadence to these cookies. If this flavor pairing is a favorite, be sure to add these peanut butter chocolate cookies to your list, too.
- Ease: Simple to make, the dough comes together in just minutes using a few staple pantry add-ins like old-fashioned oats and peanut butter. Make them for same-day snacking or prepare them ahead of a special occasion (see Note).
- Time: This dough can be prepped and chilled in under an hour. 20 minutes in the refrigerator (the same amount of time we chill dough for brownie cookies) helps the oats soak up some moisture and prevents the cookie from overspreading.
If you love these cookies but don’t have oats, try these peanut butter chocolate chip cookies instead. If you love these cookies but need a gluten free dessert recipe, try these flourless peanut butter oatmeal cookies or flourless monster cookies instead. We’ve got all the bases covered!
One reader, Dyna, says: “Hands down the BEST cookie recipe I have ever made, and I’ve made a lot of cookies… All the extra notes and suggestions too were spot on. Following those tips made for a beautiful, delectable cookie!”
Recipe Testing: What Works & What Doesn’t
- The weight of peanut butter. This cookie dough is adapted from my oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. The addition of peanut butter here, however, can weigh down the dough. To counter this, I add baking powder for lift.
- A spreading solution. When testing the recipe, I found the cookies weren’t spreading enough. I decided to swap the quantities of granulated sugar and brown sugar. Granulated sugar—dry and thin—helps increase cookie spread. Brown sugar—moist and thick—keeps cookies compact. Increasing the granulated sugar makes all the difference in this dough for the perfect spread. You won’t even miss that extra brown sugar flavor because the peanut butter is our front-runner.
- Fewer oats + more chocolate. When testing, I originally had a higher quantity of oats in the cookies. I decided to reduce that amount to make room for more chocolate chips. Can you blame me?
Choosing the Right Ingredients:
Peanut butter. Though natural-style peanut butter is my #1 choice for eating and snacking, I recommend using non-natural peanut butter for this particular cookie recipe. Natural peanut butter can be used in my regular peanut butter cookies (though the cookies are a little crumblier than intended), but it’s not ideal for today’s recipe. Instead, use Jif or Skippy. You can use creamy or crunchy, but I prefer creamy peanut butter as crunchy can make the cookies taste a little dry. You need 1 cup of peanut butter for this recipe.
Room-temperature butter. Like my basic soft chocolate chip cookies, the base of today’s oatmeal cookie recipe is creamed room-temperature butter, granulated sugar, and brown sugar. You can’t cream butter and sugar together if the butter is too warm or too cold. (It usually spells disaster for your cookies!) Room temperature butter is about 65°F (18°C). It’s cool and slightly firm to touch, not warm or slippery. I recommend placing your butter on the counter for 1 hour prior to beginning the recipe to achieve ideal “room temperature” butter. If you don’t have an hour, here is my trick to soften butter quickly. You need 1 cup of butter for this cookie dough.
Whole oats: To ensure the cookies spread nicely and do not dry out, be sure to use whole oats and not quick oats. Quick oats are cut finer, and will soak up more moisture in the dough.
Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
After you prepare the peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies dough, chill it for 20 minutes in the refrigerator. After chilling, it’s time to scoop the dough and bake the cookies. Each cookie uses 2 Tablespoons of dough which is about the same size as these regular chocolate chip cookies. Arrange the cookie dough balls 3 inches apart on your baking sheet. These cookies are large, so I use a medium cookie scoop and overflow it with dough (since the medium only holds 1.5 Tablespoons.)
More Quick Cookie Recipes
- Peanut Butter Cookie Sandwiches
- Mini M&M Cookies
- Nutella Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Giant Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Brownie Cookies
- Shortbread Cookies
Big Fat Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Prep Time: 40 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour, 10 minutes
- Yield: 32 cookies
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
Big fat peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies are easy, thick, and exploding with peanut butter, oats, and chocolate chips to satisfy your cookie cravings.
Ingredients
- 1 and 1/2 cups (188g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup (16 Tbsp; 226g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1 cup (200g) granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 cup (240g) creamy peanut butter
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 2 cups (170g) old-fashioned whole rolled oats
- 2 and 1/2 cups (450g) semi-sweet chocolate chips, plus more for topping if desired
Instructions
- Whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl. Set aside.
- In a large bowl using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium-high speed until smooth, about 1 minute. Add the granulated sugar and brown sugar and beat on medium-high speed until creamed, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs, peanut butter, and vanilla and beat on high speed until combined, about 1 minute. Scrape down the sides and up the bottom of the bowl and beat again as needed to combine.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix on low until combined. With the mixer running on low speed, add the oats. Once combined, beat in the chocolate chips. Dough will be thick and sticky. Cover and chill the dough for at least 20 minutes in the refrigerator (and up to 4 days). If chilling for longer than 1 hour, allow to sit at room temperature for at least 30 minutes before rolling and baking because the dough will be quite hard.
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Line baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. Set aside.
- Scoop balls of dough, 2 Tablespoons of dough per cookie, and arrange 3 inches apart on the baking sheets. Bake for 12-14 minutes until lightly browned on the sides. The centers will look very soft.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely. While the cookies are still warm, I like to press a few more chocolate chips into the tops—this is only for looks!
- Cookies stay fresh covered at room temperature for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Make Ahead Instructions: You can make the cookie dough and chill it in the refrigerator for up to 4 days. Allow to come to room temperature then continue with 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 Mat or Parchment Paper | Medium Cookie Scoop | Cooling Rack
- Peanut Butter: Use a non-natural peanut butter like Jif creamy or Skippy creamy. I do not suggest using natural style or oily peanut butter as both produce crumbly, fragile, and sandy tasting cookies. (Try this recipe for flourless peanut butter oatmeal cookies if you want to use natural!) Crunchy peanut butter is OK, but I find the cookies taste a little dry with it.
- 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
I rarely post a comment, but I made these yesterday and shared with several neighbors. Everyone who tried reached out to tell me they were the best cookies they have had in a long time! I am sure they are perfect as written, but I used dark brown sugar as that us what I have, and I added some spice to the dough. For me, it is an amazing texture and chew-thanks Sally for always having great recipes!
I was wondering what the individual specs on a single cookie are. Like calories, protein, sugars.
Hi Paul, 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
Love this recipe, thank you!
I made the batter for these cookies Tuesday night and only had time to bake a half dozen. The cookies were absolutely delicious!!! It’s Thursday now and my batter is still in the fridge, am I okay to continue baking being that it’s been in the fridge for 3 days? Thanks for the wonderful recipe and tips
Hi Amy! We usually recommend chilling cookie dough up to 2 days in the fridge. It’s up to you if you want to bake the dough or not. Next time, you can freeze the dough balls (see recipe Notes). Glad you enjoyed them!
Is there anything I can add to natural peanut butter as I never have the other?
Hi Lorie, for best results, we recommend using non-natural peanut butter here. Using natural/homemade peanut butter could produce crumbly, fragile, and sandy tasting cookies. If you’re looking for a recipe that does work with natural peanut butter, these flourless peanut butter oatmeal cookies are a favorite! You can replace some of the chocolate chips in either recipe with walnuts, keeping the total amount of add-ins about the same.
This may be my new favorite cookie recipe! I only had natural peanut butter so I used 1 1/2 cups oatmeal, and added 2 tbsp of honey. They were still a little crumbly, but held together for the most part. Delish!
Very tasty cookie recipe, got me third place in a bake off at work
This recipe was another hit with my family! My son said it was the perfect combination of all the cookies that he loves into one. I am so thankful for your website and I appreciate the time you take to explain the reason for certain ingredients and all your tips. I always read every word before I start to make the recipes.
Can I sub coconut sugar. I really want to make these but without regular sugar.
Hi MJ, You can, but the cookies won’t spread as much.
My absolute favourite cookie recipe
I substituted quick cooking steel cut oats and chipatti high protein flour and they turned out great.
my absolute favorite! I cant make these that often, I eat way to many!
Can you use quick oats?
Hi Kalynn, quick oats are more powdery and dry out the cookies. We recommend sticking with whole oats for best results.
I just made these, I used half quick oats and half rolled oats. I dial back the butter and substitute about 1/3 of it with shortening, and I cream the sugar all by hand with a wooden spatula, cover dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for about 24hrs. In my opinion this creates a superior oatmeal cookie. My mixins are 175g of Reese’s PB chips and 150g of Skor bits
These are delicious! I followed recipe exactly except made my cookies smaller and didn’t bake as long. They were chewy and perfect! Thank you for sharing your recipe!
I just finished making these and WOW I made them gluten free by using gluten free flour and dairy free by df butter + chocolate chips and they still turned out AMAZING! Keeping this recipe to use forever lol
These are amazing. Turn out perfect every time. Sometimes I use less sugar sometimes I don’t. Works either way
These are amazing. Turn out perfect every time. Sometimes I use less sugar sometimes I don’t. Works either way
These were good; I especially liked the texture of the oats in these cookies. I tried a mix of regular semisweet chocolate chips and white chocolate chips, and I much preferred the semisweet chocolate over the white chocolate in these cookies. There wasn’t as much peanut butter flavor as I would have liked in these cookies… that’s not a criticism of the recipe, which works perfectly, but hopefully helpful info for other peanut butter lovers like me. I’m going to try the peanut butter chocolate chip cookies next!
These look great! Do you think granola butter or sunflower seed butter would work well as a peanut butter substitute?
Hi El, those should work! The texture may be slightly different, depending on the consistency of the granola butter/seed butter. Let us know if you give it a try.
I try a LOT of new cookie recipes, and this one is one of the best I’ve ever tried! So rad!!
Can these be sweetened with maple syrup vs. sugar?
Hi LB, we do not recommend a liquid sweetener in place of the granulated sugar and brown sugar.
Best of both worlds for peanut butter and oatmeal cookies!
I’ve just made these and they are delicious! I pressed a few roasted salted peanuts into the top of each cookie before baking. Thanks for a great recipe with clear directions and cookies that come out as described.
Excellent recipe, not overly sweet, not overly peanut buttery, not overly oat-y. Crisp bottom, with a soft inside. I did use half mini MM’s seeing I had them and they needed to be used and wonderfully, I had all the ingredients in the house. They also have a nice shape. Well done!
Sally, these cookies are SO good that my husband, who does not have a sweet tooth and could take or leave most sweet things, who does not love peanutbutter, nor chocolate chip cookies, tells me: Make some of those cookies!! These are THE BEST!!! About to make some (again!) right now!
I loved this recipe. It was very easy to make. I only had 70g of chocolate chips and i do think that is a shame, the cookie is great still even with only 1-2 chocolate chips per. I will be making these cookies again!
Best oatmeal cookie ever! Made our second batch with smarties and white chocolate chips- crowd pleaser for sure! Make SURE you double your recipe and keep some dough ready to bake in the freezer!
Best Recipe Ever
Wow, these are a home run! Next time, I’ll decrease the choc chips. Even though I used dark chocolate they were a bit sweet for me. Another great recipe, thank you, Sally!
I have opened this recipe so many times to bake these cookies, it just finallyy clicked to offer a review. Have to say, by far, the best cookie recipe ever. It’s not just my opinion, it’s everyone in my household. When they walk in the door to see I have made these, there are happy excited shrieks! I do reduce the oats slightly and and add some unsweetened coconut and it works very well. I am a novice baker, and this recipe is true each step of the way. Remember to take out your butter and eggs in advance folks! It makes a difference! Thank you for this recipe. It is handwritten in the recipe box of favorites that I have for my daughter.
Can I substitute quick cooking oats for old fashioned?
Hi Bridget, quick oats are more powdery and dry out the cookies. We recommend sticking with whole oats for best results.