These soft, thick, melt-in-your-mouth peanut butter cookies may be the only peanut butter cookie recipe you ever use again. Some readers say the cookies taste like the inside of a peanut butter cup—YUM! You need just 9 ingredients and the dough can be adapted in many ways to make different variations like peanut butter blossoms and peanut butter jam thumbprints.
I originally published this recipe in 2012 and have since added new photos, a video tutorial, and more helpful success tips.
Why hello there, peanut butter cookie lovers. You’ve come to the right place! This may look familiar, as I have shared a number of peanut butter cookie recipes over the years. But believe me when I say this one is the one to keep in the front of your recipe folder.
This go-to, flagship peanut butter cookies recipe is the same dough used to make these popular peanut butter blossoms among the other 6+ variations listed below. The recipe stands the test of time and even after publishing dozens of other peanut butter recipes online and in my cookbooks… THIS IS THE BEST ONE.
One reader, Joyce, commented: “I’ve been looking for the recipe like my mother used when I was growing up. Soft and chewy in the middle, crispy on the edges, and the perfect peanut butter taste. Takes me back to when I was 9 years old and learning how to make these standing on a chair. Thank you for a wonderful recipe!!! ★★★★★”
Another reader, Faith, commented: “Seriously the BEST peanut butter cookies I’ve ever had! So delicious. The recipe was very easy to follow while still including helpful tips and directions. Thank you! ★★★★★“
And another reader, Rita, commented: “I’ve been baking for my family for 50 years. This is the absolute best cookie recipe we have ever tried. Thanks, Sally. Outstanding! ★★★★★“
Why You’ll Love These Soft Peanut Butter Cookies
- Pillow-soft centers with slightly crisp exterior and crumbly edge
- No-fuss recipe with 9 ingredients
- Super simple to make
- Marked with a traditional criss-cross on top
- Major peanut butter flavor
- Versatile cookie dough—add mix-ins or turn the dough into pb&j thumbprints
Grab These 9 Ingredients:
You can find the full printable recipe below, but first let me tell you some of the keys to recipe success, starting with the ingredients.
Ingredient Success Tips
- A shockingly small amount of flour. You may look at the recipe below and wonder why there’s so little flour… has Sally completely lost her mind?! Ha! Well, peanut butter and other nut butters act as a binder and can actually replace some or all flour in recipes including these flourless almond butter cookies. Using more flour will dry out the cookies, so stick with the recipe below.
- More peanut butter than other recipes. Most recipes I’ve tried call for around 1/2 cup of peanut butter with similar amounts of other ingredients. We’re using more.
- Use creamy peanut butter instead of crunchy. Just like when making peanut butter snickerdoodles, big giant monster cookies, or white chocolate peanut butter cookies, creamy peanut butter is ideal because crunchy peanut butter creates an overly crumbly cookie. Crunchy peanut butter is typically thicker and, well, less creamy! For a soft cookie that stays mostly intact, use creamy peanut butter.
- A combination of brown sugar + white granulated sugar. Like when you make chocolate chip cookies, it’s ideal to use more brown sugar than white granulated sugar in this dough. Brown sugar lends a softer, moister, and thicker cookie, while white granulated sugar helps the cookies spread. Use both, but use more brown.
Can I Use Natural Peanut Butter in Peanut Butter Cookies?
Yes, you can use natural peanut butter in this dough! Over the past decade, I’ve made these exact cookies with processed peanut butter such as Jif or Skippy as well as natural-style where the ingredients are only peanuts and salt. Here are my notes:
- Processed: The cookies truly taste perfect with great texture. They spread less and aren’t as crumbly.
- Natural-Style: The cookies spread a bit more and are somewhat sandier/crumblier.
But, most importantly, both cookies have fantastic peanut butter flavor. Keeping the above notes in mind, you can use either kind, just like you can in flourless peanut butter oatmeal cookies.
Another Success Tip: Chill the Cookie Dough
Chilling the cookie dough in the refrigerator before baking the cookies is crucial to this recipe’s success. The dough is incredibly creamy, almost like peanut butter frosting, and you’ll have a heck of a time trying to roll and bake such a soft dough. Set aside 1–2 hours for chilling, or do yourself a favor and make the dough the night before.
Expect a VERY creamy cookie dough:
After chilling, the cookie dough solidifies and it’s easier to roll into balls:
After chilling, roll the dough into balls and then generously roll in granulated sugar. Sugar gives these cookies a sparkly sweet exterior with a touch of crunch before giving way to soft, melt-in-your-mouth bliss. Don’t forget the classic criss-cross on top of each cookie, just press with a fork!
Another success tip: After flattening the balls with a fork, use your fingers to reshape the edges into thicker/taller discs, because the thicker the disc, the thicker the baked cookie.
Welcome to the Peanut Butter Cookie Headquarters
Today’s cookies have been my go-to for a decade. If you want to compare, here are 2 other peanut butter cookie doughs and how they differ:
- Crisp/Old-Fashioned Version: Crispier with less peanut butter punch.
- Very Peanut Butter Cookies: Bigger and crumblier with EXTRA peanut butter flavor. It’s practically today’s recipe, only doubled. This is the same dough we use for peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.
The following recipes use today’s dough. (Note that the plain cookies have an extra Tablespoon of flour to retain shape because we’re flattening with a fork.)
- Peanut Butter Chocolate Swirl Cookies (pictured)
- Peanut Butter Blossoms (pictured)
- PB Cookie Cups on page 138 in Sally’s Cookie Addiction
- Peanut Butter M&M Cookies
- Peanut Butter Jam Thumbprint Cookies
- Reese’s Cup Stuffed Cookies
So whether you’re looking for a classic criss-cross cookie or want to add some flair, this soft-baked peanut butter cookie is the ideal base recipe for many variations.
Print
Soft & Thick Peanut Butter Cookies
- Prep Time: 1 hour, 30 minutes (includes chilling)
- Cook Time: 12 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour, 45 minutes
- Yield: 32 cookies
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
These are the softest, thickest peanut butter cookies! You need just 9 ingredients for the base recipe, and it can be adapted in so many ways to make different variations (see post above). Do not skip chilling the dough.
Ingredients
- 1 and 1/3 cups (170g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (8 Tbsp; 113g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1/4 cup (50g) granulated sugar, plus 1/2 cup (100g) for rolling
- 1 large egg, at room temperature
- 3/4 cup (about 185g) creamy peanut butter (see note)
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Instructions
- Whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl. Set aside.
- Using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment, beat the butter for 1 minute on high speed until creamy. Switch to medium-high speed and beat in the brown sugar and 1/4 cup (50g) granulated sugar until completely creamed and smooth, about 3 minutes. (Here’s a helpful tutorial if you need guidance on how to cream butter and sugar.) Add the egg and beat until combined, about 1 minute. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl as needed. Add the peanut butter and vanilla extract and beat until combined.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and beat on low speed until combined. The dough will be very creamy and soft. Cover and chill the cookie dough in the refrigerator for at least 1–2 hours, and up to 3 days.
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Line large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
- Roll & coat the dough: Place remaining 1/2 cup (100g) of sugar into a bowl. Roll chilled cookie dough into balls, about 1 scant Tablespoon (5/8 ounce or 18g) of dough each. Roll each ball in the sugar and arrange on baking sheets about 2 inches apart. Use a fork to make a criss-cross indent on top of each. To prevent the cookies from over-spreading, after indenting the cookies, use your fingers to reshape into a thicker disc (since indenting the balls flattened them out).
- Bake for 11–12 minutes or until the edges appear set and are very lightly browned. The centers will still look very soft.
- Allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes. After 5 minutes, transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
- 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 3 days. Baked cookies freeze well for up to 3 months. Unbaked cookie dough balls, without sugar coating, freeze well for up to 3 months. Let frozen cookie dough balls sit on the counter for 30 minutes, roll in sugar, indent a crisscross pattern with a fork, then bake for an extra minute. No need to completely thaw. See How to Freeze Cookie Dough for more success tips.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Mixer (Stand Mixer or Handheld) | Baking Sheets | Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Paper | Cooling Rack
- Peanut butter: Creamy peanut butter is ideal for this recipe because crunchy peanut butter creates an overly crumbly cookie. You can use processed peanut butter such as Jif or Skippy, or natural-style peanut butter. If using natural peanut butter, make sure it’s at room temperature, stirred well, and expect a slightly crumblier cookie. 3/4 cup of peanut butter weighs anywhere between 185–195g.
- Can I use almond butter? Yes, you can use almond butter in this cookie recipe; however, expect a crumblier cookie. You may enjoy these flourless almond butter cookies more, though!
- Can I add chocolate chips or other add-ins? Yes, in step 3 after the dry and wet ingredients come together, you can fold in 1 cup add-ins like chocolate chips (180g), peanut butter chips (180g), or chopped salted or unsalted peanuts (150g). Skip indenting the cookies with a fork.
Reader Comments and Reviews
These are amazing and possibly one of the few cookie recipes I’ve made where they’re actually better the next day.
These didn’t turn out very soft for me.
I weighed out each cookie to 18g, rolled in sugar, pressed with a fork, and only baked them for 10 min. Once they cooled they were crunchy, although still delicious.
Potential problems: 18g seemed a little small. Once pressed with a fork they were barely bitter than a silver dollar. I may have also flattened them too much. I’m going to try 25g cookies next time, flatten them less, and bake for less time.
Great flavor tho.
Absolutely Fantastic!! What I enjoyed most was all the wonderful tips you give. I’ve been baking for years but you have taught me things that I never knew about. This is the first recipe I have tried of yours and looking forward to trying many many more. Thank you so much Sally.
Let the church say AMEN! These are the best peanut butter cookies. While pronounced in PB flavor, the other ingredients balance it out. Y’all these cookies chilled are a whole different type of DELICIOUS! After they were completely cooled I put them in the fridge overnight to hide them from my kids. When I took a bite that kerrygold butter flavor came through! If you are worried about crumbling, please be sure to follow the recipe and notes exactly. I promise you they will turn out great.
Why is my dough dry and crumbly! Same thing with chocolate chip. Don’t spread on baking sheet during baking. I’m puzzled
I haven’t had a. Issue with any of your other recipes but those are for cakes
When cookies aren’t spreading, it usually means that there’s too much dry ingredient (flour) soaking up all the liquid. When measuring flour, use the spoon & level method. Do not scoop the flour out of the container/bag. Doing so leaves you with excess flour in the cookie dough. Hope this helps for next time!
This peanut butter cookie recipe came out so amazingly soft and delicious. They lasted a day in my house! Now I have to make more to share more with co-workers (which was my first intention!) Thank you for sharing!
I absolutely love all of your recipes. I veganize recipes. Can you also publish veganized recipes and tips and tricks on how to veganize any recipe? I am making the peanut butter cookies and I’m using vegan butter and vegan Greek style yogurt as the egg replacement. Thank you! The animals need us to have a vegan world. I have been a vegetarian for about 40 years and I’m almost vegan. Thank you for your great recipes!
Hi Christine, we aren’t expert vegan bakers, so wouldn’t trust ourselves to be the best resource for vegan baking conversions. Thankfully there are plenty of wonderful recipe websites with vegan recipes!
Hi Christine, Did your substitutions – Greek Yogurt for the egg and Vegan butter for butter – work well in the recipe? I am looking for feedback before I attempt the same thing. Thank you!
Thank you Sally for this AWESOME recipe!! It is so easy to put together and it is worth the wait for the chilling time. I have tried many, many peanut butter cookie recipes and yours is the ultimate best one EVER!!! I can’t wait to share your recipe with my family. Thank you so much!!
PS: my son and I are big fans of your recipes. He really enjoyed your Super Moist Chocolate Cupcakes. He passed your recipe on to me. I can’t wait to make them.
Perfect!
These are super yummy!
Next time I’ll skip the pretty criss cross pattern as I’d like my cookies to be thicker/taller still. I made some cookies with choco chips and some without; both were delicious.
You can never go wrong with a recipe from Sally!
I’m not usually inclined to write reviews/comments about recipes – but this recipe is incredible! I’ve tried many peanut butter cookie recipes in the past, even my mom’s famous recipe, and this one is hands down the best (sorry mom!) I added Easter-coloured M&Ms to the dough, and wow – so so so delicious! Will forever be using this recipe! Sally is the best!
We’re so glad you enjoyed the peanut butter cookies, Tara!
This is the BEST pb cookie recipe ever! The shaping method is a lot of fun and makes all the difference. Adding some cinnamon to the rolling sugar is very tasty too
I made these cookies and added some chopped semi sweet chocolate chips. Like some of you the first cookie I lifted to place on cooling paper fell apart. Here is what I did I baked the cookies for 11 minutes and then I let them cool for 15 minutes on the baking sheet and now they are perfect and yummy. No more breaks. I hope this helps.
Perfect recipe. Delicious ❤️❤️❤️
I was really looking forward to making this recipe, but my screen is covered by a Wal-Mart ad every 2 or 3 seconds
Hi Tina, I do not allow ads on my website that cover my content. Are you certain it was blocking the text, photos, or recipe? Let me know if you were viewing on mobile or desktop, and I can report the feedback to my ad network. Again, ads should never be covering my content.
I go on little tangents sometimes. For the past few weeks I have baked appropriately 12 different peanut butter cookie recipees including one of your other recipees and I can safely say that *THIs* is the best peanut butter cookie recipe on the internet. Amazing.
So glad you love this recipe, Desiree! Thanks so much for giving this one a try!
This is a fabulous recipe! Followed directions and they came out amazing. My fiance wonders if we can do half the butter amount and sub in more peanut butter ?(he loves a more intensely flavored peanut butter taste)
That aside, we say this is going to be our future definitive recipe for peanut butter cookies!
Hi Bess, so glad you love them! It wouldn’t a an even swap with peanut butter and butter, so it would take some testing.
Can I add cornstarch to bake a bigger cookie?
Hi Selah, these cookies are quite puffy without the addition of cornstarch, so we haven’t tried adding it. If you’re looking for a bigger cookie, you can simply make your dough balls a bit bigger to your liking. Hope you enjoy the cookies!
I made bigger cookies without any recipe changes. Longer baking time and they hold together after sitting overnight. They were quite soft when warm
Fantastic as always! These are incredibly soft and fluffy cookies – nice work! For those having trouble… I followed the recipe exactly (by weight). I also measured each cookie by weight. They are smaller than what I normally bake but I continued to follow directions and 11 minutes baking was spot on.
Do you adjust the recipe for a cookie cake? Thanks so much!
Hi Tammy, we recommend using our recipe for Peanut Butter Skillet Cookie!
Is this the same base cookie recipe as this link which no longer returns? https://route-span.live/soft-baked-peanut-butter-lovers-cookies/%3C/p%3E
I used that recipe for years and was a huge family hit. It looks very similar if not the same, but if you can confirm I’d really appreciate it. Love your recipes!
The recipes are *almost* identical, which is why we removed the older recipe. The Peanut Butter Lover’s cookies recipe called for 1 and 1/4 cups flour, instead of 1 and 1/3, with the additions of honey roasted peanuts, mini PB cups, and PB chips. We can email you the older recipe if you would like! Shoot us an email at sally@sallysbakingaddiction.com
SallysBakingAddiction is my go to for all my cookie recipes! They never let me down! I get more compliments following her recipes than any other. I have sent her links to countless fans!
I loved making these for my family!
These were a huge hit. I made them two separate times but I had an issue I wanted to ask about. The first thing they came out exactly as described , thick and chewy! But I only ended up making like 20 cookies and I used a 1.5 tablespoon cookie scoop. So the next time I decided to make them smaller, and I ended up with 34 cookies, but they were small and they came out perfectly round and thin and crispy, but still delicious! But I used a small spoon so they were much smaller. So I don’t know maybe I should stick to the original recipe so I end up with the thick and chewy result but like I said I ended up with much less cookies.
Hi Kristina, we do make these cookies smaller, just about a scant tablespoon (18g) of dough each. They should still turn out fairly soft and not thin and crispy, though. Bake them for just 11 minutes, let cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes, and then transfer to a wire rack. Hope your next batch turns out great!
Amazing!!! These are my new favorite!! I even added more flour AND didn’t refrigerate the second and third time I made them… they still came out perfectly!!
Recipe followed exactly. Cookies came out crumbly, dough did not adhere together
Amazing recipe but, do I have to chill them for 3 days or can I bake them now?
Hi Damien, you can chill the cookie dough in the refrigerator for at least 1–2 hours, or up to 3 days. So as long as the dough has chilled for at least 1-2 hours, feel free to go ahead and bake. Enjoy!
Really great recipe even doubled!
I threw in a handful of milk choco chips and did not roll them in sugar. I did the crisscross with the fork and they were beautiful!
Disappearoooo!
PS I have no clue what ingredients Karen/ Tracy did or did not use…inferior ingredients?
Careless measuring? This recipe is fail proof!
Ohhhh yum!! I love peanut butter cookies. This recipe is excellent!! I I’ll be saving this recipe!!
This is a favorite! I keep this recon my online cookbook and my husband LOVES these, comes out perfect every time.
These are SO good! I had a craving for PB cookies, which I haven’t made in years. Naturally, I checked Sally’s recipes first because they never fail me. I followed the directions exactly and am now in PB heaven. They’re our dessert tonight, and I know everyone will love them. THANK YOU!
So glad you love these cookies, Dana!
Hi Karen, we’re happy to help troubleshoot. How did you measure your flour? Be sure to use the spoon and level method (or weight measure) to ensure that excess flour doesn’t make its way into your baked goods, causing them to dry out. You’ll also want to only bake the cookies until the edges appear set and are very lightly browned. The centers will still look very soft. Over baking can cause them to dry out. Hope these tips are helpful for next time, and thank you so much for giving these cookies a try!