Chocolate chip cookies. Could there be a more perfect cookie in the world? And in my book, knowing how to bake them — and get a consistent outcome every time — is a basic life skill.
There are chocolate chip cookie variations. Thin and crispy with loads of butterscotch flavor. Soft and cake-y, dotted with a few chocolate chips. Or a fan favorite: irresistibly chewy and chock-full of dark, gooey chocolate.
For this tutorial, we’ll go with chewy chocolate chip cookies. But it will also include tips for creating different kinds of cookies (as mentioned above) and include troubleshooting advice as well. In no time at all you’ll be confidently playing around with your own recipe to make The Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie.
All chocolate chip cookie recipes call for the same 8-10 ingredients: butter, sugar (white and brown), eggs, vanilla (or another flavoring), flour, leavening (usually baking soda), salt and chocolate chips. At the bottom of the post, you’ll find the perfect recipe to work with, but first, let’s talk about ingredients and processes that will help you make the perfect chocolate cookie.
8 SECRETS TO MAKE THE PERFECT CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIE
Butter = flavor. Shortening is fine for baking and the cookies will come out looking pretty, but they won’t taste as great. Shortening just can’t compare to straight-up butter.
Using unsalted butter when baking means you can control the amount of salt in a recipe. But that’s just preference.
Secret for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie #1: Butter should be at (cool) room temperature. This means it’s pliable and you can press your finger into it. If you use butter that is too soft, your cookies can end up greasy and oily. It also won’t cream as well with the sugar.
Microwaving butter to soften results in unevenly softened butter — usually a very melted center. The best way to bring your butter to proper temperature is to cut it into pieces and let it sit at room temperature for about 30 minutes while the oven is preheating and you’re gathering all of your ingredients.
Creaming is the process of beating butter and sugar together until it’s light and fluffy. This is important for chewy, delicious cookies. The sharp edges of the sugar help aerate the butter. (We’ll save the science lesson for another day, just trust me, you don’t want to skip this step.)
Secret for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie #2: Start by creaming the butter by itself with an electric mixer, then adding the brown and white sugars.
While we’re on the subject, an electric hand mixer or stand mixer is the way to go for creaming. The stand mixer is a little quicker, but more people have a hand mixer, so that’s what is shown in these pictures.
The picture on the left shows the creaming at the halfway point. The picture on the right shows properly creamed butter and sugar. It’s lighter in color and very fluffy.
Most recipes call for a combination of white and brown sugars.
White sugar will help give cookies a nice crisp edge. The brown sugar, because of its higher moisture content, will lend chewiness. Brown sugar is white sugar with molasses added back into it. There is also dark brown sugar which has more molasses and will give an even stronger butterscotch flavor to the cookies.
Secret for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie #3: Using all white sugar will give you hard, crunchy cookies. All brown sugar will give you tender, chewy cookies. Play around with the ratio until you get the cookie how you like it. This recipe recommends using almost all brown sugar, with just a little bit of white.
Eggs should also be room temperature. When you add eggs to the creamed mixture and they are cold, the mixture will curdle. This can affect the way the cookies bake and lead to uneven results. If this happens, let the mixture sit for a few minutes until it warms up and then continue beating. It should eventually come back together.
A quick way to get an egg to room temperature is to place it in a bowl of warm tap water for about 10 minutes before using it.
Secret for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie #4: Eggs should be added one at at time and beaten well between additions to keep the mixture nice and emulsified.
Vanilla is the traditional flavoring for chocolate chip cookies. You can also add a little of another extract for a variation — almond is a favorite. The debate between pure vs. artificial vanilla can get heated. Use what you like. Go with a generous tablespoon for plenty of vanilla flavor.
Unbleached all-purpose flour is ideal for most baking needs.
Secret for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie #5: How you measure your flour is more important than what kind you use. Try spooning the flour into your measuring cup, then scraping off the mound with a butter knife. Dipping the measuring cup into the flour and dragging it up along the side of the flour bin, can result in too much flour in the cup.
Another great way is to weigh out your ingredients. One cup of unsifted all-purpose flour weighs 4.5 oz. or 125 grams.
And that brings us to sifting. You don’t need to sift the flour for these cookies. A quick whisk is all the flour will need. (This is not the case for making cakes, however.) Sifted flour will weigh less than unsifted flour. Whisk after you measure the flour.
Salt is a huge flavor enhancer in sweets. If you use unsalted butter, start with what the recipe says and taste it. If you like, add more until it tastes just right to you. If it’s too salty, make note of it on the recipe and use less the next time. Unfortunately there’s no way to take the salt back out. If you use salted butter, you might want to use about 1/4 tsp. less salt than the recipe calls for.
Whisk the salt and the baking soda in with the flour so it’s evenly distributed in the dough.
If you should decide to use whole wheat flour in your cookies, use a little less than you would if it was regular flour. The whole wheat flour will absorb more of the liquid from the other ingredients.
Secret for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie #6: You don’t have to follow your recipe word for word when it comes to the flour. That’s not always the case with other baked goods. But with cookies, there is a little room for experimenting to find what works best. Factors like humidity, climate, altitude, and brand of flour can affect how much flour a cookie dough needs. (So can slight variations in the water content of the butter or eggs you use.)
And now for the best part…the chocolate chips.
Have a generous amount of chocolate chips on hand. Dark chocolate, white chocolate, milk chocolate. As long as there are plenty of them, everything is fine.
Now let’s talk about the baking process — this includes baking sheets, temperature, and time.
Cookie sheets come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. The most popular is a basic, stainless steel rimmed baking sheet — preferably NOT non-stick.
Line the baking sheets with parchment (NOT waxed paper) or silicone baking mats. Baking cookies on silicone baking mats or parchment paper will give you evenly baked cookies. You’ll be less likely to get cookies with burned bottoms and raw middles. Bonus: parchment makes clean-up a snap! If you don’t have access to either of these, greasing the cookie sheet works too.
Secret for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie #7: To make the cookies uniformly sized (for even baking), use a small spring-loaded ice cream scoop to spoon out the dough.
Once you’ve got your cookie dough onto the baking sheets, it’s time to close that door and set the timer.
Some people prefer to bake cookies one sheet at a time. For multiple trays, rotating your baking sheets back to front, top to bottom halfway through baking time will also produce evenly baked cookies. Most cookies only need to bake between 8-12 minutes, depending on the size of the dough balls and the temperature of your oven. (Invest in an oven thermometer if your oven is inconsistent and adapt it accordingly.)
Let cookies rest on cookie sheets for a few minutes before transferring to cooling racks.
Secret for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie #8: Let cookie sheets cool completely before baking the next batch of dough.
TROUBLESHOOTING & VARIATIONS
Now for those variations, as well as a few helpful hints for troubleshooting.
FLOUR: The cookies on the left were made with the exact amount of flour called for in the recipe, the cookies in the middle had a little more flour, and the ones on the right had about 3/4 cup more flour. All were baked for the same amount of time on the same cookie sheet.
With practice you’ll learn how much flour to add. A good thing to do is to always bake one or two test cookies to see how the cookies spread in the oven. If they spread too much, you can add more flour.
If you go overboard and add too much flour, add a little milk or water until the dough comes back to where you want it.
TEMPERATURE: These cookies spread too much. I already mentioned adding more flour to the dough. But you can also lower the baking temperature.
The cookies in the picture were baked at 375 degrees F (right), 350 degrees F (middle), and 325 degrees F (left) for about the same amount of time — give or take 60 seconds.
You can also chill the cookie dough which will help inhibit the dough from spreading.
MELTED BUTTER: The cookies on the top were made with melted butter and a higher ratio of white sugar. The cookies didn’t brown very well. The cookies on the bottom had more brown sugar. They are both chewy because of the melted butter.
There are recipes that call for melted butter. If you go this route (and why not try it sometime?), use 2 Tbsp. less per 1/2 cup of butter so your cookies aren’t greasy. Skip the creaming process.
WHITE SUGAR: The cookies above were made with equal amounts of white and brown sugar and more flour. They were firm and not chewy or crisp.
BROWN SUGAR: These cookies were made with all brown sugar. They are very chewy and very soft.
CAKE-Y: These are super soft, cake-y chocolate chip cookies. For these cookies, use an extra egg, about 1/4 to 1/2 cup less sugar, more flour, and a tablespoon of milk.
DARK BOTTOMS: The cookies in this picture were baked on parchment (left) and a greased baking sheet (right). If you prefer darker bottomed cookies, skip the parchment.
The Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe
Ingredients:
1 cup (8 oz.) butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 Tbsp. pure vanilla extract
2 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
Beat butter with an electric mixer until creamy. Add the brown and white sugar and beat for 5 minutes on high speed until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating for another minute after each addition. Add the vanilla and mix well.
Whisk together the dry ingredients. Add the dry ingredients to the creamed mixture in two or three additions, mixing on low speed just until the flour is incorporated. Stir in the chocolate chips using a silicone spatula or the mixer on low speed.
Using a small ice cream scoop or tablespoon, drop balls of dough onto the prepared baking sheets, leaving a few inches of room between them. Bake for 10-12 minutes, rotating baking sheets front to back and top to bottom halfway through baking time. Let cookies cool on baking sheet for about 10 minutes before transferring them to a cooling rack.
Makes about 3 dozen perfect chocolate cookies.
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This was a lot of information. If you made it to the end, congratulations! You can say you are now officially a chocolate chip cookie pro!
P.S. — Baking chocolate chip cookies is a satisfying task, and if you’re looking for a kid-friendly activity, it’s a great fit! There are lots of steps kids can help with. They’ll enjoy cracking the eggs, spooning the flour, balling the dough. But most of all, they’ll love sneaking chocolate chips to snack on while the first batch bakes, and waiting (impatiently) for the cookies to cool just enough to handle without burning their tongue.
You said a crispy version, which is our fav, but did not find it in your variations…could you please add, Thanks
Thank you SO much for all these great tips! I’ve never been able to make good cookies and after following your guide I finally made some to be proud of! Thank you thank you thank you!
Hey i keep getting puffy cookies. I made this recipe exact even read about common mustakes what did i do wrong?
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I made these cookies last night and they turned out great. I used 1 cup of whole-wheat flour as a substitute, and I added walnut pieces. They are definitely irresistible! I used a potato masher to blend the butter + brown sugar + vanilla + egg mixture, and a fork to mix everything together, as I don’t have a hand mixer. Put the white sugar in the separate bowl with the “dry ingredients.” Baked for 12 minutes.
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These were the best tips and yummiest cookies! Can I add cocoa powder to turn them into double chocolate or would that change the recipe? (and how much would I add?) Thank you for this informative post!
I loved these cookies! I’m not a great baker and these came out great, however I had a problem of them coming out a bit too raw on the inside, but too brown on the bottom for me to leave in longer. I ended up popping them back in the oven after cooling to cook longer. How should I adjust my methods to avoid this problem?
I wash my two, old fabulous pans between baking to cool them. Ain’t nobody got time to sit around waiting for a pan to cool!
I followed your recipe for the perfect Chocolate Chip cookie and couldn’t be happier. The last few batches I made were completely flat and embarrassing looking. These were not only beautiful looking, they were absolutely delicious. They really are perfect! Thank you for sharing your research and recipe.
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I have NEVER made chocolate chip cookies before that have actually turned out at all well. Until now. These were amazing! I actually feel like I could offer them to other people and not be embarrassed about them. Lol. Thankyou!
Just wanted to know about brown sugar that was used. Does it matter if using light or dark brown sugar? will it change the taste?
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So I made this recipe and they are delicious! I did add a little more flour because mine was still a little wet, but the flavor was perfect. However, I found that I still had to cool my batter before baking otherwise they got too flat. Also, my cookies came out a little browner than I would’ve liked, I love how your cookies look in your photo, any tips on how to get a lighter color without changing the recipe? Perhaps baking temps and times?
I am a fairly good cookie-maker, but never had much luck with chocolate chip. Mine already spread out too much and are flat “chip-holders”. I was excited about this recipe, and the end result did turn out to be delicious, but my cookies are still flat (though not as flat as other attempts) What am I still doing wrong???!!!
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When do you add the white sugar? It’s not listed in the instructions!
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Just used this recipe, mostly, and my cookies are amazing! I used all brown sugar and used carob chips instead. (Allergic to cocoa) They were gooey and soft, and just sweet enough!
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Dear Lindsey,
Thanks ever so much for this post. My husband and I have stumbled up on a cookie business -at a time when money was scarce and cookies were a cheap way of saying thanks to friends for help- and though our cookies are wonderful in taste and shape, I came here looking to hone them even more- namely in shape/size. Got my answer and I’m incredibly grateful – bless you:). In the matter of a few months, we’ve gone from giving away cookies, to now being in cooperation with one of Slovakia’s greatest coffee chains, and our imaginations keep sparkling.
:**
I always make terrible choc chip cookies….these were delicious!!!! I think it was the brown sugar! And all your tips!!! Thanks for the recipe!
How would margarine influence the cookies?
WOW….the more I click…the smarter I get….click on…I say
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I’ve made this recipe several times and even thought the taste is very yummy they turn out greasy… what am I doing wrong? I even reduced coconut oil. I used butter that was completely room temperature maybe that was my mistake? butter too soft?
Hi Isabel! You know, I have had similar trouble when using coconut oil in other cookie recipes. Way too oily. I suspect the thing that will help that immensely is refrigerating the cookie dough – whether before or after make the dough balls. As far as the butter is concerned, that could also be the culprit. There could be a difference between brands of butter. I know some have more butterfat in them than others. For example, European style butter is higher in fat than the typical generic butter you find at the grocery store. I would err on the side of colder butter (not solid out of the fridge, but still slightly cold) and see if that helps. Or another thing you can do is add a little more flour. One more thought – oven temps can also vary quite a bit by as much as 25+ degrees or have hot spots. I suppose that could also affect things and may lead to the cookies coming out greasy. Hope that helps!
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I have to tell you…. I am known as the “cookie queen” at work and have been encouraged to open my own cookie business (which I may do when I retire) and consider myself a chocolate “chip cookie connoisseur” 🙃BUT if I may say so, in my opinion these were the most, DELICIOUS, PERFECT chocolate chip cookie of ALL‼‼‼ Thank you soooo much for sharing😊😊💗
Aw! That makes me so happy, Carrie! I’ll take that compliment from you any day!
I have found them!! The perfect chocolate chip cookies!
Thanks Lindsey, I’ve been on a hunt for years to find the perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe. They usually come out like cake blocks; sad attempts at cookies. But this recipe was all star. They spread wonderfully, they are chewey in the middle and golden and crispy on the edges. I made a half recipe (yielded 18 cookies) and it worked perfect.
As I got to the ‘add chocolate chips steps’ I realized I HAD NONE! So I found a chocolate bar and chopped it up. Added some raisins and peanuts to add a little something since the chocolate bar was kinda small. Excited to try again, going into my ‘when I’m a grandma I’ll keep this recipe secret book’
I love this recipe, I am from Mexico and I was really searching for the perfect way of making chocolate chips cookies. Because I was having a lot of problems making good and beautiful cookies, and I found it thanks to you.
This post is so helpful! Thank you for all your time. 😍🍪
I used your wonderful advice to bake the best chocolate chip cookies I’ve had since my mother baked for me.
The brown/white sugar ratio is perfection—but I might try a little less of both next time.
I used dark chocolate and semi sweet mini morsels because they were what I had on hand, and the combo was terrific.
And I added a tablespoon of orange zest, because I am currently obsessed with it.
Thank you for the recipe!
I noticed that the so-called ‘newer’ posts are dated 9 yrs ago! However, while googling for advice about bringing eggs to room temperature, up flashed this recipe, which showed several different improvements to the historic Toll House recipe. So I decided to try it, and the results exceeded by wildest dreams! I’ve been routinely frustrated with too flat — too crisp — too spread out cookies over a 50-yr history of baking ccc’s. But this is the bomb! Will bake these for the rest of my life! THANK YOU!
I have tried every recipe I can find for CC Cookies. They used to turn out perfect when I used the Toll House Recipe. Now nothing is turning out. I’ve tried melted butter, room temp butter, 1/2 butter and butter flavored Crisco, chill the dough, freeze the dough, 375 degrees, 350 degrees. Stainless Steel cookie sheets with and without parchment paper or Silpat mats, nonstick baking sheets, more flour, less flour, baking soda, powder, both, more time, less time, bake 2 sheets at once and rotate, bake 1 sheet at a time. HELP!!!
I use the microwave to warm butter, eggs, cream cheese, …
I microwave a cup of water to create a warmer atmosphere, then I place the things that need warming inside the warm microwave.