Chocolate Chip Cookies

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These classic Chocolate Chip Cookies have deep flavor from brown sugar, vanilla, and salt, and a perfect balance of crispy and chewy with lots of chocolate packed in each bite. The cookie dough can be baked right away, chilled for deeper flavor, or frozen for later!

This is my classic chocolate chip cookie: crisp golden edges, a chewy middle, and puddles of semisweet chocolate all throughout. The dough needs no chilling, so you can have warm cookies about 30 minutes after you start.

When I tested this recipe, I baked the same 1½-tablespoon-sized dough balls three ways: straight from the bowl after mixing, after an hour in the fridge, and completely frozen. All three work, and below I’ll show you what I discovered changes about each one. Plus, I share my experience from making this recipe over 20 times to change the cookie texture by simply tweaking an ingredient ratio, baking time, or temperature.

Why These Cookies Are Chewy in the Middle and Crisp at the Edges

There are three main components to this recipe that produce my perfect chocolate chip cookie texture.

• More brown sugar than white sugar. The dough uses a 2:1 ratio of light brown sugar to granulated sugar intentionally. Brown sugar carries molasses, which holds onto moisture and keeps the middle chewy, while granulated sugar caramelizes more easily and crisps the edges. When I’ve tipped the ratio toward more granulated sugar, the cookies baked flatter and crispier throughout.
• The right amount of flour. The right balance of flour makes the cookie spread just enough without being too thin. It also provides enough structure to hold a lot of chocolate chips in every bite. When I tested measuring methods, 1 cup scooped straight from the flour bag weighed 138g (1 cup should be 120g), so scooping all 2½ cups can add about 45g of extra flour. That’s the most common reason these come out dry and puffy instead of chewy. Weighing is the most accurate measurement method. Follow my spoon-and-level method in my guide on how to measure ingredients correctly if you don’t have a scale.
• Baking soda. Don’t swap this with baking powder! Baking powder makes the cookies puff up and turn cakey instead of spreading into crispy-edged rounds. Baking soda raises the pH of the cookies, lowering the temperature at which the sugars caramelize and reducing the strength of the gluten network in the flour. This means the cookies spread more than they puff.

There are so many other factors that go into cookie texture, and you can read about all of them in my guide to The 4 Cookie Textures! I tested this chocolate chip cookie recipe 20 times to make soft, chewy, crispy, and cakey cookies, and shared my findings in the guide. You can use it to make adjustments to this recipe for your perfect cookie texture by changing the fat, sugar, ingredient ratios, how the dough is mixed, and the baking temperature.

Key Ingredients

These are the main ingredients you need to make chocolate chip cookies. You can find the full list of ingredients and measurements in the recipe card below.

Flour — a standard all-purpose flour makes an excellent chocolate chip cookie. If you want more chewiness, you can replace up to half of the AP flour with bread flour. For a more tender, crumbly cookie, you can do the same but use cake flour.

Baking soda — make sure your baking soda has not expired and is lump-free. Sometimes it clumps if stored in the cardboard box on the shelf, so sift it if needed.

Salt — fine salt is mixed into the dough and rounds out the flavors in the cookies. Flaky sea salt is the perfect finishing touch for sprinkling on top of the chocolate chip cookies hot out of the oven. Learn the difference between these two types of salt in my Salt 101 guide.

Butter — you need softened unsalted butter. It should take a fingerprint but still feel cool with some resistance. Butter that’s gone so soft it’s greasy will make a flatter cookie because it doesn’t hold air as well and it is on the verge of melting. Using unsalted butter and adding the salt separately allows you to have control over the saltiness of the cookie dough. If you want to use salted butter, see my guide on Salted Vs. Unsalted Butter to make the correct swap.

Sugar — you need both granulated sugar and light brown sugar. Not only does brown sugar impart moisture and a subtle molasses flavor, but it also contributes to the chewy texture of the cookies. Granulated sugar creates the addictive crisp edges. If you want the cookies even chewier, you can use all brown sugar. Dark brown sugar works too, but the molasses flavor will be more pronounced.

Egg — an egg helps to bind the cookie dough ingredients. Without the egg, the dough will bake up thinner and crispier with a more crumbly texture.

Chocolate chips — you can use semisweet chocolate chips, chocolate chunks, or your favorite type of chocolate chips. For the ultimate chocolate chip cookies, use two kinds of chocolate. In testing, I made one batch with chopped Guittard semisweet bars plus bagged chips. The chopped bar breaks into tiny shards, and I found these pieces melted into streaks throughout the dough, making them taste even more chocolatey. I like to press a few extra chopped pieces or chocolate chips on top of each dough ball before baking, which is what gives you those pools of melted chocolate on top!

How To Make Chocolate Chip Cookies

Learn to make chocolate chip cookies with these step-by-step process images. You can find the full set of instructions in the recipe card below.

1. Mix the dry ingredients. Combining the salt and baking soda with the flour first ensures they incorporate evenly throughout the dough without having to overmix.

2. Combine the butter and both sugars. Beat on medium-low speed until very light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Creaming beats tiny air pockets into the butter, and those help the dough lift and stay tender. When I’ve cut the creaming down to a minute or two, the cookies come out denser and greasier at the edges.

3. Mix in the egg thoroughly. Once the egg is added, you may need to stop and scrape down the sides of the bowl so the liquidy egg gets fully incorporated with the fluffy butter and sugar. The mixture should be thick and fluffy when the egg is fully mixed in.

4. Beat in the vanilla. It’s easier to incorporate the extract at this stage than once the dough gets stiff from the flour being added.

5. Add the flour mixture on low just until it disappears. Overmixing will make the cookies dense or tough and turn out flat.

6. I stir the chips in by hand with a rubber spatula, for the same reason I just mentioned—not overbeating the dough. Be sure to scrape down the bowl, getting down to the bottom so any dry bits of flour or pockets of butter are fully mixed.

7. Scoop the dough balls. I use a 1½-tablespoon scoop so all 32 cookies are the same size and finish baking together.

8. Press a few more chips or chopped chocolate onto each ball. Bake one sheet at a time at 350°F for 12 to 14 minutes, until the edges are golden brown and the middle looks puffed and dry on top but is still soft to the touch. I bake one sheet at a time so they bake evenly. When I’ve crowded two sheets into the oven during testing, the top sheet spread more and didn’t get as golden, and the bottom sheet browned very quickly on the bottom and didn’t spread enough. Sprinkle flaky salt on top right away, then let the cookies cool on the pan for 5 to 10 minutes. The hot pan keeps cooking the centers, which is why you want the centers soft when you take them out.

Should You Chill Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough?

You don’t have to! I wrote this recipe so you can bake straight from the bowl when you want cookies now. In my tests, the cookies that were baked straight from the bowl had a good flavor, chewiness, and crisp edge.

Chilling is an added benefit: an hour in the fridge, or 30 minutes in the freezer, gives you a more deeply flavored, chewier cookie, and chilled dough doesn’t spread quite as much as dough baked straight from the bowl at room temperature. The flour has time to soak up moisture and the cold butter melts more slowly, so the edges set before the cookie spreads. Fully frozen cookies amplified this chilling effect even more, for thicker cookies with a more distinct difference between the crispy edge and soft center.

In my side-by-side bake, the chilled cookies came out noticeably thicker with a bigger variance in texture. The flavor definitely improved too. If you have time, it will make a great chocolate chip cookie even better!

To chill, scoop the dough first, then chill the balls. You can cover and refrigerate them for up to 72 hours. For more on timing and shelf life, see my cookie academy guide on how long to chill cookie dough.

Bake Times for Every Size

I wrote the recipe for 1½-tablespoon-sized dough balls, which make about 2¾-inch-round cookies. You can change the size of the dough balls to make them bigger! Here are my tested bake times at 350°F with different dough temperatures for each dough ball size. Start checking a minute early since ovens vary.

Portion	Dough Temp	Bake time
1½ – 2 tbsp. (#40 scoop)	Straight from the bowl	12 minutes
1½ – 2 tbsp.	Chilled 1 hour	13 minutes
1½ – 2 tbsp.	Frozen solid	15 minutes
3 tbsp.(#20 scoop)	Straight from the bowl	13 minutes
3 tbsp.	Chilled 1 hour	14 minutes
3 tbsp.	Frozen	16 minutes
¼ cup(#16 scoop)	Straight from the bowl	14 minutes
¼ cup	Chilled 1 hour	15 minutes
¼ cup	Frozen	18 minutes

For big bakery-style cookies, use the 3-tablespoon or ¼-cup portions and give them extra room on the sheet. I don’t go bigger than ¼ cup, because the edges burn before the middle bakes through.

Variations

This recipe is easy to adapt to change texture, flavor, or mix-ins! I often make one of these swaps based on my current craving or who I’m giving a batch to.

• Soft chocolate chip cookies. Whisk 2 tablespoons of cornstarch into the flour mixture for softer, chewier cookies with tender edges. The starch traps more water, keeping the cookie texture softer.
• Brown butter. Browning the butter adds a toasty, nutty flavor. Browned butter loses water as it cooks, so you’ll need to start with 2 tablespoons more butter than this recipe calls for. It also needs to cool down before you can cream it with the sugar. If brown butter is the cookie you’re after, my brown butter chocolate chip cookies are tested with the cooked butter from the start so you don’t have to make any adjustments.
• Nuts and other mix-ins. Chopped toasted walnuts or toasted pecans, white chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, toasted coconut, sprinkles, and M&Ms all work, as long as the total amount of mix-ins stays at 1½ cups. Past that, I find that the dough has trouble spreading and you end up with thicker baked mounds.

How to Store Chocolate Chip Cookies

I keep cooled cookies in an airtight container at room temperature. They have the best texture if eaten within 5 days, but they last for a few weeks and just get drier with time. I like to store them with a slice of sandwich bread or a few large marshmallows—the cookies will absorb their moisture to keep them chewy for longer.

To freeze baked cookies, set them on a lined sheet until solid, then move them to a freezer container for up to 3 months and thaw at room temperature.

Frequently Asked Questions

If you’ve tried this chocolate chip cookie recipe, then don’t forget to rate it and let me know how you got on in the comments below. I love hearing from you!