These brown butter chocolate chip cookies are the perfect cookie. The brown butter gives these cookies a rich toffee flavor and a hint of salt. They have crisp, golden edges, a nice crust on the outside, but are still soft and gooey in the center with melty semisweet chocolate.
Why this Recipe Works
I spent years trying to find the perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe. I tested dozens before deciding to just come up with my own. The brown butter and high baking temperature I think it what gives these brown butter chocolate chip cookies an edge.
The brown butter offers a subtle nutty flavor that blends perfectly with the molasses in the brown sugar to give the cookie that amazing rich slightly smoky and nutty toffee flavor.
Baking your cookies at a higher temperature will cook the outside of the cookie faster before the inside cooks too much. This trick is going to give you those crispy edges and exterior and keep the inside nice and soft.
Ingredient Notes
- Butter. The amount of butter listed in the ingredients is the amount needed before you brown it. Once browned you will probably lose about 25% of your butter as liquid evaporates during the browning process.
- Brown Sugar. We use a higher proportion of brown sugar to white sugar in this recipe. The molasses in the brown sugar compliments the brown butter well and amps up that amazing toffee-butterscotch flavor. If you want an amazing chocolate chip cookie recipe without brown sugar, we have a delicious and super easy one!
- Flour. A classic, no-frills, all-purpose flour is all we use here. The most important thing when it comes to flour is making sure you don't use too much-spoon and level, weigh, and check out our guide on How to Measure Flour Correctly.
- Semisweet Chocolate Chips. I prefer semisweet chocolate chips over milk in this recipe. The slight bitterness from the semisweet chocolate chips adds the perfect contrast to this rich brown butter chocolate chip cookies.
How to Make this Recipe
- How to Brown Butter. Start by browning your butter. Place the butter in a heavy bottomed pan, make sure it is large as the butter tends to foam up quite a bit. Keep stirring it over medium-high heat until the butter has reached an amber color and there are brown bits at the bottom. Consult out How to Brown Butter tutorial for FAQs on browning butter, pictures, and a video!
- Chill the butter. Place the butter in a large bowl and chill or freeze until it has returned to a solid state. You want it to be room temperature, solid, but soft enough to be creamed. Chilling the butter is essential to these brown butter chocolate chip cookies, so do not try to skip this step. Picture A shows what the butter will look like after it is chilled and Picture B shows it after it has been moved to the mixing bowl. Notice the toasted milk solids (the dark bits) have sunk to the bottom of the dish. Don't forget to get all those dark bits into your mixing bowl, they add lots of toasted butter flavor!
- Cream the butter and sugar. Cream together the butter, brown sugar and white sugar for 1 minute.
- Add the eggs. Then add the eggs and vanilla and beat for another 2-3 minutes until the mixture is light and fluffy. Please note: the image pictured is a double batch, which is why you see 4 eggs in the image instead of 2.
- Add the dry ingredients. Add the flour, baking soda, and salt. Mix the dry ingredients in so they are just barely incorporated. Overworking the dough will result in tough cookies.
- Add the chocolate chips. Stir in the chocolate chips until they are evenly dispersed throughout the dough.
- Bake. Take 4 tablespoons of dough and shape into round balls. Place on a greased or lined baking sheet and bake for 8-10 minutes at 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Leave plenty of room for the cookies to spread (I typically place 6 cookie dough balls on a baking sheet). Let the cookies cool for 2-3 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
When butter is browned the milk solids are toasted giving it a nutty and toffee flavor that complements the rest of the ingredients. If 1 ¼ cups of butter seems like a lot to you in this recipe it is because butter loses about 25% of its liquid when it is browned. So you end up with closer to 1 cup of butter by the time you add it into the mixing bowl.
If your cookies are too flat, this is usually a result of not chilling the butter after it has been browned. We need the butter chilled back to room temperature so that air can be whipped into it when it is creamed together with the sugars and eggs. Otherwise you will end up with puddles for cookies.
Typically, if your cookies are hard after they have cooled it means that you didn't make the cookies large enough. Remember, we're using about 4 tablespoons of dough per cookie. If you make them smaller they will end up slightly overbaked and won't have that same soft center that you get with the larger cookies.
Expert Tips
- Make sure your flour is measured correctly. Too much flour is a cardinal sin in baking. You need to take care when measuring it, I prefer to weigh my flour, but otherwise take a second to review our guide on How to Measure Flour Properly. Too much flour in your brown butter chocolate chip cookies can make them dry, tough, crumbly, or too thick, none of which are good.
- Get all the brown bits in your brown butter. After you brown your butter you'll see all sorts of little brown bits at the bottom of the pan. Those are toasted milk solids and they add a delicious toasted and salty flavor to the brown butter chocolate chip cookies. So scrape every last bit of them into your bowl for maximum flavor.
How to Make Pretty Cookies
- Make your cookies big. Bigger cookies look prettier. I use ¼ cup of dough for the perfect crispy and gooey ratio. This is my favorite cookie scoop to use.
- Top the off. Before you put your cookie dough balls in the oven top them with a few extra chocolate chips. This makes sure you've got some chocolate chips picture perfect on top of every cookie.
- Bang the Pan. Right when your cookies come out of the oven bang the pan on the counter. the pushes the cookies out and gives them those beautiful wrinkles.
- Make them circular. If your cookies are a little misshapen it's okay, you can fix them. While the cookies are still hot take your spatula and gently push in the edges anywhere the cookies aren't perfectly round. You can also use a large round cookie cutter or even a large mason jar to shape your brown butter chocolate chip cookies. Just move the cookie cutter in a circular motion around the cookie to make it a perfect circle.
How to Store this Recipe
How to Freeze Cookie Dough
I love to have a stock of these in my freezer for when I'm craving a cookie or in case I need to bring a little treat to someone fast! So here's what you'll want to do:
- Scoop the cookie dough into ¼ cup balls and line them up on a lined cookie sheet and place the entire cookie sheet in the freezer for 30-60 minutes. This is going to make sure they maintain their shape and don't get squished and misshapen in the freezer
- Then you can place them in a freezer safe gallon back or stack them on top of each other in a tupperware container, I like to place a piece of parchment paper, wax paper, or even plastic wrap in between the layers of cookie dough so that they don't get stuck to each other. You can freeze these for up to 3 months.
- Before baking, pull out however many cookie dough balls you want and let them sit out at room temperature for about 30 minutes. Then bake according to normal instructions, you may need to add a minute to the baking time
How to Store at Room Temperature
- To maintain the crispy edges and soft centers, my preferred method of storing these is to leave them on a plate or tray and loosely cover them with a towel overnight.
- If you decide to store them in a sealed container (like a Ziploc bag or Tupperware) The cookies will likely lose their crisp exterior and take on a chewy texture overall (still delicious though!).
You May Also Like These Other Cookie Recipes:
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Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 ¼ cup butter (280 grams) see notes
- ¾ cup granulated sugar (150 grams)
- 1 cup firmly packed brown sugar (200 grams)
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 2 ¾ cups of flour (357 grams) measured correctly
- ½ teaspoon of salt
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 2-2 ½ cups semisweet chocolate chips (360-480 grams)
Instructions
- Brown 1 ¼ cups of butter in a medium-large saucepan, stirring constantly over medium-high heat, until you reach a deep honey color. Remove from heat and pour into your mixing bowl. Cool butter in fridge or freezer until room temperature consistency, you want your butter to be solid. If you use it when its still liquid your cookies will be flat.
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease baking sheets with cooking spray or line with silicone mats or parchment paper.
- Once butter has set up, cream together butter and both sugars for 1 minute. Add in eggs and vanilla for and additional 2-3 minutes until the mixture is pale and fluffy. (Make sure you get all those toasty brown bits at the bottom of your brown butter!)
- Add in flour, baking soda, and salt. Only mix the dry ingredients in until just barely combined-over mixing will make the cookies tough. Stir in chocolate chips.
- Take ¼ cup of dough (about 68 grams) and shape into round balls bake for 8-10 minutes at 375 degrees Fahrenheit until the top and edges are just golden. Cool cookies on baking sheet for 2-3 minutes before moving to a cooling rack.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
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originally published August 19, 2018
Nicki says
Without a doubt the best cookies I have ever made!
Bri says
This is the flavor and texture I’ve been looking for in my chocolate chip cookies! So happy with how they turned out!
Brandy says
Delicious!! I used choco chunk instead though 🙂
Amie J says
Oh my! This is hands down, the best chocolate chip cookie recipe! As I was mixing up the dough it smelled AMAZING with the browned butter and I struggled not eating the dough right then. My family all told me they loved this better than my other recipes. Absolutely delicious!
Kelly says
Best chocolate chip cookies I’ve ever made
Isabella says
when you put the butter in the fridge, once it solidifies do I have to take it out and let it get to room temperate? or can I use it straight from the fridge?
In Fine Taste says
Hi Isabella, good question. You want the butter to be room temperature, so if it's completely cold just let it sit out on the counter for a bit until it comes to room temperature.
- Alyssa
Stefani says
I’ve made these cookies probably about over 30 times, they are amazing! Thank you for sharing the recipe. The only thing I noticed is that the amount of flour that goes into them is a bit much, I’ve since reduced 50g of flour and the cookies turn out more moist and less crumbly the next day. The nuttiness favour also tends to come out stronger! That’s my only comment. Thanks again.
Theo says
Came out perfectly! Texture is closely and they have the perfect amount of salt- just enough to make everything pop, but not at all salty!
Lindsay says
Hi! So I accidentally filtered out the bits in my brown butter. Will this heavily impact my cookies?
In Fine Taste says
You'll still end up with a delicious cookie, however the brown bits are the toasted milk solids, so they add quite bit of nuttiness to the cookies.
-Alyssa
Vanina says
These are the best cookies I’ve ever made!! Instead of semi sweet chips I chopped up 2 bars of Tony’s Chocoloney (one dark and one milk chocolate). I like the chocolate chunks. I like how salty these are and I even added a sprinkle on Maldon after baking. Delicious!!
Vanina says
These cookies are the best cookies I’ve ever made!! I sprinkled Maldon salt on top after baking and instead of semi sweet chips I chopped up 2 bars of Tony’s Chocoloney (one dark and one milk chocolate). I like the chocolate chunks. The texture of these are amazing, light and crisp. Delicious!
NRuff says
HOLY CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES! These were by far the best browned butter chocolate chip cookies I have made so far. TRY them, take the time to actually BROWN the butter and let it cool before mixing it in the sugar. Game changer!
Morgan says
I made these and my husband and my father in law both said that these were the best cookies they’ve ever had!! So so good!!
Ashley says
How long can you store these in the fridge before baking?
In Fine Taste says
Hi Ashley, I would say about 24 hours. The dough tends to dry out a touch (even tightly covered) and you won’t get as much spread in the cookies when baked. If you want to make them further in advance than that, I recommend scooping the cookie dough into balls and freezing them.
- Alyssa
J Allen says
If we freeze these, would you still cook still from 375 and just increase bake time? TIA 🙂
In Fine Taste says
Hi! Yes, I'd still cook them at 375, just add 1-2 minutes to the bake time. You may find that they don't spread as much if completely frozen. If I'm using frozen cookie dough balls, I find it helps to let them thaw out for about 30-60 minutes before baking.
- Alyssa
Archie says
why does the nutrition have a serving as 1g if the cookies are 68g? does that mean that 1 cookie has 23120 calories?
In Fine Taste says
Hi Archie, no that is for one cookie. It defaults to grams as the serving, and sometimes I miss changing it. I’ll try to get that updated to avoid future confusion.
- Alyssa
Molly says
May be an obvious question but do you combine the dry ingredients before adding? The video looked like no but usually I do, thank you! These are actually amazing by the way, I’m shocked by how amazing the brown butter makes them smell!
Rachel says
Great recipe. So easy to follow.
Mstone says
They turned out WONDERFUL!!!!Brown butter makes them soooooo rich!!!
Haley says
Wonderful recipe! Makes literal Pinterest perfect cookies every time. The instructions are easy to follow, but if you have questions, the video will answer them. I honestly wish I could include a picture of what I made to prove how perfect they turn out. **the tip about banging the pan as soon as they come out of the oven is a pro-tip!
Jules says
came out so delicious! I'll be using this recipe from now on!♡
Mimi says
These turned out amazing. I was worried because I didn’t let the butter come back to room temperature after solidifying, so I tended to over mix. Thought they might turn out tough like the recipe said, but they ended up turning out fabulous! Thanks for the incredible recipe.
Karen says
They were perfect. I even weighed ingredients…easy recipe
Carolina says
Best recipe ever. Not a single detail was missing. You didn’t keep any secret for you, it was all there 💖💖💖
Emma says
We love making these! I always make more than one batch. I always portion them out and freeze the dough.