These rank at the top of our list when it comes to the Best Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe. We recommend scooping them large so they have time to develop buttery crisp edges and retain their soft centers. We’ve found that everyone has their “perfect” chocolate chip cookie and since many factors (elevation, humidity, personal preference) influence what is “perfect” for YOU, we recommend trying a few to find your favorite! Our two other favorite recipes are these Classic Chocolate Chip Cookies and also the famed NY Times Chocolate Chip Cookies. If you love this recipe below, it’s also the inspiration behind our beloved GIANT Chocolate Chip Cookie, and in bar form, these Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars! If you want just a few cookies, try our little Small Batch Chocolate Cookie Recipe, which makes just 6-8 cookies.
Scroll past recipe card for step by step photos and instructions!
Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
Description
This cookie is a perfectly chewy, bakery style chocolate chip cookie– crisp on the outside and soft in the center.
Ingredients
2 cups plus 2 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoon butter (1 1/2 sticks) melted and cooled until warm*
1 cup brown sugar (light or dark)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate chips
Instructions
*You want your butter melted, but not hot. It’s best when it has a milky look, not clear yellow. Your dough will be quite loose if you use hot melted butter and you’ll need to wait for it to harden a bit before scooping your dough. I recommend melting slowly at half power until all the pieces are almost melted and let residual heat finish melting it. It should be just warm to the touch, not hot.
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Adjust oven rack to middle position. Mix flour, salt, and baking soda together in medium bowl; set aside.
Beat butter and sugars until thoroughly blended. Mix in egg, yolk, and vanilla. Add dry ingredients; mix until just combined. Stir in chocolate chips.
Scoop into balls* and bake until outer edges start to harden yet centers are still soft and puffy. Baking time will depend on the size of your cookies. I think the texture of these cookies are best when scooped large, about 3 tablespoons of dough, each, which will bake for 9-12 minutes. Cool cookies on cookie sheets. Serve or store in airtight container.
*alternate scoop method: This recipe as written from ATK suggests rolling 1/4 cup dough into a ball and then breaking it in half, placing the broken side facing up on the cookie sheet. The craggly texture of the top creates a nice shape and texture to the baked cookie. That being said, I almost always just use an extra large cookie scoop and skip the breaking part because it’s quick and easy and they still turn out amazing.
How to make Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
This recipe relies heavily on brown sugar, which is something that helps give it a warm caramel flavor and chewy texture.
Another main component in achieving a good texture is the addition of an extra egg yolk.
You can use any chocolate chips you like. I personally am always a fan of semisweet chocolate chips in cookies, and most desserts. I love Ghirardelli brand, but use whatever you have and like!
Size Matters!
I prefer the texture of these cookies best when scooped large, in a ball of about 3 tablespoons dough. A scooper works great! Don’t flatten them down after placing them on the baking sheet.
Bake Your Cookies
More Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipes to Explore!
Classic Chocolate Chip Cookies
NY Times Chocolate Chip Cookies
GIANT Chocolate Chip Cookie
Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars!
Small Batch Chocolate Cookie Recipe
Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
Questions & Reviews
Thank you for sharing this cookie recipe! It has become one of our favorites and I use it all the time!
i made these tonight and they were wonderful; soft and chewy was the perfect title for it! thanks for sharing your talents with us!
Made them tonight for Santa (we are doing Christmas early) and um, amazing. Santa will have no problem-o finishing them off. Thanks for the fabulous new favorite!
I made this recipe tonight. They turned out really good, but they were still flat. I live in Breckenridge colorado and the elevation is 10,000 ft. Should I put more flour in them?
Try adding 2 tablespoons of flour. And my brother got married in Breckenridge–it’s SO beautiful! 🙂
I love this recipe, it is my favorite CC cookie recipe after a long search! However, I have had problems with it when I freeze the dough and want to bake some another day. They always turn out super flat and greasy and run all over the pan. Any suggestions about proper prep to bake after freezing them in dough ball form?
I’ve actually tried this with Heath bar bits and they came out amazing! Also doubled this recipe and made a 16 in round cookie cake. And it baked and set really well! This is my go to cookie recipe, I literally just change out the type of chips I use and it tastes delicious! Thank you!
Yup- perfect cookie recipe, thanks for the recommendation to 1. cool the dough (it’s hot and humid in TX so that was a great tip) 2. to put the cookies on the broken side up. THANKS. I have used the same chocolate chip recipe for years and I am over that one and in with this one.
I’m so happy I found your website! I have been making this recipe for a couple of months now, but just to hop on in here and say thank you for posting it. This is my go-to choc. chip recipe now. I love that it uses melted butter, as I never plan in advance and my butter is always hard as a rock! lol! The texture is absolutely perfect!
I made these tonight, and while they taste good, they’re too sweet for me! My husband and kids have major sweet teeth, they loved them.. but I think I’ll cut down to 1/2 c. of brown sugar next time! 🙂
These are awesome!
I made these today……absolutely delicious! I love how they are so soft and chewy but just set/crunchy on the outer edges! Best chocolate chip cookies ever! Thanks for sharing.
Thank you for posting this recipe!!!! This is the best chocolate chip cookie recipe! I’m not a fan of cakey cookies, but mine seemed to turn out like that until I found this recipe. THANK YOU!!!!!!
Seriously the best cookies hands down. Thank you so much for generously putting this recipe on here. I have had so many compliments about these cookies and they are my go to give-neighbors treats. This recipe will be sticking around in my recipe book for a LONG time 🙂
These were delicious! I also browned the butter and it gave them a caramel taste, which I loved. I’ll be making these again for sure!
I have made these cookies many times. I love them. The other day instead of just melting the butter I browned the butter! The cookie dough and baked cookie were AMAZING!!
I live about 10 minutes north of Salt Lake and mine went flat. Any suggestions? I wonder if I should take Suzanne’s ideas (comment #125). I did try putting the dough in the fridge for awhile, then the freezer just because the dough was so sticky (not sure how long exactly). It was still sticky when I gave up and baked the cookies anyway. I used Imperial (not sure if it’s margarine or butter; it doesn’t say!) so maybe I need to try using real butter? I wonder if your other cookie recipe would work better. Also, I’m interested in the recipe you mentioned in comment #21. 🙂 I think I will try different recipes and see what works better for me at this altitude. Thanks!
Andrea, the Imperial is definitely your problem- you didn’t use butter. Imperial is margarine. Try it out with 100% real butter!
I tried this recipe tonight and they came out perfect! I love chewy cookies, they were amazing. Thanks for sharing!
Yay! These cookies were so good. Especially after letting them cool off completely. My children, mother-in-law, sister-in-law and father-in-law and I loved them! They complemented me on how delicious these were. I was making more in the kitchen because they could not have enough of these and they even watched me make them and wanted to learn how to make these. Thank you for sharing this recipe!!!
This is THE BEST chocolate chip cookie recipe! It is the only one I will use when making chocolate chip cookies. I have made them over and over again. Perfect, every time!
My darling husband was craving cookies so I thought I’d try this recipe. He wasn’t sure he wanted me to deviate from our tried and true recipe but I convinced him to try these and now he is SOLD! In fact he made a cookie dough sandwich with them. (some of the dough between two warm from the oven cookies). What men think of!
Hi, can someone give me a tip or two? I attempted am attempting to make these awesme cookies, but the step where I am wondering if I did right is mixing the 1 1/2 cups of melted butter with the 1 cup of brown sugar, then I added the vanilla extract and the 1 egg + 1 yolk , ok at this stage my brown sugar would sink and it seemed as though the butter kept separating from the brown sugar no matter how fast and long I mixed it for( it didn’t look like pasty like on the picture posted at all) so I shrugged my shoulders and figured maybe after I add the 1large egg + egg yolk it will improve well it did but still did not look right. But it may workout in the end. Ok so I added the flour mixture and I put the “cookie dough” mine looks more like gooey paste consistency so I put it in the fridge to harden it a bit so that I can shape them put on the sheet. I’m still waiting for it now, but someone please give me a tip
Perhaps you had a mis-measurement somewhere? Did you use real butter? It should come together with no problems so I’m not sure!
Ps oops I meant 1 1/2 sticks of butter. I wrote cups instead of writng sticks. But I measured it right. My cookies came out just fine they looked awesome and had great flavor. A little cakey due to my part because while I was making this recipe I discovered I had no baking soda so I got a tip” but I’m going to do the recipe with baking soda and do it the right way!
I’m trying this recipe asap! I like a soft cookie not chewy, gooey, nor cakey. I can’t really explain it but I hope this recipe is just what I need. I will let you know how I liked this recipe…
P.S. What’s Kate’s recipe?
Kate’s recipe is right here: https://ourbestbites.com/2008/03/chocolate-chip-cookies/
Oooooh! Thank you Sara!!! I can’t wait to try these ! I just threw my batch of chewy chocolate chip cookie dough in the oven my kiddos love the chewy, I may like Kate’s recipe better I haven’t tasted anything yet though but I will let you guys know!
Made these two weeks ago and they didn’t last long at all! I plan to make more tomorrow! Best chocolate chip cookie recipe ever!!! Thanks for sharing!!
So, I’ve just found a new Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe….This one!! WOW!! It is SO yummy and SO easy!! I even baked them with my two daughters (ages 9 and 4), and they turned out!! Thanks again for yet another wonderful recipe!! 🙂
So I have made these several times and now have figured a few things out:
– The original recipe from CI says to break the 1/4 cup of dough in half and then squish those two halves together. These make really big cookies (although that didn’t stop me from downing 3 out of the oven…) so I would stick with Sara’s way and just do the halves
– Oddly enough, the dough seems to work better mixing by hand (don’t know why?!) but the good news is it is really easy to mix by hand
– The dough usually seems runny even after mixing in the flour, but by the time you measure out the choc chips and dump them in it is more dough-like. Still really sticky, but more like cookie dough. Like Sara said, DO NOT ADD MORE FLOUR! Chill or just have faith that sticky = chewy
– I am in Utah, and even after chilling or freezing the dough for a bit, mine tended to bake really flat (although still yummy and chewy!) I read on a CI message board to chill for an hour or more in the fridge (I usually cut it down to 15-20 mins in the freezer) and then bake at 375. Obviously shorten your time from the original recipe, but that seemed to help, they were more bakery like after that.
YUM! I love me a chewy cookie.
Oh, these are my favorite, too! I’ve been making them since the recipe first appeared! In fact, I have about 3 dozen in the freezer right now.
I need this cookbook!
I love Cook’s Illustrated too. They are so beautiful, have yummy recipes and they are so informative. I love your website! Thanks for all your hard work. I gave my daughters (and myself) OBB calendars for Christmas. 🙂
I love chocolate chip cookies- any way shape or form but these are great!