The Absolute Best Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

If you are anything like me, you delight in finding the absolute best recipe for your favorite foods and treats. I love chocolate chip cookies. And I don’t even determine the best based on if it is soft, hard or chewy. My palate just goes for good.

But when it comes to making chocolate chip cookies from scratch, I’m a bit more discerning. I tend to prefer a crispy edge with a softer center. Many years ago, America’s Test Kitchen stayed true to their promise and produced the absolute best chocolate chip cookie recipe. Over time I have tweaked the recipe for my personal taste and to keep my waistline nice and trim.

This recipe requires a little more time and patience, but as Alton Brown from the Food Network always says, “Your patience will be rewarded.” How would I describe what makes this recipe and these cookies the best? Here are a few reasons in no particular order:

1. It is adapted from a recipe seen on America’s Test Kitchen,
2. My mother refuses to share any of hers with her own grandchildren, as cute and precious as they are.
3. My ex-husband—not known to be a chocolate chip cookie lover—eats as much, if not more, of them as I do and will even take the last one.
4. My sister hides them from her husband and daughters whenever I give them to her family to share (advance notice always goes to my brother-in-law, but my sister is evasive).
5. As a self-proclaimed connoisseur of chocolate chip cookies, I have not tasted anything better.
6. I will sacrifice my gluten and dairy intake for the month to have them. (I have yet to master a gluten-free, dairy free, egg free version of this cookie.)
7. As a health advocate I even gave a little basket of them to my doctor who was starting his weight loss journey.

The Preparation, The Yield, The Bake Time

Active preparation time: 5 minutes

Inactive preparation time: 9 minutes

Yields approximately 28 cookies if using rounded teaspoon

Bake at 375 degrees Fahrenheit for 11-14 minutes

The Ingredients

• 14 tablespoons unsalted butter
• ½ cup white sugar
• ¾ cup brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 whole egg + 1 egg yolk
• 1 ¾ cups flour
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
• 1 ¼ cup chocolate chips

Directions

1. Melt the butter in a microwave safe measuring cup (about 60-70 seconds if not at room temperature).
2. In a large metal bowl whisk together sugars, salt, vanilla extract, and eggs.
3. (Here’s where the bulk of the inactive prep time comes in).
4. Let the mixture stand for three minutes and repeat two times (I take this time to line the cookies sheets with parchment and preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit).
5. Add flour, baking soda, and chocolate chips to the wet mixture.
6. Stir to combine evenly.
7. Using two teaspoons, round off batter so you have three evenly spaced mounds towards the top of the sheet and three towards the bottom. If you use teaspoons and not tablespoons, you can fit two extra cookies on the sheet between the rows. (Spacing is crucial because they cookies do spread a lot).
8. Bake 11-14 minutes.
9. Let cool for two minutes. Then transfer to paper towel lined platter.

Tips And Changes To The Original Recipe

I don’t remember the show specifying the type of butter. But if you use salted butter, do not add the salt listed or else you will have saltlicks instead of cookies. Since I have transitioned to goat butter (if I use butter for anything), if I use it for this recipe, I would cut out the salt almost entirely.

The original recipe called for browning some of the butter. This was more labor intensive, added a slightly nutty flavor, but nothing to write home about considering the use of a pan and high risk of burning the butter. I have not owned a microwave for over 5 years at this point. So I no longer recommend microwaving the butter, let alone anything. That’s some serious radiation and destructive properties at the atomic level.

Avoid measuring over the bowl. You can potentially add too much that you can’t take back out. The same goes for cracking eggs directly into the bowl. I know I’m not alone in fishing out broken shell fragments.

Use the left over egg white for later cooking in an omelet or something else.

I use unbleached flour to make me feel better about all the butter that goes into the recipe. As mentioned above, I still have not conquered a gluten-free version of this amazing chocolate chip cookie recipe.

I eyeball 1 ¾ cups of flour—I know baking is a science, but when I measured the exact amount of flour, the dough was a little stiffer. While the cookies were soft, it was almost too fluffy and cake-like for me. Using a little less flour results in a cookie that is slightly crunchy on the outer rim (still soft though) and soft and chewy in the middle: the best of both worlds. Also, it seems like there is a hint of a butterscotch flavor. Major bonus!

I recommend semi-sweet chocolate chips. But I have done a mix of semi- and bittersweet: it provides a nice surprise and more complexity of flavor. If you like healthy alternatives, I love using brands like Enjoy Life, which is free from 14 allergens, and made in a dedicated nut and gluten free facility.

On the show they said they stumbled upon the wait time when one of the testers took a phone call and starting whisking again. His cookies tasted better than the other versions. Patience during this step is not just a nuisance, it is well worth it.

I switch to a spoon after whisking in the flour because the batter just gets stuck in all the tines. I add the flour in about thirds or else it can become almost unmanageable.

The original recipe called for baking one sheet at a time. It felt like it took forever to get through all the batter. They did show how the cookies end up unevenly browned if you bake more than one sheet at a time. I just rotate the placement of sheets midway through the cook time and have had no problem: top goes to the bottom rack and vice versa.

When baking, check the edges of the cookie for doneness. If the whole cookie is golden or brown, it will be overdone by the time you take them out due to carryover cooking.

Lining your display platter with a paper towel does two things. First, I find it wicks away some extra butter. Second, it keeps condensation down if some cookies are still a little too warm.

If you want to see some really old and dated picture of when I used to faithfully make these cookies, check out my original article about the absolute best chocolate chip cookie recipe from scratch.

If you find you like this recipe but want to add a twist, check out how I adapted the recipe for cranberry orange cookies. Yum!

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