Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
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Updated Dec 04, 2025, Published Dec 18, 2023
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Welcome to my favorite Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies. These cookies have a deep, nutty flavor to them; they’re made with two types of chocolate, chopped walnuts (optional!) and flakey sea salt on top. Their texture is perfection: crispy edges with soft and chewy centers–yum!
It is no secret that I love brown butter. It makes everything better. Maybe you’ve seen my Brown Butter Scallops with Butternut Squash Risotto or my Brown Butter Apple Crumble. Savory or sweet, it truly makes EVERYTHING better.
Ingredients For Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Chocolate – I like using a bar of bittersweet chocolate (we will chop this) AND semi-sweet chocolate chips. This gives great chocolate dimension to these cookies.
- Sugars – This recipe uses white sugar and brown sugar. The ratio is definitely more brown sugar to white, resulting in a chewy cookie.
- Eggs – Whole eggs and an egg yolk. The egg yolk adds a nice richness to the dough that feels luxurious.
- Butter – I like using unsalted butter so we can control the salt amount in the cookies. And of course, using good-quality butter helps. I used KerryGold for this recipe.
- Baking soda – This gives a nice color to the cookies as well as helps with spreading.
- Vanilla extract – I love making Homemade Vanilla Extract. Of course, store-bought is fine!
For the full list of the ingredients, please see the recipe index card below!
How to Brown Butter
I like to start with the butter cubed. And place it in a shallow pan over medium heat. You will slowly see it foam up (this is all the water evaporating out of the butter). Give it a stir regularly. Slowly you will start to see the milk solids caramelize, resulting in brown butter! I like to take my brown butter pretty far. You want it to be golden, dark brown. Immediately pour it into a bowl so it stops cooking.
How to Make Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Whisk together the dry ingredients. Brown the butter, allow the butter to cool for five minutes.
- Then whisk in the sugars.
- Add in the eggs and egg yolk and whisk until very smooth.
- Pour the wet ingredients into the dry.
- Mix until just combined.
- Add the chocolate and the walnuts.
- Chill the dough for 1 hour or overnight.
- Next, scoop out balls with a 2-ounce cookie scoop.
- Bake cookies at 350°F for 8 minutes. Remove the cookies from the oven and use a large cookie cutter to help shape them. Then bake for an additional 4 minutes.
- Let them cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes, then move them to a cooling rack. Serve them warm!
Tips and Tricks
Weigh your flour – For quick breads (like my Easy Banana Nut Bread), weighing flour isn’t that necessary but I find with cookies it’s critical to get the perfect consistency.
Use light colored baking sheets – My favorite are from NordicWare. I own a few of them and they’re amazing. Dark colored baking sheets will result in darker bottomed cookies that are burnt or overbaked.
Place chocolate chips on top. I like to place a few chocolate chips on top of the balls of dough so they look the best.
Use a large cookie cutter to ‘scoot’ the cookies. I like to do this to shape my cookies into perfect circles. It’s totally optional.
Make these ahead! The cookie dough can be made, scooped out into dough balls and kept in the fridge, covered tightly, for up to 3 days. Bake them straight from the fridge.
Christmas Cookies
For festive Christmas cookies, swap out the chocolate chips for red and green candy-coated chocolate. I like to add the chocolate candies to the batter and also pack them around the entire dough ball. They look extra festive and stand out beautifully in a Christmas cookie box!
To Freeze this Cookie Dough
I have a whole post on How to Freeze Cookie Dough. But quickly, here’s how:
- I like to scoop out the doughs of cookie dough and place them on a plate or baking sheet (whatever fits in your freezer).
- Place them in the freezer for 30 minutes. This is known as flash freezing them.
- Then add the to a freezer-safe bag. Bake them straight from the freezer; you’ll most likely need a few minutes longer.
More Cookies to Make and Eat
Desserts
Homemade Mint Milano Cookies
Desserts
Iced Oatmeal Cookies
Desserts
Chewy Pistachio Lace Cookies
Cookies
S’mores Cookies
If you tried this Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe or any other recipe on my website, please leave a 🌟 star rating and let me know how it went in the 📝 comments below. Thanks for visiting!
Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
Video
Ingredients
- 3 (360g) cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 cup unsalted butter, (we're going to melt it so it can be straight from the fridge)
- 2 teaspoons water
- 1 1/2 cups brown sugar
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 2 large whole eggs
- 1 large egg yolk
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract or vanilla paste
- 3 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped (from a bar)
- 6 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 1/3 cup finely chopped walnuts
Instructions
- In a large bowl, mix together flour, baking soda and salt.
- In medium saucepan, set over medium-low heat, melt the butter. Take out a silicon whisk and give the butter a stir. It will begin to foam up and bubble. Stirring frequently, allow it to keep going until it goes from a pale yellow color to a light brown color. Once it hits a light brown color, I like to give it a few more stirs just so I can monitor the color. This process happens quickly so don’t walk away! Keep stirring it until it goes from a light brown color to deep golden brown. Remove it from the heat and give it a few more stirs.
- I like to let it continue to cook until it’s dark brown. Immediately pour it into a large bowl. Whisk in the two teaspoons of water. Allow the brown butter to cool for about 10 minutes. (If you don’t do this, when you add the chocolate, it’ll melt.)
- Next, whisk in the sugars. And then, add the eggs and vanilla. Pour into the dry ingredients and mix until combined. Lastly, fold in chocolate chips and walnuts (if using). Stick in fridge for 1 hour to chill.
- Preheat oven to 350F. Scoop out 2-ounce balls of dough and roll them between your palms; place them onto a parchment-lined baking sheet spacing them 4 inches apart.
- Bake for 8 minutes. At the 8-minute mark, remove them from the oven to shape them (this is optional). Rotate the pan and bake for an additional 3 to 4 minutes, until the edges are lightly golden brown.
Notes
Tips and Tricks:
- Weigh your flour – For quick breads (like my Easy Banana Nut Bread), weighing flour isn’t that necessary but I find with cookies it’s critical to get the perfect consistency.
- Use light colored baking sheets – My favorite are from NordicWare. I own a few of them and they’re amazing. Dark colored baking sheets will result in darker bottomed cookies that are burnt or overbaked.
- Place chocolate chips on top. I like to place a few chocolate chips on top of the balls of dough so they look the best.
- Use a large cookie cutter to ‘scoot’ the cookies. I like to do this to shape my cookies into perfect circles. It’s totally optional.
- Make these ahead! The cookie dough can be made, scooped out into dough balls and kept in the fridge, covered tightly, for up to 3 days. Bake them straight from the fridge.
To Freeze Cookie Dough:
I have this post right here that explains how to do so! Equipment and Tools: OXO Medium Cookie Scoop | Baking Sheets | KitchenAid Stand-Up Mixer | Silicon Spatulas |Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
*The original post is from 2019; this recipe has been updated and new photos have been taken. I can guarantee this recipe is SO much better. For clarity, the leavening has been adjusted, new chocolates are being used. But that’s it!
I don’t have a cookie scoop so I want to just form by hand. What is the weight approx for each ball?
hi not sure! didn’t weight them out just scooped them.
I don’t eat chocolate, but made these and they were a huge hit with everyone. They came out flat (like most my cookies do). What’s the trick to avoid that? Still, though, no complaints from those who ate them !
Best chocolate chip cookie recipe ever! They are so easy to make and they always turn out delicious! Using a scale to weight the flour made a huge difference. My cookies used to come out domed but with the right amount of flour I got perfectly flat cookies! Thanks for the tip and the yummy recipe!!
These are so good! Browning the butter adds an incredible taste – my new go-to cookie recipe, for sure. I noticed the pictures show salt on the cookies but the instructions don’t mention it… I added Maldon flakes and they were divine 🙂 My new cookie scoop was massive and I ended up with cookies larger than my hand…not complaining!
If making without nuts do you add more flour?
nope, you can simply leave them out! 🙂
How do you measure the flour? Scoop with a spoon and level or just just use a measuring cup and level off? How about ounces/weight measurement?
Thanks
I scoop and measure or weigh but you can weigh it out and I think weighing out flour for cookies is pretty smart because even a few grams off can affect their height. My new site which is being designed right now will have weight measurements. For this recipe the flour needs to be 360grams! Hope that helps.
You bet!!! I LOVE using my kitchen scale and get as accurate as possible. My daughter and I are going to bake the cookies today. Thank you!!
I love your cookie recipes but this one turned out a bit too sweet for my taste. The texture and the flavor of the brown butter is great though. How much could we reduce the sugar?
Combined this recipe with your oatmeal chocolate chip cooke recipe (which I have made as written a couple of times before and is a no-fail delicious experience). Holy smokes! Recommend!
Definitely want to try this, but how much is a cup in grams? thanks!
what ingredient are you referring to? happy to help!
flour, butter and sugar 🙂 thank you!
This is hands down the best choc chip cookie recipe. So full tasting, like something you’d get at a bakery. Fool proof. Absolutely Devine.