Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies made with all brown sugar and brown butter for rich, buttery, chewy chocolate chip cookies!
Brown butter makes cookies extra delicious!
This recipe is basically my traditional chewy chocolate chip cookie recipe taken up a couple notches.
These cookies are chewy and buttery and sweet and just a little salty. In other words, they’re pretty much exactly what you’d want in your chocolate chip cookies.
How to make
Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat. The butter will begin to foam. Whisk butter regularly as it cooks.
After a couple of minutes, the butter will begin to brown on the bottom of the saucepan. Continue to whisk, and remove from heat as soon as the butter begins to turn amber brown and smells rich and nutty.
Stir in brown sugar. Set aside to cool for 5-10 minutes or until cool enough to touch.
Whisk in egg, egg yolk, and vanilla until combined.
Add the dry ingredients, and stir in until just combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.
Cover, and chill dough for at least 1 hour.
Once dough is chilled, preheat the oven to 375 F. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
If the dough has been in the fridge for longer and has gotten really hard, take dough out to sit while you preheat the oven.
Scoop out 1.5 tablespoons dough (medium cookie scoop), and place 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheet. Bake 6-11 minutes, or until the edges of the cookies are golden brown.
The centers should still look underdone. Let the cookies cool on the sheets for 5 minutes.
Sprinkle lightly with coarse sea salt, if using, and remove to wire cooling rack to finish cooling.
Tips
Butter: I use salted butter in this recipe. You can use unsalted butter and adjust the amount of salt to taste.
Brown sugar: I use light brown sugar, but you could use dark brown sugar. Dark brown sugar will give the cookies more caramel flavor.
Flour: It’s important to properly measure the flour. To measure the flour, either weigh the flour or sift/stir to aerate. Then lightly spoon into a measuring cup and level.
Kosher salt: You can substitute 1/4 teaspoon of table salt in place of the kosher salt.
Chocolate chips: Feel free to use another type of chocolate chip, like dark or milk, in place of the chocolate chips.
Mixing: I like to mix these cookies by hand to avoid over-working the dough.
Storage
The cookies will keep for up to 4 days when stored in an airtight container at room temperature.
More chocolate chip cookie recipes!
If you’ve tried this brown butter chocolate chip cookie recipe, don’t forget to rate the recipe and leave me a comment below. I love to hear from people who’ve made my recipes!
You can SUBSCRIBE to receive my latest recipe newsletters or FOLLOW ME on FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM and PINTEREST for even more delicious food.
Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
Equipment
- Cookie sheets
Ingredients
- 1 cup butter
- 1 ½ cups brown sugar packed
- 1 large egg
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
- Sea salt optional
Instructions
- Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat. The butter will begin to foam. Whisk butter regularly as it cooks.
- After a couple of minutes, the butter will begin to brown on the bottom of the saucepan. Continue to whisk, and remove from heat as soon as the butter begins to turn amber brown and smells rich and nutty.
- Stir in brown sugar.
- Set aside to cool for 5-10 minutes or until cool enough to touch.
- Whisk in egg, egg yolk, and vanilla until combined.
- Add the dry ingredients, and stir in until just combined.
- Stir in the chocolate chips.
- Cover, and chill dough for at least 1 hour.
- Once dough is chilled, preheat the oven to 375 F. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
- If the dough has been in the fridge for longer and has gotten really hard, take dough out to sit while you preheat the oven.
- Scoop out 1.5 tablespoons dough (medium cookie scoop), and place 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheet.
- Bake 6-11 minutes, or until the edges of the cookies are golden brown. The centers should still look underdone.
- Let the cookies cool on the sheets for 5 minutes.
- Sprinkle lightly with coarse sea salt, if using, and remove to wire cooling rack to finish cooling.
Notes
- Butter: I use salted butter in this recipe. You can use unsalted butter and adjust the amount of salt to taste.
- Brown sugar: I use light brown sugar, but you could use dark brown sugar. Dark brown sugar will give the cookies more caramel flavor.
- Flour: It’s important to properly measure the flour. To measure the flour, either weigh the flour or sift/stir to aerate. Then lightly spoon into a measuring cup and level.
- Kosher salt: You can substitute 1/4 teaspoon of table salt in place of the kosher salt.
- Chocolate chips: Feel free to use another type of chocolate chip, like dark or milk, in place of the chocolate chips.
- Mixing: I like to mix these cookies by hand to avoid over-working the dough.
- Nutrition values are estimates.
Nutrition
Did You Make This Recipe?
Share it with me on Instagram @i_heart_eating and follow on Youtube @katedean and Pinterest @katedean for more!
Originally published 8/27/12. Updated with new photos and tips 4/12/21.
Reader Interactions
Love this recipe?
Share your thoughts below and let’s chat! Make sure to connect with me on your favorite social platform below and show me what you made!
Comments & Reviews
Danielle says
Fantastic. I’m going to be one of those people that says great recipe but I substituted (I can’t stand those) but for a gluten free family this recipe was fantastic!!! We only substituted the flour for King Arthur measure for measure flour and these were the best gf cookies we have had. I couldn’t not comment for those that need gf this recipe turned out perfectly. Thank you for the great recipe.
Kate says
Thank you! I appreciate you sharing that using GF flour worked well in this recipe!
Bridget I. says
I baked these cookies yesterday and they were so good. The recipe was very easy to follow. I will be baking them again. Thank you!
Kate says
Thank you! I’m glad that it was easy to follow.
Karen says
I prepared by weight using the metric recipe. Too sweet for my taste, but I also substituted half butterscotch chips for the semi sweet chocolate chips. Texture is nice, crunchy outside chewy inside.
Kate says
Hi! Butterscotch chips are quite a bit sweeter than semisweet chocolate chips. If you want to decrease the sweetness, you can use dark chocolate chips or bittersweet chocolate chips next time.
Jayme Morton says
Made these today and as someone else commented, the dough was to die for! So caramel-y. I baked the cookies at 375 and after 7 minutes the bottoms were burned. I used the same pans as always with my standard oven rack position. Thankfully I still had half of the dough left. I adjusted to 350 for 6 minutes and they came out much better! Will definitely make in the future with this adjustment.
Kate says
Hi! Yes, you should absolutely adjust for your oven because oven temperature vary widely.
Gabrielle says
I love this recipe but how do you get flat cookies?
Kate says
Hi! Did your cookies fail to spread?
L.A. says
Just made this recipe. And hands down…the best chocolate chip cookies ever! Planning to wrap them up as gifts …and save some for myself :-)
Kate says
Thank you so much!
Hazel says
Oops! My mistake. I used the Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe, which you have on your blog. That is my favorite 😋chocolate chip cookie recipe.
Kate says
I’m glad that you found the right recipe! =)
Hazel says
I made this maybe 3 years back. But what I copied then was lil different. I have 3 C. flour, 3/4 tsp. Kosher (or 1/2 tsp. table salt) and 10 oz. pkg. chocolate chips; which were wonderful 😋 Have you since revised?
Cathy says
These are great! I love all your recipes! Easy and so tasty . Thank you
Just made your chocolate cake…. delicious
Bethany says
These cookies are my new go to chocolate chip! They are so simple but extremely delicious! They have a caramel taste that is absolutely mind blowing!!
Kate says
Yay!! Thank you so much! =)
Chelsey says
The dough for these was like candy.. soooo good. When cooked they were good too.( Didn’t spread much)but the dough.. omg..the dough.
Kate says
I’m so glad you liked it! I have to confess that I haven’t tried eating the dough, but your comment makes me want to make a batch just so I can try it. =) Thanks for coming back to comment!
Jess says
OMG!!! This is my new favorite cookie recipe! Thanks!!
Kate says
I’m so glad! Thank you!
Karly says
You can never have too many cookie recipes! These look so delicious!
Kate says
Thank you! So true!! I could have all the cookie recipes, and it still wouldn’t be enough! =)