Recipe: Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

I will actually be working in person this weekend, so I wanted to bring a treat for my other colleagues that they could take home with them. I tried Krispy Kreme donuts last weekend; that didn't work (barely anyone took any!). So I thought cookies might be better.

I knew I wanted to make something with peanut butter because I also had a lot of cashews I wanted to use. And everyone knows chocolate goes well with peanut butter, so I looked for recipes for peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. And I found this recipe on the Crazy for Crust blog (I get the emails but rarely actually read them; I keep them all in a "Crazy for Crust" folder!). 

INGREDIENTS

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter melted
• 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 2/3 cup packed brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips

INSTRUCTIONS

• Mix or stir butter with peanut butter until smooth. Add brown sugar and granulated sugar and mix until creamy.
• Beat in vanilla, egg, baking soda, and salt. Mix in flour slowly until cookie dough forms. Stir in chocolate chips.
• Scoop 2 tablespoon sized cookie dough balls onto cookie sheets covered with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. Chill 30 minutes.
• Preheat oven to 350°F.
• Press cookie dough balls flat with the tines of a fork.
• Bake cookies for 8-12 minutes, or until slightly brown on the bottom and the top just loses the wet cookie dough look.

I mostly followed this recipe, except I used a little less brown sugar, added the cashews, and didn't push the cookies down with a fork (I just left them as drop cookies). Typically I wouldn't bother putting the dough in the fridge before baking, but this dough was falling apart before it was even in the oven. I knew they'd never stay together once they started heating up! I had visions of a big, melty, peanut butter mess if I didn't follow the recipe*. In the end they didn't melt in the oven...but they didn't seem to bake either. I left them in for 10 minutes and they looked almost the same as when I put them in. They even felt kind of cool to the touch! I put them in for a few extra minutes, but it didn't seem to make a difference. I tried one cookie: it tasted good, but that's probably because it tastes like cookie dough; the inside clearly wasn't baked all the way. I wouldn't say these are a complete failure, but I might tell my friends to heat the cookies up in a microwave for a few seconds so they don't get salmonella...

*Read my blog post about my failed unicorn cake mix cookies.