Puffy Peanut Butter Chip Cookies — Rich vanilla cookie dough is studded with peanut butter chips and baked to puffy perfection! The ultimate soft peanut butter chip cookie with zero frills, just delicious flavor!
Ultra Soft Cookies with Peanut Butter Chips
These cookies turned out so puffy that they caught me by surprise. And they’re so vanilla-ey, but that was by design because I’m a vanilla fiend.
They are a little bit peanut buttery even though I didn’t add peanut butter to the actual cookie dough.
Instead, I used peanut butter chips and they gave a subtle peanut butter flavor, yet not so much that the vanilla flavor was lost.
I was going to add white chocolate chips, too, but I know not everyone is as crazy about white chocolate as I am, so I refrained.
I did add something to them that I almost never bake with. Good ole Crisco.
I read cookie making guides and online websites devoted to The Perfect Cookie and never tire of the epic food science quest in finding what makes cookies puffy, flat, chewy, crispy, you name it.
Many people swear by some lard to keep things moist and puffy. Scientifically, that makes sense.
And boy, puffy is what happened.
That would be pufffffyyyy.
Not using butter is a smidge of a sacrifice in the flavor department because there is nothing that can replace the flavor of butter in baking. However, in terms of puffiness, chewiness, and softness, these babies were perfectly puffalicious and right on point.
Ingredients in Peanut Butter Chip Cookies
You need very few ingredients to make cookies with peanut butter chips. Here’s the ingredient list:
- Vegetable shortening
- Granulated sugar
- Light brown sugar
- Egg
- Vanilla extract
- Cinnamon
- Salt
- Baking soda
- All-purpose flour
- Peanut butter chips
Note: Scroll down to the recipe card section of the post for the ingredients with amounts included and for more complete directions.
How to Make Peanut Butter Chip Cookies
This peanut butter chip cookie recipe is one of my easiest yet! Here’s an overview of how the recipe is made:
- In a large mixing bowl, beat together the shortening, sugars, egg, water, and vanilla.
- Add the cinnamon, salt, baking soda, flour and mix until just combined. Fold in peanut butter chips by hand.
- Cover and refrigerate dough for 30 minutes, or freeze for 15 if you’re rushed.
- Using a cookie scoop, form 1-inch balls and place on parchment paper-lined cookie sheets. Bake until barely brown. Remove cookies from oven when they look slightly under-baked.
- Allow cookies to cool and firm up on cookie sheets for at least 5 minutes before moving to cooling racks.
Can I Use Coconut Oil Instead of Shortening?
A few readers have suggested using coconut oil in place of the Crisco. In theory, that’s a good idea. However, coconut oil melts when warm, which will result in thin cookies.
However, if you’d looking for a coconut oil cookie recipe, try these coconut oil chocolate chip cookies. Just sub peanut butter chips for the chocolate chips!
Can I Use Butter Instead of Shortening?
Go for it! Make sure your butter is at room temperature and isn’t melted. Just note that your cookies won’t turn out quite as puffy as mine.
Tips for the Best Peanut Butter Chip Cookies
I like vanilla-flavored foods. Actually, I am passionately in love with vanilla-flavored most anything, and I usually use twice the recommended amount of vanilla extract in any recipe.
The way I wrote this peanut butter chip cookie recipe, you don’t need to do that, but if you’re really wanting to go nuts with vanilla flavor because you’re obsessed like I am, you could possibly add one more teaspoon or perhaps some vanilla bean paste to knock your vanilla socks right off.
Also note that instead of peanut butter chips, you could use any baking chip you’d like. Butterscotch, chocolate chips, white chocolate chips, you name it.
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Puffy Peanut Butter Chip Cookies
Ingredients
- ½ cup Crisco, or vegetable shortening
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ¼ cup light brown sugar, packed
- 1 large egg
- 1 tablespoon water
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- ¼ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- ¾ cup peanut butter chips, or butterscotch, white chocolate, chocolate chips if preferred
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375F and line two cookie sheets with Silpat liners, parchment paper, or spray with cooking spray.
- In a large mixing bowl, beat together Crisco, sugars, egg, water, and vanilla, until batter is creamy.
- Add the cinnamon, salt, baking soda, flour and mix until just combined.
- Fold in peanut butter chips by hand.
- Cover and refrigerate dough for 30 minutes, or freeze for 15 if you’re rushed. Do not skip chilling the dough if you want puffy cookies because cold dough results in puffier cookies.
- Using a cookie scoop, form 1-inch balls (or roll balls by hand) and place on prepared cookie sheets, allowing for adequate spacing (these cookies do not spread much, but like all cookies, they spread some; and the colder the dough, the less they will spread).
- Bake for 8-10 minutes or until barely brown. Remove cookies from oven when they look slightly under-baked and allow cookies to cool and firm up on cookie sheets for at least 5 minutes before moving to cooling racks.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies — These peanut butter chocolate chip cookies are hands down the best peanut butter cookies I’ve ever made. Know that I don’t say that lightly! They’re melt-in-your mouth soft and chewy, and extremely moist!
Soft Peanut Butter Chip Sugar Cookies with Peanut Butter Frosting — Similar to Lofthouse Soft-Frosted Sugar Cookies, but these are for peanut butter fans! I added peanut butter and frosted them with peanut butter buttercream.
Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Chip Cookies – Super soft, perfectly chewy, BROWNED BUTTER cookies that are LOADED with two kinds of chips!! An EASY one-bowl, no-mixer recipe for irresistibly DELISH cookies!!
Triple Peanut Butter Cookies — PB is used 3 different ways in these melt-in-your mouth cookies! Batch size of just 8 cookies when you don’t ‘need’ dozens laying around!
Those look yummy. I love puffy cookies so I always use Butter Crisco in place of butter. Can’t wait to try these.
Made these today – they are phenomenal! Love the subtly of the cinnamon!!
yay thanks for making them and the report back! love that you’re happy with them!
I left the peanut butter chips out completely, the cookies were still absolutely delicious but I found they had more of a cinnamon taste than the anticipated vanilla. Maybe next time I’ll double it? Anyways family loved it and I will be using this recipe again
At only 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon for a whole batch of cookies and 2 teaspoons vanilla, my hunch is that it’s your vanilla extract that isn’t super flavorful or intense.
Doubling it would put you at 4 teaspoons vanilla, which is not unheard of, but quite a significant amount. I think leaving out the pb chips may be a culprit, too, for the flavor.
All in all, sounds like a winner for you! Thanks for making them and for the field report – this is the stuff I live for :)
I just made these, they literally just came out of my oven. My entire family loves them and my house smells divine! Definitely keeping this recipe, thank you!
thanks for the feedback and for trying them, Jody! Glad they are a hit with the family and a keeper!
I nce had a friend tell me that the secret toher amazing chocolate chip cookies was using half Butter and half Butter flavor Crisco. That is the only way I will make Chocolate Chip Cookies now. Makes amazing cookies!
did you know that crisco is one molecule away from plastic? horrible stuff to be putting in your body. they also color it to look more appealing.
Lard and shortening aren’t the same thing. Shortening is plant based. Lard is from animal fat. My grandmother who lives on a farm always baked with lard. My grandmother from the city used shortening or margarine. I bake with butter mostly, but I do have some good recipes that use shortening. Between lard and shortening, I’d go with the shortening. Lard has a taste to it that seeps into the baking. It’s subtle, but it’s there. Shortening has a cleaner taste that doesn’t distract from the flavors you want.
thanks for all the info…the post was a bit tongue-in-cheek since I rarely have the opportunity to say “lard” and the younger generation of bakers don’t tend to use it, but yes, lard (animal) and shortening (plant) – got it :)
I just made these and they are so delicious!!!! I think I will have to make a double batch next time. Thanks for sharing!
Oh thanks for LMK!! Glad you liked them!! If you ever make anything else, please LMK about it and how it went for you!
Could something else substitute the Crisco?
yes you can try the Spectrum brand of vegetable shortening, butter, or vegan butter – knowing that your results will likely be different than my results
Yum! Perfect for a potluck we have coming up. I’m going to try coconut oil instead of the crisco and see how it works.
The only issue is that coconut oil melts and spreads and I can almost guarantee they will NOT stay puffy. They’ll taste awesome, but they will spread. If you don’t want to use shortening, you can use butter or vegan butter, but coconut oil..eek, they are gonna spread on you I think. But…if you do it, please LMK how it goes b/c I LOVE food/field reports!!