My family loves my soft peanut butter cookies and my Nutella peanut butter cookies, so I decided to create a chocolate version of this fave. That was easy to do by just substituting some of the flour with cocoa powder. Nice and soft and full of chocolate peanut buttery flavor, yum!
Why we love these
I love this dough. It’s such an easy recipe and comes together nicely. This recipe adds just enough chocolate to the peanut butter to make them awesome.
You’ll also love my Cinnamon Chocolate Chip Cookies. With a subtle hint of cinnamon and chocolate combined, you’ll be in cookie heaven!
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Ingredients for this recipe
Get all measurements, ingredients, and instructions in the printable version at the end of this post.
- 1/2 cup shortening or butter flavored shortening (you can substitute butter but the texture may be a little different)
- 3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
- 1 1/4 cups firmly packed light brown sugar
- 3 tbsp milk
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1 large egg
- 1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup cocoa (measure by scoop and sweep, do NOT pack into cup)
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 3/4 tsp baking soda
How to Make Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies
These step by step photos and instructions are here to help you visualize how to make this recipe. Please scroll down to simply print out the recipe!
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
- Combine shortening, peanut butter, brown sugar, milk and vanilla in large mixing bowl. Beat with electric mixer at medium speed until well blended.
- Add egg. Beat just until blended.
- Combine flour, cocoa, salt and baking soda. Add to creamed mixture at low speed. Mix just until blended.
- Drop by heaping tablespoons (using a cookie scoop works great) 2 inches apart onto ungreased insulated baking sheet.
- Flatten slightly in crisscross pattern with tines of fork.
- Bake for 7 to 8 minutes, or until set and just beginning to brown. DO NOT OVERBAKE.
- Cool 2 minutes on baking sheet. Remove cookies to Wire cooling racks to cool completely.
Expert Tips & FAQs
- You can substitute butter for the shortening, but the texture may be a little different.
- I have used both regular shortening and butter flavored shortening, both with great results.
- Just like with flour, you have to be careful when measuring cocoa. If you pack it into the measuring cup or scoop it out of the container using the measuring cup, it will be way more than the recipe intends, causing your dough to be too dry.
I hope you love these as much as we do!
What others are saying about these cookies
Absolutely phenomenal recipe! These cookies are wonderful and as a baker myself, the dough is the easiest cookie dough I have ever worked with. Follow the recipe as it is posted and you will not fail! I have made these cookies twice now in just one week’s time! So thankful I found it!
~ Janice
This cookie recipe was perfect! First peanut butter cookies I ever made! Love that cocoa was included to give them a kick of chocolate with the peanut butter. They turned out perfectly! Super yummy! 💗
~ Kristina
I just finished a batch of these. I substituted the shortening for butter. After I put the dough on the cookie sheets, I put the pans in the freezer for about 15 minutes. I love a soft cookie and these have a great soft texture.
~Laura
More Cookie Recipes
- Chocolate Mint Cookies
- Peanut Butter Cookies
- Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Chocolate Filled Peanut Butter Cookies
Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup shortening or butter flavored shortening
- 3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
- 1 1/4 cups firmly packed light brown sugar
- 3 tbsp milk
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1 large egg
- 1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup cocoa DO NOT pack into measuring cup, scoop and sweep only
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 3/4 tsp baking soda
Things You'll Need
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
- Combine shortening, peanut butter, brown sugar, milk and vanilla in large bowl. Beat with electric mixer at medium speed until well blended. Add egg. Beat just until blended.
- Combine flour, cocoa, salt and baking soda. Add to creamed mixture at low speed. Mix just until blended.
- Drop by heaping tablespoonsful (using a cookie scoop works great) 2 inches apart onto ungreased baking sheet. Flatten slightly in crisscross pattern with tines of fork.
- Bake for 7 to 8 minutes, or until set and just beginning to brown. DO NOT OVERBAKE. Cool 2 minutes on baking sheet. Remove cookies to racks to cool completely.
Expert Tips & FAQs
- You can substitute butter for the shortening, but the texture may be a little different.
- Just like with flour, you have to be careful when measuring cocoa. If you pack it into the measuring cup or scoop it out of the container using the measuring cup, it will be way more than the recipe intends, causing your dough to be too dry.
Nutrition
This post originally appeared here on Apr 6, 2011.
Amanda Formaro
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Mike Taylor says
Perfect midnight snack, my girlfriend and I were craving something with milk, peanut butter, and cocoa powder in it and this came up…so we made them at quite literally midnight. These are delicious, thank you for posting.
Amanda Formaro says
Oh how fun! Love a good midnight snack :)
Lynette says
These cookies are fantastic! I will definitely be making them again!
Amanda Formaro says
Thank you Lynette, so glad you liked them!
Twila says
I just made your cookies exactly as you wrote the receipe. Really good. I needed more so I made a second batch and used margarine. I usually use margarine for cookies because it tends to melt better and does not give you such a hard cookie like butter does. Just my opinion but I think that the flavor is better than shortening. Also I added some chocolate chunks and some peanuts. They were amazing. Thank you so much for sharing.
Amanda Formaro says
So glad you enjoyed them Twila!
Lizzie says
Recipe sounds good.
Did you really mean to drop by
heaping teaspoonfuls? Seems that would make a tiny cookie. Could you have meant by heaping tablespoonfuls? Thanks.
Amanda Formaro says
Yes thank you! I will correct it :)
Kevin says
I stumbled onto this recipe a couple of days ago .. it looked great so I tried them the next day. Wow .. these made it to my top 5 list. Just the right balance of peanut butter and chocolate IMO.
Also, I made the recipe with butter vs. shortening .. turned out terrific in my opinion.
Thanks.
Amanda says
Thanks Kevin! So glad you liked them, my family loves these :)
ann knoble says
very good
Lisa @ Snappy Gourmet says
Can’t go wrong with chocolate and peanut butter! These look great!
Kiersten says
Thank you so much for this recipe! I’m going to make them with my kids later today! I’m 39 weeks pregnant with baby #3 and have been craving a cookie EXACTLY like this so I am soooo excited to try it! Must get in those last calorie splurges before baby comes :)
(found you with a google search, btw!)
Amanda says
I hope you enjoyed them Kiersten!
Laura says
Hubs asked for chocolate peanut butter cookies last evening, so I googled it and found your recipe. Hubs was concerned they’d be crunchy, but they are soft and scrumptious!! We added white chocolate chips as well as butterscotch chips. Hubby and boys LOVED them! ;)
Amanda Formaro says
So glad that you liked them! I love how soft they are too! :)
Jamie says
Totally totally totally yummers!
Amanda D says
Thank You a Million Times!!! Finally a good chocolate cookie recipe that uses unsweetened cocoa! My daughter has food sensitivities (gluten, egg, cane sugar) so baking sweets is pretty much fruit and oat-based and I’ve been dying to give her something truly decadent. This is a hit! I was able to easily substitute the brown sugar for an amber agave nectar and my usual egg and gluten subs and the flavor and texture are just amazing! (They usually fall flat when I try to alter a recipe.) Now that we’ve got some rich chocolaty treats baking in the house, it finally smells like the holidays!
Amanda Formaro says
That is an amazing comment, I am so glad to hear that Amanda, thanks so much for sharing that with me! I’m so glad you have a chocolate cookie that will work with your daughter’s health u=issues. Yay!
Sonya says
I made these the other day and they were a huge hit :) I added in chopped salted peanuts and used a large cookie scoop to portion the dough out. They tasted like a brownie almost :) I also used real butter without any problems! thank you for a wonderful recipe!
Amanda Formaro says
Thanks so much Sonya!
Amanda R says
I’m so excited to try this recipe. I put chocolate peanut butter cookies into a Google search and when I saw your site pop up, I knew this was the recipe for me!
From one Amanda to another, thanks in advance for this great recipe!
Amanda Formaro says
How fun, thanks Amanda! I know you’ll love them :)
Liezl says
So delicious! We loved them! Thanks for the recipe <3
Amanda Formaro says
Thanks Liezl, so glad you liked them!
hayley says
i just made these cookies and they are so easy to make!!! Can't wait for them to cool off :) thanks for the recipe!!!
Amanda says
Love the addition of the pb chips part, those sound great!