Soft Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

I thought that I had eaten some great cookies, when I was growing up. My family would buy those soft bagged cookies from the store or purchase some cookie dough and we'd make it from that.

Honestly, I didn't know much about baking until I got married and so my cookies were always burnt or tasted funny.



So my mouth was amazed when I visited the house that my husband grew up in over a weekend trip while we were in college and I tasted the chocolate chip cookies that his mom made. I thought I knew cookies, but that was before I had tasted these.

Every bite was soft and filled with a buttery/chocolaty taste. I had never made cookies with real butter before, I had always made them with margarine. The taste was so vastly different that it felt like this was the first time I had ever eaten a cookie. Every other cookie was like cardboard.

So, when my husband and I got married, I asked for the recipe and it was so easy to make, I think it would have been difficult to mess it up. 

I made them for the first time when my husband and I hosted a pizza party in our duplex and even though I might have slightly burned the first batch, those cookies got eaten very quickly AND I had another person ask me for the recipe.

For someone who really didn't know much about baking, that was the best compliment.

So, let me tell you, as much as I'd like to give away that recipe, I can not, but I can give you a peanut butter chocolate chip alternative that will make your taste buds even happier for all you peanut butter lovers, out there. These are so much better than those Peanut Butter Kiss cookies you have once a year around Christmas. Here you go!

Ingredients

1 1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup shortening

1 egg

1 3/4 cups flour

1/2 tsp. salt

3/4 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup peanut butter

1 packages semisweet chocolate chips
3 tbsp milk

1 cup sugar (optional) to roll dough in.

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350
• Combine brown sugar, egg, shortening, peanut butter and vanilla. Mix until blended.
• In a separate bowl, combine the flour, salt, and baking soda.
• Slowly add the dry ingredients to the first mixture and mix on low.
• Add milk to help soften it.
• Add packages of chocolate chips and mix until evenly blended. 

This part is totally optional, but with thumb print cookies, you can roll the dough in sugar for an extra sweet treat. You can do the same for these.

Spray a cookie sheet with cooking spray and plop spoonful of cookie dough onto the cookie sheet. Pop into the oven for 8 minutes. Let cool and transfer to a cooling rack. Voila! 

Can yield 18-24 cookies. 

Conclusion

If you use your oven, you probably know it. If it tends to run hotter, check your cookies at the 7 minute mark. I do not advise eating raw cookie dough, no matter how delicious it is. It can make you sick. 

Don't eat the cookies until they cool. It will be hot and it will burn your mouth. Please use common sense.

Once you eat these cookies, your mouth might have a little party and they are very irresistible, so if you eat them all at once, prepare for a little weight gain. 

These are perfect to give away and you can make many cookies at one time. These are great to freeze, so you can make some now and freeze the for later. Please allow a couple of hours to thaw.