four-ingredient peanut butter chocolate chunk cookies
These cookies are my love letter to peanut butter and chocolate.
When you have cookies that are made with four ingredients, two of those ingredients being peanut butter and chocolate — a.k.a., The Ultimate Flavor Combination, the one for which I have an undying love, the one that will always make me weak in the knees in any and all forms from cakes to ice cream to oatmeal (yes, really.) to these cookies — you know you’re in for greatness.
Should we all take a moment to write our love letters to peanut butter and chocolate? No? Just move on to the cookies? OK. Cool.
This recipe comes straight from the ever-lovely Christina of Dessert for Two’s new cookbook of the same name. The book is filled with beautiful stories and photos and recipes of the Southern/Midwestern/Californian/YUMGETTHATINMYBELLY variety all pared down for two. And it is truly a reflection of Christina herself — captivating, sweet, heartwarming, charming. I was hooked from the first page.
And guys, I don’t even want to tell you how long it took me to decide which recipe to make first — it was kind of embarrassing. I kept it by my bedside table and read through it every night, bookmarking the recipe I would FOR SURE be making first thing the next day: Chess pie bars. NO, mixed berry crisp. Oooooooh that lemon amaretto rice pudding, though. And what is this magic that is Devil’s Food Cake made with mayonnaise.
But my aforementioned love of the peanut butter and chocolate just drew me in, as it always does, and I couldn’t say no to these four-ingredient wonders. I also couldn’t say no to the idea of getting cookies from bowl to belly in less than a half-hour.
The cookies themselves are made with just three ingredients: Peanut butter, sugar and egg. Had I previously known you could make cookies from those ingredients alone, I’m fairly certain my diet would have consisted of a peanut butter cookie after every meal — including my peanut butter toast breakfast mainstay. And now that I do know, this new diet is probably inevitable. And I like it.
The cookies are a little fluffier than what I typically think of when I think of a peanut butter cookie (the kind with flour, that is), but I find the texture refreshingly unique in the realm of cookie-dom. And if you take the cookies out of the oven when they are just slightly underbaked with the edges set, the centers stay moist and soft, almost like the inside of a Reese’s peanut butter cup.
Christina suggests topping her peanut butter cookies either with chocolate chunks, mini marshmallows, both, or leaving them plain. All options sound obviously delicious, but I had dark chocolate on hand so I coarsely chopped it up and pressed a few pieces on top. As you can see, they melted into lava-like puddles on top and down the sides of the peanut butter cookies into what can only be described as, oh, THE BEST THING EVER. Along with that whole Reese’s peanut butter cup center thing.
Christina, thank you for creating this recipe and sharing it with us in your cookbook. And thank you, peanut butter and chocolate, for being so amazing. As for you, dear cookies — I’ll see you after breakfast.
PrintFour-Ingredient Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies
- Prep Time: 5 mins
- Cook Time: 10 mins
- Total Time: 15 mins
- Yield: 6 cookies 1x
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
- 5 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 1 egg
- Dark chocolate chunks/chips, for topping
Instructions
- Heat oven to 350 degrees F. In a small bowl, stir peanut butter, sugar and egg until combined.
- Scoop or spoon mounds of dough spaced 2 inches apart on an ungreased baking sheet. Lightly press dark chocolate chunks onto top of dough.
- Bake 10 to 12 minutes until golden brown and set. Cool cookies 3 minutes on baking sheet, then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.
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I like the idea of a peanut butter cookie after every meal diet! Especially if it’s these amazing looking cookies that I’d be eating!
LOVE Christina, and love these cookies! They are perfect in every way. That chocolate is making my stomach rumble!
Four ingredients?? Eek! And that melty chocolate! Amazing.
It took me a super long time too to decide on which recipe to make first from Christina’s book! Thanks for reminding me these were bookmarked. Happening this weekend 🙂
Love these cookies! That dark melty chocolate looks absolutely irresistible!
Mouth watering right now… 🙂
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now thats the way to make cookies- sweet and simple!
Oh my word look at that melting chocolate! These look sooooooo good!
Your love letter is so romantic. These cookies look absolutely amazing. Love that book! Pinned.
This is blowing my mind mostly because I have all those things now and I’m wondering why I’m not in the kitchen baking them. Fixing that now.
I think these cookies and I are about to become very well acquainted. Veeeeeery well. Gorgeous photos Stephanie!
Trying today!
These are my kind of cookies! I love how simple they are. + only 4 ingredients? I am in!
Dang, only four ingredients for these amazing cookies! How could I even possibly say no???
Yum! Chocolate and peanut butter are definitely one of my favorite combos too!