Soft and chewy, perfectly sweet, and loaded with chocolate, these cookies are irresistible. Read on to learn my 6 tips for making excellent chocolate chip cookies every time. Bonus: these cookies are easily made gluten-free — see recipe box for details 🍪🍪🍪

A tray of soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies.

Lightly adapted from a Fine Cooking recipe, this is the soft and chewy chocolate chip cookie recipe I’ve been making for over 20 years. During these past two decades, I’ve refined my method and measurements, and while I can’t promise I won’t make more tweaks, these cookies are near perfection.

6 Tips for Perfect Soft and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies:

  1. A scale is best for accurate measuring of ingredients.
  2. Butter should be at room temperature. I always use salted butter.
  3. Chocolate: Over the years I have made these cookies with various chocolate chips, from hard-to-find high-end chocolate pistoles (Guayaquil Pistoles Ecuadorian Cacao, 64% cacao) to readily available low-quality grocery store chips. My favorite now are these Guittard Super Cookie Chips, which I can find at many local grocery stores.
  4. Use a scale to portion the dough into 48-gram balls. This ensures each cookie bakes as evenly as the next.
  5. Chill the dough balls. The cookies taste even better when baked from dough balls that have been chilled. Keep unbaked balls in an airtight container in the fridge — they’ll last for weeks there. Bake off as you need.
  6. Bake cookies low and slow: I find baking the cookies for 19 minutes @ 325ºF creates the perfect shape and texture. Remove the tray from the oven and let the cookies cool completely on the cookie sheet. They will not look done when you pull them out of the oven. Have faith. Again, do not remove cookies from sheet pans until they are completely cool. I think these cookies taste best once they are completely cool.

PS: Best-Ever Fudgy (Shiny-Topped!) Brownies

How to Make Soft and Chewy Chip Cookies, Step by Step

First gather your ingredients: softened butter, sugar, brown sugar, eggs, vanilla, salt, baking soda, chocolate chips and flour.

The ingredients to make soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies.

Note: I can no longer find these chocolate pistoles (see recipe box for details) so I’ve been using…

A tub of chocolate pistoles.

… these Guittard Super Cookie Chips, which I love.

Guittard chocolate chip cookie chips.

First, combine the flour, salt and baking soda in a large bowl…

A large bowl filled with the dry ingredients to make soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies.

… and whisk until combined:

The dry ingredients to make chocolate chip cookies all whisked together in a large bowl.

Next, place the softened butter and sugars in the bowl of a stand mixer. Alternatively, use a handheld mixer or, if your butter is very soft, you can beat vigorously by hand.

An Ankarsrum mixer filled with softened butter, sugar, and brown sugar.

When the butter and sugar are light and airy…

An Ankarsrum mixer filled with butter and sugar, creaming together.

… add the eggs one at a time…

An Ankarsrum mixer filled with creamed butter and sugar, and 1 egg.

… followed by the vanilla extract:

An Ankarsrum mixer filled with creamed butter and sugar, eggs, and vanilla.

Beat until smooth, then add the dry ingredients:

An Ankarsrum mixer filled with creamed butter and sugar, eggs, vanilla, and the dry ingredients to make soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies.

Beat until the dry ingredients are just combined…

An Ankarsrum mixer filled with chocolate chip cookie dough, chocolate chips yet to be added

… then add the chocolate chips:

An Ankarsrum mixer filled with chocolate chip cookie dough, the chocolate chips just added.

If you are using an Ankarsrum mixer, fold in the chocolate chips by hand — those beaters aren’t cut out for this job:

An Ankarsrum mixer filled with chocolate chip cookie dough, finished mixing.

Using a scale, portion the batter into 48 gram balls:

A small sheet pan filled with chocolate chip cookie dough balls.

Tuck the pan into a large ziplock bag, then chill for at least 1 hour but ideally 24 hours.

A small sheet pan filled with chocolate chip cookie dough balls tucked inside a ziplock bag.

When you are ready to bake, place the dough balls evenly spaced on parchment lined sheet pans and transfer to the oven.

ready for the oven

I’ve included two baking methods below, one @ 375ºF for roughly 12 minutes (the original method): this creates a smaller-in-diameter cookie:

Just baked soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies on a sheet pan.
just-baked cookies

And one @ 325ºF for roughly 19 minutes. These cookies spread a little more:

A tray of soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies.
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A tray of soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies.

Soft and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

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Description

Soft and chewy, perfectly sweet, and loaded with chocolate, these cookies are irresistible. I’ve been making them for over 20 years. The original recipe appeared in a 2003 Fine Cooking Magazine. 

Notes:

  • This recipe halves beautifully, too. When I make a half batch, I use two teaspoons of vanilla, and I use a scant teaspoon of kosher salt.
  • Chocolate Chips: Honest Weight Food Coop no longer sells the chocolate wafers I loved so much for these cookies, and while I can find them online, they are astronomically expensive. I’ve been liking the Guittard Super Cookie Chips for these, but because they are slightly larger, I find I need to use more like 15 ounces of chips. 
  • Gluten Free: Cup4Cup Gluten-Free Flour works great here as a 1:1 swap for the flour. 
  • Sheet pans + parchment: I recently purchased 2 new sheet pans, which I have designated for cookies only, as well as a stash of parchment paper sheets (so handy!). 

Ingredients

  • 305 grams (1 1/3 cups) butter, softened, unsalted or salted (I always use salted) 
  • 290 grams (1½ cups packed) light brown sugar
  • 220 grams (1 cup) granulated sugar
  • 2 large eggs
  • 13 grams (1 tablespoon) pure vanilla extract
  • 482 grams (3¾ cups) unbleached all-purpose flour
  • 9 grams (1.5 teaspoons) Diamond Crystal kosher salt
  • 6 grams (1 teaspoon) baking soda
  • 340 grams (12 oz ) to 425 grams (15 oz) semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chips (see notes above)
  • flaky sea salt for sprinkling, optional

Instructions

  1. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking soda. 
  2. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugars together until light and fluffy. Scrape the bowl, beat again on high for one minute. Add the eggs, one at a time, followed by the vanilla, and beat until well blended, about another minute on medium-high speed.
  3. Add the dry ingredients to the mixer and beat very briefly, until just blended. Add the chocolate chips and stir till combined. The dough will be stiff.
  4. Portion the dough into 48-gram balls. This is a tedious task, but it makes for beautiful and uniform cookies that bake evenly. If you have a digital scale, this is easy; if you have no scale, use a small ice cream scoop or some other uniform measuring device —you should get 35-36 balls.
  5. Chill the portioned balls in an airtight bag or container for at least one hour, but ideally for at least 24 hours. Keep the balls in the fridge for up to a week or freeze for 3 months.
  6. Preheat Oven: 
    • Original Method: If you’ve made these cookies before and loved the method, continue to use it. Preheat oven to 375°F. Place portioned balls nicely spaced on an ungreased or parchment-lined sheet pan — I like to bake 6 cookies at a time. Sprinkle with sea salt if using. Bake for 11 minutes, rotating the sheet halfway through cooking if your oven tends to have hot spots. Keep a close watch. You want to remove the cookies from the oven when they still look slightly raw—you will think you are removing them too early. The cookies will continue cooking as they sit on the tray out of the oven. Let cookies cool completely on tray before removing.
    • Updated Method: I prefer this method as I find the cookies spread a teensy bit more, which I like. Preheat the oven to 325ºF. Place portioned balls nicely spaced on an ungreased or parchment-lined sheet pan — I like to bake 6 cookies at a time. Sprinkle with sea salt if using. Bake for 18 to 20 minutes. The cookies will still look slightly underdone when you remove them from the oven. Let the cookies cool completely on the sheet pan before transferring them to a cooling rack. 
  • Prep Time: 15 minutes
  • Cook Time: 11 minutes
  • Category: Cookie
  • Method: Oven
  • Cuisine: American