High Altitude Crunchy Peanut Butter Cookies
A high altitude recipe for peanut butter cookies that have crisp, crumbly edges with slightly soft, chewy centers, and a perfect sweet and salty flavor.
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- Large Cookie Scoop with Release Lever (2 1/2 - 3 tbsp capacity)
Ingredients
- ½ cup unsalted butter, melted
- ¾ cup creamy peanut butter
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 large egg
- 1 large egg yolk (save the extra white for another use)
- 2 cups all-purpose flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- ½ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
Instructions
- In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat, then remove from the heat. In a bowl, whisk together the hot melted butter with the peanut butter until smooth.
- Whisk in the sugar and the vanilla extract, then whisk in the egg and egg yolk until well combined.
- Separately, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, and stir the dough until all the flour is incorporated.
- Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 1/2 hours.
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Use a large cookie scoop (2 1/2 - 3 tbsp capacity) to scoop 16 balls of dough. The dough may be a bit crumbly; just press it into the cookie scoop. Use the tines of a fork to slightly flatten each dough ball in a classic criss-cross pattern.
- Place the dough balls 3 inches apart on the baking sheet and bake on the center oven rack for about 16 minutes.
- Cool the cookies for 5 minutes on the baking sheet, then transfer them to a cooling rack to cool completely. If you like, lightly sprinkle the tops of the cookies with cinnamon sugar and flaky salt.
Notes
- Store leftover cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3-5 days, or frozen for 3-6 months.
- Peanut butter that's not labeled "all-natural" is usually best for baking, as it's more stable. If using a drippy all-natural peanut butter (which contains only peanuts and salt, with no other oils), you should increase the flour by a couple of tablespoons to keep the cookies from spreading too much.
https://curlygirlkitchen.com/