Sometimes, no matter how much I love my chocolate, I just have to have something… else. That’s right, something other than chocolate. Shocking, I know.

That’s where these cookies come in. I had actually never really liked peanut butter cookies before around three or four years ago, when we still lived in the dorms and had to get our cookie fixes by ordering in. If you’ve lived in Austin and/or went to UT, you would probably know about Tiff’s Treats. (Oh, they’ve opened one in Dallas, now!) If you’re scoffing at the idea of delivered cookies, know this: They. Are. Good. And they arrive warm! What more could you want?

An oven with which to make your own cookies?

I have that (now)!

Oh, back to the story about peanut butter cookies. Ones I’d tried before seemed to be brittle and crumbly. And we like our cookies soft and chewy around here. “Juicy,” if you will.

I must have lucked out with this recipe, because it was the first peanut butter cookie recipe I tried and I am sticking to it forever now. They totally fulfill the soft/chewy/juicy requirements.

peanut butter cookies
- adapted from JIF’s Irresistible PB Cookies

3/4 c creamy peanut butter
1/2 c butter, softened
1 1/4 c brown sugar, firmly packed
3 Tbsp milk
1 Tbsp vanilla
1 egg
1 3/4 c AP flour
3/4 tsp salt
3/4 tsp baking soda

Oven temperature: 375F

With an electric mixer, combine peanut butter, butter, brown sugar, milk, and vanilla. Beat together at medium speed until well incorporated and a little bit fluffy looking. Add the egg; mix until just combined.

In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, salt, and baking soda.

Add the dry ingredients to the peanut butter mixture at low speed just until the flour disappears. At this point, you might want to throw in some chocolate chips. Or maybe not.

The original recipe calls for shortening, but I never have that around, so I used butter instead. Note that this will probably require chilling the dough. (See the note at the end.) So if you used butter, chill the dough for an hour or so (or until firm); preheat your oven, and then make your cookies. You can use a couple teaspoons and drop the cookies onto the pan, or use a scoop.

For unknown reasons, it has become something of a tradition to use the tines of a fork to make a criss-cross pattern on top the cookies before they bake. I suspect this may have something to do with alerting those with peanut allergies to steer clear. Is this true? Anyway, I dipped a fork in a little white sugar before making the imprints on mine — I don’t know if it added much, but you can just see a few of the crystals on top of the finished product.

hello there

Bake 7-8 minutes, or until just beginning to brown. Remove from oven and let rest on the baking sheet for a couple more minutes; then move the cookies to a cooling rack or aluminum foil to cool fully.

Kept in an airtight container, these stay juicy for 3-4 days.

Notes:

I should have listened to my instincts when I scooped out the first six cookies and they sort of gooed onto the pan… I thought I might get away with just baking them anyway, without the chill, and they turned out like this:

oops.

Just a little flat and floppy. Don’t worry, they tasted just fine. (As perhaps evidenced by the mysteriously missing 6th cookie.)

So, live and learn. I put the prepared dough into the refrigerator while that first batch baked, and then I was on my merry way. After the chill, they stayed thick and juicy! Or as juicy as a cookie can be, at least.

there we go