This a very easy chocolate chip cookie recipe, and perfect if you like soft chocolate chip cookies. What makes it so easy is the melted butter. You just melt the butter and mix everything together in one bowl. But the cookies are soft, so if you're after crunchy or crispy cookies, you may want to use a different recipe. For soft cookie lovers, this recipe calls for either cornstarch or a little pudding mix so they are also a little chewy.
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Instant Pudding Mix Cookies
The cookies in these photos were made with a little French vanilla flavored instant pudding. It adds flavor and makes the cookies soft and slightly golden. The modified cornstarch in the pudding mix also helps the dough hold its shape more. So if you like cookies with lumps in the middle, you can scoop the cookies like this and they'll sort of hold that shape.
If you use Plugra and chill the dough overnight, they'll really hold that shape! I like the big lump in the middle of this one.
No Mixer Required for Easy Chocolate Chip Cookies
This is a one bowl cookie recipe that doesn't require an electric mixer. If you want to mix the dry ingredients separately you can, but it's not necessary here. Just put everything in the bowl and add ingredients, preferably by weight. You can even melt the butter directly in the mixing bowl if your bowl is microwave-safe. I'll sometimes do this an hour ahead of time to give the butter plenty of time to cool, then come back and stir together the dough. The butter really needs to be cool.
Milk Chocolate and Dark Chocolate Chips
These very easy chocolate chip cookies are good with any type of chips, but I think they are especially tasty with milk chocolate chips. I love the large ones from Guittard, but Ghirardelli and Hershey will also work. If you don't want to use chips, you can use chunks. These little cookies work well with both.
Substitute for the Pudding Mix
If you don't have pudding mix, you can use 1 ½ teaspoons of cornstarch and add an extra tablespoon of granulated sugar.
Large Size Version
It's interesting how dough changes over time in the refrigerator. This dough improves with age and works really well for big, fat cookies. Just smash two or three of the smaller dough balls together for big cookies. Bake the big cookies at 375 for 15 to 18 minutes or until they look nicely brown on the inside. For the big cookies, I like to use a mix of milk chocolate chips and large Ghirardelli bittersweet chips.
Recipe
Melted Butter Soft Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 stick unsalted butter (See note about salt) (114 grams)
- 3 tablespoons sugar (36 grams)
- ½ cup brown sugar, firmly packed (100 grams)
- 2 ½ tablespoons instant pudding mix (25 grams)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 large egg
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¾ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 ½ cups all purpose flour (195 grams)
- 1 cup milk or semisweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- Melt the butter gently using one of the lower settings in the microwave. Let cool.
- With a wooden spoon or scraper, beat together the cooled melted butter, both sugars, pudding mix and vanilla until blended, then beat in the egg.
- Add the salt and baking soda and stir until blended, then add the flour and stir until you have a dough. Stir in the chocolate chips.
- Using a small cookie scoop, scoop out 24-26 or so generous size ball. If you want little rings around the edges, make the scoops slightly larger than the scoop and press down on a flat surface so your scooped dough has a ridge around it (see photo). Put all the little scoops on a plate and cover with plastic wrap until ready to bake or bake right away.
- Preheat the oven to 375 F Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Arrange the chilled scooped balls on a cookie sheet spacing 2 inches apart. Bake one sheet at a time for about 10-12 minutes or until the cookies are lightly brown around the edges. I usually bake mine even longer than 12 minutes because I like the cookies more brown, but I recommend checking at 10 because some ovens are faster.
- Bonus: For large cookies, take 3 of your balls and mash them together into a ball. Bake on a parchment lined cookie sheet at 350 for about 15 to 18 minutes or until set and cookies have small cracks in the top. Let cool completely. The large ones work best with dough that's been chilled for a day.
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