Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies

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Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil CookiesThey’re made with coconut oil, which smells stronger than it tastes, and although you can ‘taste it’, it’s much milder and more subtle than coconut flakes. The peanut butter flavor really shines through.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

I could not get the last cookies I made with coconut oil out of my mind. They were some of the best cookies I’ve ever had.

But they didn’t include peanut butter. So I changed that.

I have been in love with baking with coconut oil. I won’t go into my full diatribe again about how it doesn’t make your baked goods taste like tanning oil. It makes food taste tropical vacation-scented, but not like you’re eating a straight up bottle of Hawaiian Tropic. The smell of coconut oil is stronger than the actual flavor it imparts, which is present but not overwhelming.

The flavor of peanut butter definitely dominates these cookies, which is what I was hoping for. The previous coconut oil cookies have been very different; namely White Chocolate and Brown Sugar-Molasses. It was time to pair my beloved peanut butter with coconut oil. The result is a soft, puffy, and very lightweight peanut butter cookie with hints of coconut in the background.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

Looking at them, you’d think they were heavy bricks because they’re made with peanut butter and coconut oil, neither of which are exactly lightweight. But a secret ingredient keeps them deceptively soft, light, and almost airy. If they were any airier they’d be cakey, but thank goodness they’re not. I only want cakes to taste cakey, never cookies or brownies.

Make the cookies by combining peanut butter, coconut oil, light brown sugar, an egg, vanilla, and cream until very light and fluffy, about five minutes. It’s important to use coconut oil that’s softened to the consistency of softened butter. The same consistency you’d use for creaming butter, sugars, and eggs in traditional cookies.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

If your coconut oil is rock hard, microwave it in a small bowl for five or ten seconds, or just until it begins to soften. Conversely, if it’s runny or melted, place it in the freezer momentarily until it firms up. A tiny amount of runniness is fine; it’s an oil and that happens. But do not use melted or purely liquid coconut oil because you can’t effectively cream a liquid; it would be like trying to cream liquid butter. Doesn’t work.

I used light brown sugar, which is less robust than dark brown sugar, used here. Either will work but I didn’t want molasses-laden dark brown sugar to compete with the peanut butter, so chose light brown. I used 1 tablespoon of vanilla, because I love it and this dough is bold and can stand up to it, but if you prefer less, add to taste. I used Homemade Vanilla Extract, full of vanilla bean flecks and specks.

Please don’t write to tell me that brown sugar is white sugar with molasses added. I’ve been told that about 500 times. I am making a taste claim about dark brown sugar, not a health claim. You cannot get the flavor from white sugar that brown sugar lends.

I always use creamy peanut butter for baking, and always storebought, never Homemade Peanut Butter. Homemade is thinner and doesn’t have the same structural integrity as good old-fashioned Jif, Skippy or Peter Pan. Baking with natural peanut butter is a recipe for flat-as-pancake cookies that spread like crazy and I don’t recommend it.

Peanut Butter averiecooks.com

Add the flour, corn starch, baking soda, salt, and mix to just incorporate. Cornstarch is the secret ingredient that keeps the cookies so soft and light. I used it in Soft Batch Dark Brown Sugar Coconut Oil Cookies and in my favorite Chocolate Chip Cookies. It does the job of both softening and tenderizing dough, and cookies made with it bake up extremely soft. If you’ve ever made Pudding Cookies and love how they always turn out super soft, it’s because one of the first ingredients in pudding mix is ‘modified food starches’, code for cornstarch.

The same is true of cake mix cookies, like Strawberry Cake Mix Cookies or Mounds Bar Chocolate Coconut Cake Mix Cookies. The cornstarch in both pudding and cake mix helps cookies stay soft, light, and fluffy.

In the past it’s always done a great job of making my cookies soft, but between the coconut oil and peanut butter, these cookies are the lightest, puffiest, and fluffiest of all.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

For many cookies, I use a combination of bread and all-prose flour in cookies, but for these, I used all-purpose because cookies made with it are softer and I was going for Keebler Soft Batch-style softness. When adding the flour, start with 1 cup. If your dough seems quite wet, sloppy, or isn’t combining, add up to another one-quarter cup, for a total of 1 1/4 cups. The more flour added, the more prone these cookies will be to getting cakey. I don’t like cakey cookies and would rather my dough be a little on the loose side than dry, so that the cookies bake up chewy and not cakey.

Because brands of coconut oil vary, as well as moisture content in brown sugar, coupled with different climates and personal taste preferences, add the flour as needed. The dough shouldn’t be sticky or tacky, a little loose and oily is preferred to dry and crumbly. It should have a Play-Doh like consistency, and if pinched and squished, it’ll stick together and to itself, but not to your hands. Like Play-Doh, you can just push any tiny dough pebbles in the bottom of the mixing bowl onto the master dough ball and they will stick.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

I used my medium 2-inch cookie scoop and made 18 mounds, about two heaping tablespoons of dough each. I didn’t flatten them, shape them, or touch them in any way. I let the tops stay ‘feathered’, which is the impression the wire-release mechanism on the cookie scoop makes.

Place the dough mounds on a large plate, cover with plasticwrap, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, or up to 5 days before baking. The dough is too warm, limp, soft and is unsuitable for baking until it’s been chilled. If you bake with warm, soft, dough your cookies will spread. However, of all the coconut oil-based cookies I’ve made, these spread the least and stayed very puffy and flattening the dough mounds just slightly before chilling the dough is recommended. After chilling and the coconut oil solidifies, shaping the dough is much more challenging.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

Bake the cookies at 350F for 8 to 9 minutes, and if you like really gooey, super soft cookies, or your dough wasn’t extremely cold, these could be 7-minute cookies. My dough was rock hard coming out of the refrigerator after two days chilling, and I allowed it to sit on baking sheets at room temperature for 30 minutes before baking. I baked for 8 minutes, rotating trays midway through.

Pull them from the oven when the tops are just barely set. They’ll be glossy, pale, and appear underdone, but they firm up as they cool. Baking any longer than 9 minutes and you run the risk of the bottoms browning too much and as the days pass, they’ll be prone to drying out and turning cakey. Everyone’s ingredients, oven, climate, and personal preferences are different, but they taste best when they’re not overbaked.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

The edges and bottoms are chewy with soft and lightweight interiors. It’s paradoxical that two heavy ingredients like coconut oil and peanut butter produced such puffy softies, but it’s true. When I handed these to the family and they tried them, I was met with looks of confusion. They were expecting really heavy cookies, and instead bit into these lightweights. Scott loves lighter cookies whereas I’m a dense slab girl, so he especially liked these.

There’s no white sugar and no butter used, so the intensity of the peanut butter flavor really shines. If you don’t like coconut, I’d still try them anyway. They’re definitely peanut butter cookies, with hints of coconut in the background. But if you’re dead-set against it, make these Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies (GF), still my favorite peanut butter-based cookie.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

Pairing my beloved peanut butter with coconut oil was one of those things I just had to try.

And I’m so glad I did.

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies averiecooks.com

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies - NO Butter & NO White Sugar used in these soft, puffy cookies that are bursting with peanut butter flavor. If you've wanted to start baking with coconut oil, these are so easy!

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies - They're made with coconut oil, which smells stronger than it tastes, and although you can 'taste it', it's much milder and more subtle than coconut flakes. The peanut butter flavor really shines through.

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4.80 from 5 votes

Soft and Puffy Peanut Butter Coconut Oil Cookies

By Averie Sunshine
There's no butter and no white sugar used in these soft, puffy, and very peanut buttery cookies. They're made with coconut oil, which smells stronger than it tastes, and although you can 'taste it', it's much milder and more subtle than coconut flakes. The peanut butter flavor really shines through. If you've never tried baking with coconut oil and replacing it one-for-one with butter in cookies, these cookies are a great place to start. A bit of cornstarch is the secret ingredient that helps the cookies bake up soft, light, slightly chewy, and very thick and puffy.
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 8 minutes
Total Time: 18 minutes
Servings: 18
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Ingredients  

  • ¾ cup creamy peanut butter, use Jif, Skippy, Peter Pan or similar; not natural and not homemade peanut butter
  • ½ cup coconut oil, softened (softened to the consistency of soft butter; not rock hard and not runny or melted, see below)
  • 1 cup light brown sugar, packed
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract, yes tablespoon, not teaspoon, or to taste
  • 1 cups all-purpose flour, see below
  • 2 teaspoons corn starch
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • ¼ teaspoon salt, optional and to taste

Instructions 

  • To the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine peanut butter, coconut oil, egg, sugar and beat on medium-high speed to cream until light and fluffy, 4 to 5 minutes. Note - Coconut oil should be the consistency of soft butter like you'd use to cream with sugar and eggs in traditional cookies. If coconut oil is rock hard, microwave it in a small bowl for 5 to 10 seconds or just until it begins to soften. If coconut oil is runny or melted, place it in the freezer momentarily until it firms up. A tiny amount of runniness is fine; it's an oil and that happens. But do not use melted or purely liquid coconut oil because you can't effectively cream a liquid; it would be like trying to cream liquid butter.
  • Stop, scrape down the sides of the bowl, add the vanilla and beat to incorporate, about 1 minute. Add 1 cup flour, corn starch, baking soda, optional salt, and mix until just combined, about 1 minute. If your dough seems quite wet, sloppy, or isn’t combining, add up to another one-quarter cup flour, one tablespoon at a time, for a total of 1 1/4 cups. The dough shouldn’t be sticky or tacky, and a little loose and oily is preferred to dry and crumbly. It should have a Play-Doh like consistency, and if pinched and squished, it’ll stick together and to itself, but not to your hands. Over-flouring the dough will cause the cookies to be prone to cakiness and dryness.
  • Using a medium cookie scoop, form mounds that are 2 heaping tablespoons in size; or divide dough into approximately 18 equal-sized pieces. Place dough mounds on a large plate, and slightly flatten each mound. Get the dough mounds in the exact shape you want to bake them in because after chilling, flattening or re-shaping the dough is difficult. Cover with plasticwrap, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours; up to 5 days. Do not bake these cookies with dough that has not been properly chilled because they will spread.
  • Preheat oven to 350°F, line a baking sheet with a Silpat Non-Stick Baking Mat, parchment, or spray with cooking spray. Place dough on baking sheet, spaced at least 2 inches apart; I bake a maximum of 8 per sheet. Bake for 7 to 9 minutes, or until tops have just set, even if slightly undercooked, pale, and glossy in the center. They firm up as they cool and I recommend the lower end of the baking range. The cookies in the photos were baked with dough that had been chilled for 2 days, left at room temp for 30 minutes to warm up slightly, then baked for 8 minutes, with trays rotated once at the 4-minute mark.
  • Allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 to 10 minutes before moving. Store cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 1 week, or in the freezer for up to 3 months. Alternatively, unbaked dough can be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 5 days, or in the freezer for up to 3 months, so consider baking only as many cookies as desired and save the remaining dough to be baked in the future when desired.

Nutrition

Serving: 1, Calories: 188kcal, Carbohydrates: 18g, Protein: 3g, Fat: 12g, Saturated Fat: 6g, Polyunsaturated Fat: 4g, Cholesterol: 10mg, Sodium: 157mg, Fiber: 1g, Sugar: 11g

Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.

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Please note: I have only made the recipe as written, and cannot give advice or predict what will happen if you change something. If you have a question regarding changing, altering, or making substitutions to the recipe, please check out the FAQ page for more info.

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Comments

  1. I just wanted to let you know that this is definitely now my go-to peanut butter cookie recipe.  They are SO good! I’m usually not patient enough to wait for refrigerating dough, but these are totally worth it. Although, I must admit, most times I put them in the freezer instead to speed things up, and they still come out perfect.  Thank you for a great recipe!!

    1. Thanks for LMK that this is your go-to peanut butter cookie recipe! I haven’t made these in awhile and you’re reminding me that I should! I love the coconut oil in them!

  2. Just made this cookies today and mine came out pretty good. They are a tiny crumbly but not to the point they fall apart when I pick them up. However while I was cooking them I noticed they didn’t really spread from the ball shape I made them into. I had to go in with a spatula and flatten them. They also taste a bit dry, but the middle is a little doughy. Tastes great, just wondering if I could cook it any better? Perhaps less flour? I used about a cup of flour!

    1. If they were a bit crumbly, using a bit less flour next time, and/or slightly more oil will combat that. All ingredients, climates, etc. vary and with baking it’s not always an ‘exact science’ and you need to a experiment a bit given all the variables. Sounds like overall a very easy fix!

  3. As I beat in the vanilla the batter totally separated into an oily mess. The coconut oil was soft not runny when I started and even after mixing in the flour it’s a lake of oil. I’ve refrigerated it but will that salvage it? Maybe this is a cookie that can’t be made on a warm day? Of course I did a double batch and it looks like it’s trash worthy

    1. Coconut oil, as well as peanut butter brands and depending on how oily they are, as well as temperature and all the nuances of baking can make it tricky to exactly tell what will happen when, or why things happened as they did since I wasn’t there with you. Hopefully the fridge helped it and also sometimes some recipes don’t do well as double batches; this may be one of them. I haven’t tried it so can’t say for sure either way. Thanks for giving it a try.

    2. Unfortunately refrigerating didn’t help. I could not get the oil reincorporated. I baked the cookies anyways but they weren’t edible. I’ll try another coconut oil recipe in the future but for now I’ll stick with butter cookies since I know they will turn out.

      1. It could have been the double batch. Honestly not all recipes double well, and this sounds like it was one of them. And/or the coconut oil used; just a lot of variables. Thanks for trying the recipe.

  4. Is the corn starch a necessity? Can I use anything in its place? That’s the one ingredient I don’t have at home with twin toddlers who are finally sleeping! :(

    1. It’s not an essential in terms of if the cookies will rise, bake properly, etc. But it helps provide the extra softness that I love in them.

  5. I baked the peanut butter coconut oil cookies today and they came out perfect! My son is in peanut butter cookie heaven. Thanks for this grand recipe!

  6. Very nice recipe!! Glad I found it. Because I was short on two tablespoon peanut butter I supplemented for the first thing I saw in my fridge: 2 tbsp condensed milk. Yummie they were good. Extremely soft and puffy. I refrigerated for 1.5 hour and didn’t let them come back to room temp. Thanks!!

  7. Loving the recipe! Right now dough is being refrigerated, I’m wondering If I need to warm the cookies for 30 mins on room temp before baking? keeping in mind the chilling time is only going to be around 2 hours! I hope you get a chance to reply soon. Thank you so much!

    1. Bake them from the fridge to the oven. Or on the counter only as long as it takes the oven to preheat. If you left them sit at room temp for 30 mins before baking, that nearly defeats the purpose of chilling the dough! Hope you enjoy them!

  8. I dont like peanut butter cookies. Most of my buddies dont like peanut butter cookies. I dont think ive eaten a bakers dozen in my 65 years. Suntan lotion, no butter,
    And an hour to decide if its worth ingredients to make a stinky cookie! I love peanut butter coconut oil cookies. All my friends love PB/ COCONUT OIL COOKIES. I bake many confections for my farmers
    Retirement bakery business. Thank you for this cookie i love to make. I learned valuble life lessons as well.
    You ROCK AVERIE…..BILL SCHREADER

    1. Thanks for trying the recipe and I’m glad it’s become a staple – even for someone who has never liked PB cookies in all their 65 years! I love that your friends like them and that you’re baking for your retirement bakery business AND that this cookie has taught you a few life lessons…wow, such an awesome comment to ready and thanks for sharing this story! Have a great weekend and if you ever make any of my other recipes, please let me know! Take care!

  9. I substituted 1/2 cup honey for the brown sugar (which is usually just white sugar with molasses added see:ingredients #savingourkids, julie is right) and all natural powdered peanut butter(PB2 with water) and added some ground ginger and cinnamon for a shmorgusborg of delishous healthy goodness.
    soo…. calling shenanigans on that claim Averie.

    Thanks for the recipe, these cookies are amazing!!!

  10. Oh ya these are excellent! Followed your recipe but then added white chips and caramel bits, definitely a keeper. Thank you!

  11. Mine came out really crumbly :( they wouldn’t hold together, even after adding another egg. Could it have been the peanut butter? It was Costcos Orgainc creamy peanut butter, I thought it would work because it isn’t super runny.

    1. I don’t use ‘organic’ PB…I use old school Jif or generic storebrand stuff. Honestly, that old-fashioned PB really does work the best for baking in my experience. If yours were dry, add a dollop more PB, a little less flour, or a little extra drizzle of oil to get the dough moist and to come together and you’ll be all set next time.