Make the best Chocolate Crinkle Cookies at home with this easy recipe! These chocolatey cookies taste fudgy and brownie-like and form a pretty crackly pattern as they bake!
We are in full-blown holiday baking mode in our house right now! I have baked so many batches of cookies in the last few weeks, I am embarrassed to admit just how many! To be fair though, many of the cookies I’ve baked are stashed away in the freezer, waiting to be thawed and added to my cookie tray gifts soon.
This latest batch- these fudgy, delicious Chocolate Crinkle Cookies- are probably not going to make it to any cookie tray, I’m afraid! They are too darn good!
I made a full batch, but froze half of the dough to bake in the future (freezing tips included later in this post). I baked the other half and ended up with about 12 cookies. My hubby took care of a good number of them and I helped too. Now I am staring at the cookie plate with only a few cookies left debating if one more would be too much. As if I haven’t crossed that line already. Oops.
But seriously, how can one be blamed for eating a few too many cookies when they are so darn good? These cookies are like a brownie. They are rich in chocolatey flavour with a fudgy center. So yummy!
Ingredients for Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
To make a batch of these cookies (that’s about 20-24 cookies depending on how big you roll your cookie balls), you will need:
- Flour: I use all purpose flour but you can substitute whole wheat pastry flour too
- Cocoa powder: use a good quality cocoa powder as you really want that yummy chocolate flavour to shine!
- Instant espresso powder (optional): I add this to enhance the chocolate flavour but you can easily omit it
- Salt: added to enhance the flavour of baked goods
- Butter: the butter should be softened so it can be creamed together with the sugar nicely
- Sugar: both regular granulated sugar and brown sugar
- Eggs, vanilla extract, baking soda: we are making cookies after all!
- Powdered sugar: for rolling
How to make Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
- Mix the dry ingredients: In a large bowl, mix together the four, cocoa powder, instant espresso powder, salt and baking soda. Set aside.
- Cream together the butter and sugar: In the bowl of your stand mixer, beat the butter and sugars until fluffy (a couple of minutes).
- Add the remaining wet ingredients: Add the eggs and vanilla extract and mix to combine.
- Add the dry ingredients: Slowly add the dry ingredients to the stand mixer and mix until they are incorporated.
- Chill the dough: Cover bowl with plastic food wrap and place in the fridge to set for 2 hours (the dough will be too sticky to handle without chilling it).
- Scoop and roll: Scoop out dough (I like to use a small sized cookie scoop- to get a uniform size) and roll the dough into a ball. Roll the dough balls in regular sugar first and then in the powdered sugar, being sure to coat them generously. Place the dough balls on the baking sheets, 2 inches apart. [rolling the cookies in regular sugar first helps prevent the powdered sugar from ‘melting’ and disappearing while they bake, giving the cookies a nice bright white crackle coating]
- Bake: Bake the cookies for 10-12 minutes. Remove them from the oven and allow the cookies to cool on a baking sheet for 5 minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.
Can you freeze these cookies?
Yes! Yes, you can! As I mentioned earlier in the post, I froze half of this recipe for future baking. Since the holidays tend to get very busy, I love cookie recipes that I can prep in advance and freeze. It can be a huge help!
So how do you freeze them? I freeze the uncooked dough, not the baked cookie. If you freeze the baked cookie, as it thaws the powdered sugar will get moist and you will lose the crinkly look. No bueno.
To freeze the dough, I scoop the dough and roll it into balls as described in the recipe. Then, I place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and freeze them until they are solid. Once they are frozen, I remove the dough balls from the tray and then transfer them into a freezer safe bag.
When you want to bake them, remove them from the freezer and let the dough thaw in the fridge overnight. Then roll the dough in powdered sugar and follow the recipe as described to bake them up.
I hope you enjoy this delicious treat and have more self control with them than I do!
-Cathy
You may also like:
Chewy Ginger Molasses Cookies
Chocolate Dipped Toffee Shortbread Cookies
Christmas Kiss Cookies
Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 1/3 cups all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon instant espresso powder (optional- I like to add it for a richer chocolatey flavour)
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup butter softened
- 2/3 cup sugar
- 1/3 cup brown sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
For rolling:
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 3/4 cup powdered sugar (aka icing sugar or confectioners sugar)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F and line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, mix together the four, cocoa powder, instant espresso powder, salt and baking soda. Set aside.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer, beat the butter and sugars until fluffy (a couple of minutes). Add the eggs and vanilla extract and mix to combine.
- Slowly add the dry ingredients to the stand mixer and mix until they are incorporated. Cover bowl with plastic food wrap and place in the fridge to set for 2 hours (the dough will be too sticky to handle without chilling it).
- Scoop out dough (I like to use a small sized cookie scoop- to get a uniform size) and roll the dough into a ball.
- Roll the dough balls in regular sugar first and then in the powdered sugar, being sure to coat them generously. Place the dough balls on the baking sheets, 2 inches apart.
- Bake the cookies for 10-12 minutes. Remove them from the oven and allow the cookies to cool on a baking sheet for 5 minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.
Note: Metric ingredient measurements are provided as a courtesy using a third-party calculator and are rounded to the nearest unit. The recipes provided on this site have not been tested with metric measurements and their accuracy cannot be verified.
Nutrition
The nutritional information provided is based on third-party calculations and is an estimate only. Accurate nutritional facts will vary based on the particular brands used, portion sizes, measurement accuracy and more.
