You will love these soft peanut butter snickerdoodles! Enjoy a chewy cookie with a slightly crisp exterior, cinnamon-sugar coating, and a little crunch from chopped peanuts. I appreciate there’s no extra decorating required. These are sweet and simple, but mega flavorful!
Does anything really live up to the mighty snickerdoodle cookie? The answer is not much, but there are several variations of the cinnamon-sugar-coated treats that come close—like snickerdoodle cupcakes and snickerdoodle blondies. And it’s so much fun to play around with different flavors, including these maple pecan snickerdoodles and white chocolate chai snickerdoodles. Today, we’re adding peanut butter to the lineup!
Yes. I don’t recommend leaving out the chopped peanuts because they add so much peanutty flavor. I actually prefer adding chopped peanuts over using crunchy peanut butter, which tends to dry out cookies. Give the peanuts a good rough chop.
Peanut butter acts more like a dry ingredient in cookies because it soaks up a lot of moisture. Since there’s not too much flour, the dough is really soft… like peanut butter frosting soft. You might even think you’re doing something wrong. Don’t worry, you’re not! After the dough comes together, chill it in the refrigerator for 3 hours. As it chills, the cookie dough solidifies and is much easier to shape.
Look how thick the cookie dough is after chilling:
The cookies puff up in the oven, and then fall to their crinkly destiny as they cool. These cookies are fragile right after baking, so let them cool on the baking sheets for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.
Soft, cinnamon-sugar-coated peanut butter snickerdoodles are in your future! Chilling the cookie dough for at least 3 hours is imperative. It may seem like an odd amount of flour in the dough, but 1 cup + 2 Tablespoons (142g) makes for a tender peanut butter cookie that still holds shape. For best results, use creamy peanut butter.
