Super soft and melt-in-your-mouth tender, these orange chocolate chip ricotta cookies are delicately flavored with fresh orange zest, studded with mini chocolate chips, and topped with a simple citrus icing that sets into the loveliest sheen.
When it comes to cookie textures, chewy cookies are wonderful, and crispy or shortbread-style cookies have their charm, too—but there’s that magical category of soft cookies that bridges the gap between cookie and cake. Think soft, cakey sugar cookies, chocolate madeleines, and soft pumpkin cookies with their unbeatable tender crumb.
Today’s orange chocolate chip ricotta cookies fit right into that category. Ricotta is the secret, just like in my lemon ricotta cookies; it makes the dough incredibly soft, moist, creamy, and tender. Perfect for tea parties, winter baking days, or anytime you want something sweet but not heavy.
And the best part? They stay soft for days (one of ricotta’s true superpowers) and just might taste even better the next day.
Why You’ll Love These Orange Chocolate Chip Ricotta Cookies:
- Ultra-soft, cakey, melt-in-your-mouth texture thanks to the ricotta.
- Bright citrus flavor: Fresh orange zest + juice = the dream team.
- Mini chocolate chips: Just enough chocolate in every bite without overwhelming the orange flavor.
- They stay soft for days, making them perfect for gifting or prepping ahead.
- Icing sets, so you can easily stack and store these.
3 Key Ingredients You Need:
- Ricotta Cheese: When baked in a cookie, ricotta is less about flavor and more about texture. Think: creamy, moist, soft, and airy. Keep in mind that the higher the fat percentage, the creamier the ricotta will be. We strongly recommend using full-fat (whole milk) ricotta for these cookies.
- 1 Large Orange: You need the zest and the juice for the cookie dough, and more juice for the icing. If your oranges are on the small side, you might need 2.
- Mini Chocolate Chips: You need mini chocolate chips for these cookies—regular chocolate chips are too large for these delicate cookies, and affect the texture.
The rest of the ingredients are pretty standard cookie must-haves: Flour, baking powder + baking soda, eggs, butter, sugar, and salt; plus confectioners’ sugar for the glaze.
How These Compare to My Lemon Ricotta Cookies
If you’ve made my lemon ricotta cookies before, today’s version will feel familiar, but they aren’t identical twins. The base texture is the same ultra-soft, cakey cookie, but the orange version is slightly sturdier. We reduced the ricotta and added a bit more flour compared to the lemon recipe because the addition of chocolate chips introduced extra weight and caused more spreading. With this adjustment, the cookies bake up perfectly tender and beautifully rounded. The flavor profile is different, too: where lemon ricotta cookies are bright and zesty, these orange chocolate chip ricotta cookies feel warmer and cozier. The chocolate adds just enough richness to balance the citrus!
In Photos: How to Make the Cookies
Whisk together the dry ingredients.
Cream the butter and sugar. You want this light and fluffy; see how to cream butter and sugar if you want a little refresher on this step. Beat in the egg, ricotta, zest, juice, and vanilla. The mixture will look curdled—this is totally normal for ricotta cookies!
Add dry ingredients. Mix on low just until combined. Don’t over-mix.
Fold in mini chocolate chips. The dough will be thick and sticky, similar to muffin batter.
Cover and refrigerate. Chill the dough for at least 3 hours. The longer it rests, the easier it is to handle when shaping. I prefer chilling it overnight for the best texture.
Scoop, roll, and bake.
My Best Tips for Perfect Ricotta Cookies
Today’s orange ricotta cookies are easy to make, but here are a few tips we learned when testing the recipe:
- Avoid over-spreading: The dough mixture is a cake batter/cookie dough hybrid and that’s why it’s crucial to chill it in the refrigerator for at least 3 hours before baking. If you don’t, the dough will spread all over your baking sheet. Plus, the longer it chills, the easier it is to work with when it’s time to shape the cookies.
- Cookie size makes a difference: Carefully measure out 1 scant Tablespoon of cookie dough per cookie. You can use a small cookie scoop, but anything larger bakes into flat cookies—more like orange ricotta pancakes (and not the good kind!).
- Extra flour doesn’t work. We even tried reworking the recipe by adding more flour to help prevent excess spreading, but it was useless. Chilling the cookie dough and measuring 1 Tablespoon per cookie were the only things that work in the dough’s favor.
- Expect a sticky dough. Have some flour on hand when you’re scooping and rolling the cookies. You may need to flour your hands periodically, or even wash them a few times as you go. Totally normal and expected.
- Don’t wait for browning—ricotta cookies should remain pale. To test for doneness, lightly poke a cookie with your finger; if it leaves an indent, bake a bit longer. If the surface springs back, the cookies are done.
- Use an icing that sets. To add a little something special (and delicious!), drizzle or spoon orange icing on top of each cooled cookie. You’ll love this orange icing because it eventually sets, making these ricotta cookies easy to store and transport.
More Favorite Citrus Cookies
- Lemon Thumbprint Cookies
- Orange Cranberry Icebox Cookies
- Very Lemon Crinkle Cookies
- Lemon Shortbread Cookies
This recipe is part of my annual cookie countdown called Sally’s Cookie Palooza. It’s the biggest, most delicious event of the year! Browse dozens of cookie recipes over on the Sally’s Cookie Palooza page.
Orange Chocolate Chip Ricotta Cookies
- Prep Time: 3 hours, 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 14 minutes
- Total Time: 3 hours, 45 minutes
- Yield: around 48 cookies
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: Italian
Description
These orange chocolate chip ricotta cookies are unbelievably soft and tender, flavored with fresh orange zest and studded with mini chocolate chips. Topped with a sweet citrus icing, they stay soft for days and make a bright, melt-in-your-mouth winter treat.
Ingredients
- 2 and 3/4 cups (344g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled), plus more as needed for shaping
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (8 Tbsp; 113g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1 and 1/2 cups (300g) granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 10 ounces (283g) full-fat ricotta cheese, at room temperature (around 1 and 1/4 cups)
- 1 and 1/2 Tablespoons fresh orange zest
- 1 Tablespoon (15g/ml) fresh orange juice
- 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1 cup (180g) mini chocolate chips
Icing
- 1 and 1/2 cups (180g) confectioners’ sugar, sifted
- 2–3 Tablespoons (30-45g/ml) fresh orange juice
- optional, for garnish: orange zest
Instructions
- Make the cookies: In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
- With a handheld or stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter and sugar together on medium-high speed until creamy, about 3 minutes. (Here’s a helpful tutorial if you need guidance on how to cream butter and sugar.) Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. With the mixer running on low speed, add the eggs one at a time, then add the ricotta cheese, vanilla extract, orange zest, and orange juice. Beat on medium-high speed until combined. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl as needed. Add the dry ingredients and the chocolate chips. Beat on low speed just until incorporated. Do not over-mix. Dough will be very creamy, sticky, and thick.
- Cover dough tightly and refrigerate for at least 3 hours or up to 2–3 days. I prefer refrigerating overnight.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C). Line large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
- Remove the dough from the refrigerator. Scoop 1 scant Tablespoon of dough for each cookie (20-23g each), using the Tbsp measuring spoon and a lightly floured finger to nudge the dough onto the baking sheet. Lightly flour your finger again and reshape each portion into a ball. Cookie size is important; see recipe Note below.
- Bake for 13–14 minutes, or until the top of a cookie springs back when lightly pressed with your finger. The cookies shouldn’t brown much at all.
- Remove from the oven and allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack to cool completely before glazing.
- Make the icing: In a small bowl or liquid measuring cup, whisk together the confectioners’ sugar and orange juice until smooth. Add an extra 1 or 2 teaspoons of juice to thin out, if desired. Spoon over the cookies. Lightly top each with orange zest, if desired. If applied lightly, the icing will set within a couple hours.
- Iced cookies will stay fresh covered at room temperature for up to 2 days or in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Make Ahead & Freezing Instructions: You can make the cookie dough and chill it in the refrigerator for up to 2–3 days. You can also freeze ricotta cookie dough. Chill the dough first so it firms up (step 3), then scoop it into mounds onto a parchment-lined baking sheet. Freeze the scooped dough until solid, about 2–3 hours, and transfer the frozen mounds to an airtight container or freezer bag, layering with parchment as needed. Freeze for up to 3 months. When you’re ready to bake, simply bake the dough from frozen, adding a minute or two to the bake time. Baked cookies, cooled but unglazed, freeze well for up to 3 months. (For best taste and texture, icing should be fresh!) Thaw overnight in the refrigerator and bring to room temperature before glazing.Â
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Glass Mixing Bowl | Whisk |Â Citrus Zester | Citrus Juicer |Â Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand)Â | Baking Sheets |Â Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Paper | Cooling RackÂ
- Ricotta Cheese: We strongly recommend using whole milk/full fat ricotta cheese.
- Can I Use Regular Chocolate Chips Instead of Mini? We don’t recommend it. Regular chips are too large for these delicate cookies and weigh down the dough, causing uneven spreading. Mini chips distribute more evenly and preserve the soft, cakey texture.
- Cookie Size Makes a Difference: Carefully measure out 1 scant Tablespoon of cookie dough per cookie. You can use a small cookie scoop, but anything larger than 1 Tablespoon yields particularly flat cookies. Or let me reword that… orange ricotta pancakes.
- Expect a Sticky Dough: Have some flour on hand when you’re scooping and shaping the cookies. You may need to flour your hands periodically, or even wash them a few times as you go. Totally normal and expected.
- Can I Halve This Recipe? Absolutely. Simply halve all of the ingredients for fewer cookies. The instructions, chill time, and bake times stay the same.
- Be sure to check out my top 5 cookie baking tips AND these are my 10 must-have cookie baking tools.
Reader Comments and Reviews
This recipe is somewhere between the most delectable cake and the fluffiest cookie. I have never made anything like it. I did my cookies in a full size cookie scoop and they turned out just fine. Also put the oven on convection bake, so that may have made a difference. Either way, I 100% recommend this recipe. You will not be disappointed.
I’d give these a 4.5 rating. Texture of cookie is fabulous. I added 3/4 teaspoon Karo to icing, plus 1/2 orange zest. Karo makes icing set up faster & when dry adds a nice sheen. Then I’d double amount of icing so we can slather it on rather than just a drizzle for each cookie. Using a plastic Tablespoon to scoop dough onto cookie sheet made it easy so I didn’t bother rolling into ball too much & didn’t need to use flour & ended up with 58 cookies. I used regular sized chips since I couldn’t find the mini size in the dairy-free ones I use but worked out fine, just gave heavier chocolate taste so I’d add 1/2 orange of zest to the batter too rather than just the 1 1/2 Tablespoon as listed in recipe. I’d also reduce the oj & add a little orange extract. And yes I know 1 Tablespoon juice = 1/2 teaspoon of extract. Recipe doesn’t state so I put balls 1 1/2″ apart & they didn’t spread much in baking so that worked. I did need to bake 14 1/2 minutes or even a little longer so I put dough back in fridge between batches. It can be a long process (I prefer baking quick breads or cakes) so I make dough, then refrigerate overnight & bake next day.
This is one of the best cookies I’ve ever made. It’s like an orange roll ate a fluffy, muffiny cookie. Gave them out to tons of people with Christmas cookie boxes. These are a permanent add to my rotation. Just incredible!
These were a delicious, cakey cookie that the recipients of my holiday cookie boxes enjoyed very much. I left my dough in the refrigerator for 2 days and didn’t have any trouble using a cookie scoop to portion out the dough. I did place the cookie sheets back in the fridge after portioning and while waiting for room in the oven to bake. Using a #40 scoop I was able to get 50 yummy cookies. Thanks, Sally
This was first of your recipes . Won’t be making again!. Had to bake at least 5 minutes longer!
These were delicious . Will definitely make them again
Sorry, this was the first of your recipes that weren’t fantastic. These cookies lacked flavor.
These are delicious! Cookie is not too sweet so glaze is good on them. I was eating plain lol. The chocolate and orange shine through! I used a Tablespoon measuring spoon and knocked onto the sheet by pushing out with a teaspoon, then went around and shaped with floured fingers. Much neater and heat from hands wasn’t making a mess.
Hi Sally. I tried iut these cookies and the flavour came out great and the shape of the cookie held and is slightly crisp on the outside. however the texture is cake not cookie like. Did I do something wrong? Thanks!
Hi Angelica, the ricotta in this recipe lends to more of a cakey texture rather than a traditional chewy or crunchy cookie. It doesn’t sound like you did anything wrong!
Just made these and followed directions perfectly. They came up scrumptious. Bringing them to my cookie exchange tomorrow. What a great taste and as they rest, the flavor seems to intensify.
Went to the store and inadvertently picked up part skim ricotta. Before I go back, just curious, what happens if part skim is used instead of whole? Thanks!
Hi Victoria, the texture of the cookies may not be as soft and creamy. We highly recommend making with whole milk ricotta if you can!
These cookies were a bit time consuming mostly due to the size for baking and the divine stickiness of the dough. It was hard to have the patience to keep them small by the 4th sheet! I chose not to make the glaze and I think the taste was great. They were definitely softer and more flavorful the next day. For that reason, I won’t say I’ll never make them again, but I may need to forget over the next year the tediousness of the process.
I loved without the glaze but honestly it takes it up a notch and worth it. At least glaze half of them. ;^)