Big fat peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies are easy, thick, and exploding with peanut butter, oats, and chocolate chips to satisfy your cookie cravings.
Tomorrow, May 15th, is National Chocolate Chip Day!!! A holiday just as important as any other on our calendars, so we MUST bake cookies.
A few years ago we celebrated with chewy chocolate chip cookies. Last year we celebrated with soft & chewy oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. This year we celebrate with PEANUT BUTTER. As if there’s any other way to celebrate chocolate?
A cookie to end all other cookies, these big fat peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies are a mouthful. They’re unapologetically fat and thick with loads of peanut butter, chewy oats, and of course—the star of this week’s holiday—chocolate chips. Inspiring today’s cookie recipe is the cover of Sally’s Cookie Addiction. My monster cookie recipe, found in chapter 2 of my latest cookbook, combines chocolate chips, peanut butter, oats, and M&Ms. I skipped the rainbow candies so the focus remains on the peanut butter and chocolate chip pairing.
These massive peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies surprise me every time I bake them, which, in the past year, is more than I care to admit! As the cookie dough bakes, I confidently exclaim that these cookies “surely won’t be as thick as last time.” As I stare at them finishing in the oven—because we all do that—I’m overcome with satisfaction that not only will I eat the thickest peanut butter oatmeal cookies ever, I’ll eat my words too.
The cookie dough only needs about 20-30 minutes in the refrigerator before baking. This time allows the oats to soak up some moisture so the cookies don’t overspread in the oven. But did you read that? Only 20 minutes!! The sooner you make this cookie dough, the sooner you eat these big fat peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies!!
More Quick Cookie Recipes
- Peanut Butter Cookie Sandwiches
- Mini M&M Cookies
- Nutella Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Peanut Butter Cup Surprise Monster Cookies
Scroll down below the recipe to read more about how to bake these peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies!
Print
Prep Time:
Yield:
Category:
Method:
Cuisine:
Print
PinDescription
Big fat peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies are easy, thick, and exploding with peanut butter, oats, and chocolate chips to satisfy your cookie cravings.
Ingredients
- 1 and 1/2 cups (180g) all-purpose flour (spoon & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup (2 sticks; 235g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1 cup (200g) granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 cup (260g) creamy peanut butter
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 2 cups (180g) old-fashioned whole rolled oats
- 2 and 1/2 cups (450g) semi-sweet chocolate chips, plus more for topping if desired
Instructions
- Whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl. Set aside.
- In a large bowl using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium-high speed until smooth, about 1 minute. Add the granulated sugar and brown sugar and beat on medium-high speed until creamed, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs, peanut butter, and vanilla and beat on high speed until combined, about 1 minute. Scrape down the sides and up the bottom of the bowl and beat again as needed to combine.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix on low until combined. With the mixer running on low speed, add the oats. Once combined, beat in the chocolate chips. Dough will be thick and sticky. Cover and chill the dough for at least 20 minutes in the refrigerator (and up to 4 days). If chilling for longer than 1 hour, allow to sit at room temperature for at least 30 minutes before rolling and baking because the dough will be quite hard.
- Preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Line baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. Set aside.
- Scoop balls of dough, 2 Tablespoons of dough per cookie, and arrange 3 inches apart on the baking sheets. Bake for 12-14 minutes until lightly browned on the sides. The centers will look very soft.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely. While the cookies are still warm, I like to press a few more chocolate chips into the tops– this is only for looks!
- Cookies stay fresh covered at room temperature for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Make Ahead Instructions: You can make the cookie dough and chill it in the refrigerator for up to 4 days. Allow to come to room temperature then continue with step 4. Baked cookies freeze well for up to 3 months. Unbaked cookie dough balls freeze well for up to 3 months. Bake frozen cookie dough balls for an extra minute, no need to thaw. Click here for my tips and tricks on freezing cookie dough.
- Peanut Butter: Use a non-natural peanut butter like Jif creamy or Skippy creamy. I do not suggest using natural style or oily peanut butter as both produce crumbly, fragile, and sandy tasting cookies. (Try this flourless peanut butter oatmeal cookie if you want to use natural!) Crunchy peanut butter is OK, but I find the cookies taste a little dry with it.
- Be sure to check out my top 5 cookie baking tips AND these are my 10 must-have cookie baking tools.
How to Make Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
This cookie dough is adapted from my oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. The addition of peanut butter weighs the dough down, so I add baking powder for lift. When testing the recipe as I wrote my manuscript, I found the cookies weren’t spreading enough. I decided to swap the quantities of granulated sugar and brown sugar. Granulated sugar, dry and thin, helps induce spread while brown sugar, moist and thick, keeps cookies compact. More granulated sugar than brown sugar makes all the difference in this dough and you won’t miss that extra brown sugar flavor because peanut butter is the front-runner. Lastly, I reduced the amount of oats to make room for more chocolate chips.
Like my basic soft chocolate chip cookies, the base of today’s oatmeal cookie recipe is creamed room temperature butter, granulated sugar, and brown sugar. You can’t cream butter and sugars together if the butter is too warm or too cold– and the outcome of the cookies spells trouble too. “Room temperature” butter is about 65°F (18°C). It’s cool and slightly firm to touch, not warm or slippery. In order to hit that sweet “room temperature” spot, simply place the butter out on the counter for 1 hour prior to beginning the recipe. You need 1 cup (2 sticks; 16 Tbsp) for this cookie dough.
We’re using 1 cup of creamy peanut butter. Like in most of my baking, I recommend using non-natural peanut butter. Natural varieties, while wonderful for eating and cooking, aren’t ideal for baking. (You might remember reading this from my traditional peanut butter cookies recipe.) Cookies made with natural peanut butter are crumbly with a sandy texture. I recommend using Jif or Skippy. You can use creamy or crunchy, but I prefer creamy peanut butter as crunchy can make the cookies taste a little dry.
Two Tablespoons of cookie dough are in each cookie. I use a medium cookie scoop, which is 1 and 1/2 Tablespoons, and overflow it with cookie dough. This amount of cookie dough promises a peanut butter oatmeal cookie that’s perfectly balanced in diameter and thickness. Since they’re on the larger side, I recommend baking only 8 cookies per baking sheet to give them enough breathing room.
The recipe yields about 32 cookies and you definitely won’t have a problem getting rid of all 32. They have a ridiculously addicting quality– par for the course when chocolate and peanut butter unite. The edges are chewy, the centers are soft, and the chocolate chips are aplenty.
Would these work as a bar cookie? I want to do some regular cookies do for the sake of time a pan of bars.
Yes, absolutely! I think a 9×13 size pan is best. I’m unsure of the exact bake time.
Hi Debbie, I saw your question and I was wondering about the baking time, if you got the chance to bake them as cookie bars.
I haven’t tried it yet. I will post the results if I do.
Thank you!
The taste of these cookies is just incredible! However, I experience that peanut butter recipes in my house always end up rather crumbly and dry, instead of lovely moist/gooey/name it. Perhaps it is the dutch peanut butter? Anyhow, could I compensate this by adding an extra egg yolk, or perhaps a couple of table spoons of milk?
Would love to hear your opinion since every other recipe I have tried so far has been amazing!
Hi Iris! Perhaps it’s the variety of peanut butter? The first thing I’d try is 2-3 Tablespoons of milk. See if that helps your next batch!
Hi Sally… if I only chill the dough for 20 mins, do I roll the dough before putting them on cookie sheets, or just if chilling it for longer than a day?
Hi Trixie! I’m so sorry, but I don’t understand your question. Just leave the dough in the bowl, cover it, then chill for 20 minutes before rolling/scooping. Does that help?
I overbaked these because I was nervous about the soft centres which sort of deflated like a soufflé when I gently pressed down. I ended up baking them for 17 or 18 minutes. They turned out sort of half crunchy and half chewy which I like, and I absolutely love the texture of the oats.
Even though I chilled the cookie balls overnight after scooping, and smooshed them down before baking, the cookies were still puffy.
Sooooo good, Sally! Thanks for another wonderful recipe.
Hi Sally
The cookies are really delicious….thanks! Note that I used the weights measurements only and the cookies were perfect and disappearing fast!
Roze
Sally, my 12 year old son and I baked these cookies this morning. Let me tell you, they’re absolutely delicious! We are about to bring a plate of them over to my parents house; I know they will love them too! I’ve tried many of your recipes and we have all enjoyed them. Anxious for our next baking adventure!!!
Oh my gosh these are amazing! I brought a plate of them into work and I had three emails the next morning asking for the recipe 🙂
Can this be doubled or should I make the recipe twice? Thanks! 🙂
Hi Sheana! For best results, I recommend making 2 batches of cookie dough.
Hello Sally!
Great cookies, as usual! Just swapped for M&Ms and they were perfect for my boyfriend’s colleagues 🙂 thank you for the recipe!
I made these last weekend and they were AMAZING!! so soft and moist for a peanut butter cookie. I didn’t flatten my scoops too much and they stayed perfectly thick.
I like to be rebellious, so I added crushed pretzels to the dough. My friends said it was an addicting salty/sweet treat!
I have made these a few times now and they are SOOOOO delish! Do you think this could be adapted into a sugar free version? I have splenda brown sugar and white sugar but I don’t know if it will ruin the taste.
Hi Lisa! I’m so glad you enjoy these peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies! I don’t recommend replacing the sugar with artificial sweetener. My website isn’t the best place for sugar-free recipes, sorry!
Do you use Kosher salt or regular table salt in your recipes?
Whichever one I have on hand. I personally don’t notice a taste difference either way.
Hi Sally
I wonder if you would be able to give me some advice, i made these last week but instead of the chewy texture you talked about mine were really soft to the point of falling apart and with no chew, they were still super yummy but being a peanut butter obsessive i feel its my duty to make them again in search of perfection .. any hints as to what may have gone wrong would be much appreciated. Many thanks from a hot UK.
Love this recipe. Will definitely try this. I like cookies when it’s soft to bite, it looks yummy!
Could salted butter be used instead of non salted and the extra salt that is added be omitted?
Yes, if that is all you have on hand. You might still need a bit of salt as each brand of butter contains a different amount so you never really know how much you are adding!
my husband is allergic to peanut butter so i’m thinking of doing this with sunbutter instead. do you know if it reacts the same? also, i have quick oats on hand, can i use that instead?
I haven’t tried these with sunbutter but I would imagine that it works the same as long as it’s the same creamy consistency. I highly recommend whole oats for the best texture!
These were perfection! Thanks, Sally!!
These look so delicious! Question – can I use margarine instead of butter? Normally I only bake with unsalted butter but I ended up with a 2 lb tub of Becel that I have to use (hate to waste it). I imagine I’d have to reduce the salt.
Hi Wendy! I don’t suggest that substitution with this recipe. Margarine bakes up completely differently compared to butter.
Can I use quick oats? The kind that cook in one minute
I highly recommend whole oats for the best texture!
Sally! These were hands down the best cookies I’ve ever made!
I made mine a little smaller (just 1 1/2 tbsp) and cooked them for 13 min. Delicious!
My husband and I can polish off baked good quickly, so I rolled the batter into balls and froze them so we could bake them in the time of need.
I did use quick oats, but next time I’ll use the oats you recommend.
I found that the peanut butter taste was subtle, so I’m going to use Kraft peanut butter next time to see if there’s a difference in flavour.
Again, thank you for sharing this recipe!
You are welcome, Nadia! I always have my freezer stocked with frozen cookie dough balls too – fresh baked cookie emergencies happen all the time 😉
OMG!! This is my third time making these in three weeks… I may or may not have a Big Fat Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookie problem- haha! These are my all time FAVORITE cookie now. Thank you so much for this amazing recipe, Sally!
Haha – I’m glad you like them that much!!
These were great! I did have to chill the dough for almost 4 hours to prevent them from getting too flat
Oh my gosh this cookie is fantastic and out of this world soft and chewy…..I wanted a cookie to make for my colleagues at work and I decided upon this type. I tweaked the recipe a little:
I only had 3/4 cup of flour so I used the other 3/4 cup with whole wheat flour the difference you could not notice or taste it, the amount of rolled oats absorbed the difference. I also used 180 g of butter and 50 g of margarine and it worked out well, the cookies did not crumble it held the shape from the scoop. I used the amount of peanut butter required but I had cashew butter sitting in the fridge lonely so i used about 1/3 cup to the batter. This enhanced the peanut butter flavor and gave a smooth nut taste….lovely.
My daughter was very picky at first about the peanut butter in the cookie but became a lover of these cookies giving high praise for a delicious tasting cookie.
Sally thanks again for a wonderful tried and tested recipe because of your attempts you have saved me from ruining many baking attempts….and have boosted my baking confidence….eternally grateful.
Leisel
These are the best chocolate chip cookies I have ever made. I’ve been looking for this recipe forever!
Hi Sally! I was wondering if I could make this recipe without the oats? I am not a huge fan of them. If I leave the outs out will it significantly change the result/ruin the cookie?
Hi Ashlee! They’re one of the main ingredients so instead, I recommend my big bakery style peanut butter cookies. You can use all chocolate chips as the add-in.
Hey Sally have you ever tried making this recipe with Oil or Melted Butter? If so how did it work out?
I recommend sticking to softened butter. Liquid fat will yield very flat cookies!
you just forgot to add old fashioned oatmeal on the direction. I was looking for it
Hi JM! Oats are listed under the vanilla extract and added in step 3.
I made these, and they are delicious! Once they cool, they are even more tasty than when warm from the oven. Thanks for a great recipe!
I made these cookies yesterday evening and they are quite tasty. Yesterday I ate one and my husband had three. He’s a huge peanut butter and chocolate fan. I love the added texture of the oats. I’m sure I’ll be making these again. Thanks so much for the recipe.
You are welcome, Carla! I’m glad you both enjoyed them!
KEEPER! These were perfect the first time – SO very scrumptious with that big, fat chunky mound of cookie goodness texture! Sadly, I overcooked the first batch but discovered they are just as good well-done as rare, or medium! Side note: my heart sank, after having just put the dough in for chilling, when I read in the tips section not to use natural peanut butter. oh no! I had just used the Kirkland (Costco) brand organic all-natural pb. Thankfully, the texture was still picture perfect. (Though I have run into this problem of a too-crumbly cookie before, using organic pb – not sure why. It may have been with vegan, or paleo recipes). P.S. I added some additional kosher salt for that sweet n salty. Thank you so much for this winner! Allison
I’m thrilled you enjoyed these so much!! Usually natural peanut butter has too much oil in it so I’m glad the Kirkland one worked here!