These white chocolate macadamia nut cookies are soft-baked style with extra chewy centers. Melted butter maintains a delicious buttery flavor while an extra egg yolk adds chewiness. They’re absolutely PACKED with white chocolate and salted macadamia nuts.
Everything Old is New Again!
My website’s archives are filled with over 1,000 recipes. Some of my earlier recipes are total hidden gems, but there are others that I’ve felt needed some work. I’ve been working behind the scenes updating older recipes as I find necessary. Most notable updates: peanut butter cupcakes, monkey bread, and yellow cupcakes.
Today’s white chocolate macadamia nut cookies are part of this project. I craved a thicker cookie with softer, chewier centers and a distinct buttery flavor. There wasn’t much in this recipe that really needed to change, so I just made a couple minor tweaks.
They’re now perfect.
Video Tutorial
These are the BEST White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies
And here’s why:
- Major chunks—lots of nuts and white chocolate
- Classic comforting flavors
- Extra buttery
- Soft-baked style
- Chewy centers
- Slightly crisp edges
- Easy to freeze
Re-Testing This Recipe
This recipe is a cross between my coconut macadamia nut cookies and my chewy chocolate chip cookies. Like the original recipe first published in 2012, I use melted butter instead of softened butter. I love using melted butter in cookies because it produces an extra buttery flavor as well as a chewier texture. However, it’s not as simple as swapping melted butter for softened butter. (Of course it’s not. It’s BAKING! So particular!)
You see, melted butter—a liquid—creates spread. If there isn’t enough flour to absorb the added liquid, the cookies will spread all over the baking sheet. On the other hand, if there’s excess flour, the cookies will taste dry. Finding the balance between too wet and too dry is a total roll of the dice! Speaking of dry ingredients, I add 1 teaspoon of cornstarch here. This ingredient adds a little extra softness. I don’t add cornstarch when making the coconut macadamia nut cookies because the coconut acts as a really soft dry ingredient, so cornstarch just isn’t necessary there.
The original recipe also used an extra egg yolk. I love this addition! See my chewy chocolate chip cookies if you’re curious about it. Basically, an extra egg yolk = extra richness and extra chew. Both good things.
Two final changes: I add a little more baking soda for additional volume because the original cookies typically over-spread. I also switch the amounts of sugar. Here we use an equal amount of granulated sugar and brown sugar. In addition to sweetening, brown sugar creates a soft and more flavorful cookie and granulated sugar creates spread. Balancing them helps produce a chewy, yet crispy edge cookie.
Best Macadamia Nuts to Use
I LOVE using salted dry-roasted macadamia nuts in white chocolate macadamia nut cookies. The roasted salty flavor pairs beautifully with the extra sweet white chocolate morsels—you won’t regret it!
3 Cookie Tips to Improve Your Next Batch
- Spoon & Level the Flour: The amount of flour makes or breaks a cookie recipe—literally. Spoon and level that flour or, better yet, weigh your flour.
- Chill the Cookie Dough: Chilling the cookie dough, especially since we’re using melted butter, is an imperative step in this recipe. The colder the dough, the less the cookies will over-spread into greasy puddles. You’ll have thicker, sturdier, and more solid cookies.
- Bake 1 Batch at a Time: You get the best possible results when the oven only concentrates on 1 batch at a time. If you need to bake more than one batch at a time, rotate the baking sheets from the top rack to bottom rack a couple times through the baking process to encourage even browning. And turn the sheets around as well. Ovens have hot spots!
Super-Chunk White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies
- Prep Time: 2 hours, 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 12 minutes
- Total Time: 2 hours, 30 minutes
- Yield: 30 cookies
- Category: Cookies
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
These white chocolate macadamia nut cookies are soft-baked style with extra chewy centers. They’re absolutely PACKED with white chocolate morsels and salted macadamia nuts. Chilling the cookie dough is imperative, so set aside at least 2 hours.
Ingredients
- 2 cups + 2 Tablespoons (265g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon cornstarch
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup (12 Tbsp; 170g) unsalted butter, melted + slightly cooled
- 3/4 cup (150g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 3/4 cup (150g) granulated sugar
- 1 large egg + 1 egg yolk, at room temperature
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1 heaping cup (210g) white chocolate chips*
- 1 cup (120g) roughly chopped macadamia nuts*
Instructions
- Whisk the flour, cornstarch, baking soda, and salt together in a large bowl. Set aside.
- Whisk the melted butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar, egg, egg yolk, and vanilla extract together until combined. Pour into dry ingredients and mix everything together with a rubber spatula until completely combined. Fold in the white chocolate chips and macadamia nuts. (You can use a mixer for this step if needed.)
- Cover and chill the dough in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours and up to 4 days. If chilling for longer than 2 hours, allow to sit at room temperature for at least 20-30 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.
- Roll cookie dough into balls, about 1-1.5 Tablespoons of dough per cookie (I like to use this medium cookie scoop), and arrange 3 inches apart on the baking sheets. Bake for 12-13 minutes or until lightly browned on the sides. The centers will look soft.
- Remove from the oven and allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
- 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. Read my tips and tricks on how to freeze cookie dough.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Glass Mixing Bowls | Whisk | Rubber Spatula | Baking Sheets | Silicone Baking Mats or Parchment Paper | Medium Cookie Scoop | Cooling Rack
- White Chocolate Chips: I usually use closer to 1 and 1/4 cups white chocolate chips, about 210g. For looks, you can press a few extra chips into the tops of the warm cookies when they come out of the oven.
- Macadamia Nuts: I used salted dry-roasted macadamia nuts. You can use unsalted, raw, and/or whichever macadamia nuts you love most. Salted dry-roasted adds incredible flavor though.
- Be sure to check out my top 5 cookie baking tips AND these are my 10 must-have cookie baking tools.
I’m sorry to bother you again with all these questions. I love making cookies and my biggest pet peeve is for a cookie not turning out right. So my questions are
1. Can the dough be chill longer then 2 hours so like overnight ( but rolling the dough first before chilling)? Would that ruin the dough or it will add more flavour
2. Can I use White chocolate chunks instead of chips? If I’m using chucks, the temperature need to be reduced or can I stay the same?
3. Can dark brown sugar be used or it’s better to use light in this case
4. For the butter, is it okay to brown butter it? Or no need?
Hi Marie, happy to help here. 1) You can chill the dough for at least 2 hours or up to 4 days, so overnight will be just fine. The dough is quite sticky, which is why we recommend chilling it before rolling into balls. If chilling for longer than 2 hours, allow to sit at room temperature for at least 20-30 minutes before rolling and baking because the dough will be quite hard. 2) Yes, you can use white chocolate chunks with no other changes. 3) Yes, you can use dark brown sugar if you prefer. 4) Yes, you can certainly feel free to brown the butter if you’d like. Just be sure to account for the lost moisture during the browning process (more on that here). Hope this is helpful, Marie!
Perfect Thankyou for the helpful tip. Now if if I am doing brown butter and you mentioned to count for the lost moisture… so if the receipt says “3/4 cup or 170g of melted butter” and I’m doing brown butter, how much butter should I be using? Still 3/4 cup or now it’s 1 cup (226g)?
I’ve tried this recipe twice already and have had great success, thank you Sally! The one cup of white chocolate chips works great for me, the first batch I went a little more and that was the only bit of criticism I got from my friends. Love all your recipes, the cookie ones have always been a hit whenever I make them!
Made these cookies today 4-29-21. The recipe is too crumbly. Dough would not hold together and I used exactly what the recipe called for. I lost 6 cookies into pieces after I baked them. They do taste good. I do not think it needs the 2 Tablespoons flour to be added. And maybe need to add 2 whole eggs . Have no idea why there is cornstarch in cookie. I looked at other macadamia cookie recipes and they had no cornstarch. I could not spoon out the dough but had to use my hands to press dough into a ball shape.
Hi Marie! Thank you so much for giving these cookies a try. We like to add a little cornstarch to many of our cookie recipes for a little extra softness. How are you measuring your flour? We recommend the spoon and level method to avoid packing the flour in too much in your measuring cups – too much flour = dry cookies.
Just mixed these cookies and they are in fridge cooling 2 hrs. They are very dry and I measured everything exactly. I think it needs another egg. Would it be affected if I added another egg??? I had to use gloved hands to squeeze and mix this dough but still crumbly. Never had a crumbly cookie before?/
Hi Marie, I’m happy to help. The cookie dough could be dry if there too much flour (or another dry ingredient) soaking up all the fat. Make sure that you’re spooning and leveling your flour (or weighing it). If you try these again you can also try reducing the flour by 2 Tablespoons, which will help. Hope this helps for next time!
Hi Sally,
These cookies are amazing! I’ve made almost all or your cookie recipes many times. I come to your site for all things baked (and other recipes too of course). My friends and family think I’m a professional baker lol!
My question is… I have some friends who are gluten intolerant. If I made any of your cookie recipes and subbed “King Arthur, Measure for Measure Flour, Certified Gluten-Free” would I get as good results?
Thanks in advance!
Ray Moore
Hi Ray, thanks for making our site your go-to! We’re thrilled you enjoyed these cookies. We haven’t personally tested them with gluten-free flour, but many readers have reported success using measure for measure gluten-free flours in many of our recipes. If you give it a try, we’d love to know how it turns out for you!
Hi,
I would like to sub out the white sugar for coconut palm sugar, which already has a caramel’y flavor. Will this negatively alter anything? I’m diabetic and just don’t like things too sweet.
Hi sally, I baked these cookies and followed the recipe to the t, however my cookies turned out to be more of a ball—did not spread like a normal cookie and I found that it Alittle dry.. even when I was mixing the dry into the wet, the dough became very dry and the nuts and chocolate didn’t really combine well together. Taste wasn’t bad but it very cake like and dry. Why do you think that happened ? Was it because my egg was cold or too much flour ?
Hi Hira, it sounds like there may have been too much flour in your dough. Did you spoon and level to measure? We also share some tips and tricks for if your cookies aren’t spreading in this blog post about how to improve your next batch of cookies. Hope this is helpful!
I made them this past weekend and they came out really good! My BF was craving these cookies and decided on this recipe. He liked them a lot! Thank you
Is it possible to double the size the amount of dough to make larger cookies, and still have them come out ok?
Hi Jo, You can make larger cookies if you wish. The bake time will be a few minutes longer depending on how large you scoop them – keep your eye on them as they bake and enjoy!
I want to make this for my husband’s birthday 🙂 Would it be possible to bake this as a cookie cake? Would I have to bake it longer/at a higher temperature for it to be a cookie cake? Thank you!
Hi Helen, You can follow the same baking directions as our Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake. Enjoy!
I’m sorry if this was asked before what nut will be the best sub for macadamia please? Thank you.
Hi Nanah, You can either simply leave them out or substitute them for the same amount of your favorite type (chopped walnuts, pecans, etc.)
These are the best, particularly if you let them cold cook for 24-36 hours (fancy way of saying refridgerate the dough) as the gluten and proteins begin to caramalise and using milky bar chocolate gives them a unique taste. Fantastic
These cookies are delicious! Definitely a favourite in our household. We freeze the extra dough into mini logs that we can pull out and bake whenever we feel like a snack. SO good!!
These are amazing! I made them for the first time a couple of days ago and my husband’s response was that they’re perfect – just the right balance of chewy and crispy. These will definitely be in my cookie baking rotation.
Fabulous cookies … turned out fantastic despite my reading comprehension issues. I read over must refridgerate and directly baked after mixing up. Fortunately, no problems just moist, delicous cookies. Did make two alterations: Didn’t have all purpose flour so I subbed high gluten flour. (Could that be the reason they worked?) Also, increased vanilla by teaspoon. Thanks for the great recipe … these were a hit!
Absolutely love this recipe! Just wanted to ask if I was to half the ingredients to get 15 cookies, would the outcome still be as delicious?
Hi Namera! You can certainly try it. We would maybe use 1 egg yolk as the egg but we’re unsure of the exact results. You could also make a full batch and freeze half to bake later (see recipe notes for freezing instructions). Enjoy!
These are delicious. I used walnuts instead of macadamia nuts, because that is what we had. Also, instead of an egg I used a “flax egg” (1 tablespoon of ground flaxseed mixed with 3 tablespoons of warm water) and for the yolk I used a different version of a “flax egg” (2 teaspoons of ground flaxseed with 2 tablespoons of warm water). I added 1/4 teaspoon of baking powder to it. I let the mix sit for at least five minutes before mixing into the batter. These turned out fabulous, so soft and absolutely yummy!
Great recipe- very easy to make and the cookies came out amazing- soft and chewy!
Tasted okay, I make cookies all the time so I know I didn’t mess it up. But they were super dry, and after three hours in the fridge they were rock hard and took nearly three hours for the dough to soften. Tried a second recipe from preppy kitchen, soooo much better.
I made these for my family and they LOVE them. Perfect recipe! Thanks for sharing it!
I made them twice. LOVE them. Shared them with the neighbors and they loved them too. I’m going to try the Black and Whites next. You really know how to tweak recipes to make great cookies!
Trying my hand at baking cookies! Came across your recipe and these cookies turned out absolutely delicious! Shipping four to my son who is away at college and said he could almost taste how good they are from the pictures I sent him! Thank you so much for sharing this recipe!
I made a dairy free version tonight and they’re perfect! I just substituted butter for dairy free butter and white chocolate chips for dairy free white chocolate chips. I took a picture, but I can’t post it. Trust me when I say they look as good as they taste!
OK…seriously. I’m 64 yrs old and have been baking since my grandma taught me at 10…so 54 yrs…and I’m a really good baker. This is, hands down, the best cookie recipe ever. Perfect texture. Perfect volume. Chilling the dough is crucial. When I mixed the melted butter and all into the dry ingredients I was worried. Just seemed too “greasy” and not floury enough and never thought any cookies worth eating would come of it. Boy was I wrong. Hubby and grandson were obsessed. I normally don’t follow recipes to the letter cuz I have my own tweaks but, this one, I followed to the T. PERFECT!!! Great job, Sally! My Daughter-in-law is allergic to tree nuts so I doubled the recipe and reserved half to bake without the macadamia nuts. She’s going to go ‘nuts free’ for these cookies. By the way, I used Ghirardelli white chips. They really taste good.
Texture is what I’ve never been able to achieve – my cookies always turned out so cakey. NOT THIS TIME! this is crispy on the edges, chewy soft in the middle! It Mine also had that nice crackly texture too. I omitted the nuts and added 1.5 tablespoon matcha powder for a green tea white chocolate version. Thank you!
These are my new favorite cookies!! Everything was perfect – well, waiting for the dough in the fridge wasn’t the best, but it was worth it. They are so delicious.
Absolutely perfect! Followed the recipe exactly as noted and it turned out perfect – wouldn’t change a thing!! Thanks for sharing all your tips and tricks 🙂
Awesome!!! Simply awesome!!
Phew, these are fantastic! The dough was kinda crumby at first and I was a little worried, but the dough came together great and they turned out soooo good! Thanks for another great recipe, Sally
My sister and I made these cookies today. They were so good! They weren’t too sweet. The just had the right amount of sweetness in it. Our family loved them! Thanks for the recipe!
Hi, I only have salted butter, how much salt should i omit?
I’ve made these several times and they are the best cookies- my family loves them. Just wondering though, if I can make them with salted butter?
Hi Mary Ellen! You can use salted butter instead, reduce the salt in the dough to 1/4 tsp. You can read more about using salted butter in baking here.