The World’s Best Easy Peanut Butter Cookies are soft and chewy, and made with just 3 ingredients: peanut butter, brown sugar and egg. Devilishly moorish, these truly taste of peanut butter and you may never forgive me for introducing this to you!
3 ingredient desserts are handy emergency recipes, like Chocolate Covered Strawberries and Peanut Butter Chocolate Bars. Everybody loves them and they’re so quick to make!
Peanut Butter Cookies
Having dictated this recipe to 3 people at the dog park in the past week, and having had all 3 approach me afterwards with varying forms of love/hate gestures (“THIS is YOUR FAULT!” one lady wailed, showing me her stomach 😉 ), I decided I had better move this up the posting schedule.
3 ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies are not a new thing, certainly not my invention. I’ve no idea how long they’ve been around for, but what I do know is that every recipe I have seen calls for peanut butter, an egg and WHITE sugar.
It is quite amazing, how much difference it makes just switching white for brown sugar. While I’d never turn down a 3 ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies made with white sugar, they are quite crumbly and crisp. The texture is not really to my taste, and I do feel it’s one of those 3 ingredient recipes where you are compromising on quality quite a bit for the sake of convenience.
But use brown sugar instead… and wow! The difference is astonishing. The cookie is soft and chewy and it has more flavour too, that slight caramel-y flavour that brown sugar has.
Here’s my attempt to capture how chewy and soft these cookies are!
How to make Peanut Butter Cookies
Mix 1 cup peanut butter (the commercial spread stuff, not pure peanut butter), 1 cup brown sugar, 1 egg, flatten 1 tbsp balls on tray, bake 10 minutes at 350F / 180C.
Yes, it’s really that easy!
And here’s a peek into the inside. It’s not dense and gluey which one might expect because they are flourless.
Peanut butter lovers, this recipe is dangerous knowledge to have, especially because it’s so ridiculously simple to remember.
1, 1, 1, 10
1 cup peanut butter.
1 cup brown sugar.
1 egg.
Bake 10 minutes.
It’s stuck in your head now, isn’t it? Go, go! Go make these now! – Nagi x
For the Peanut Butter Obsessed
Peanut Butter Caramel Pie – dangerously easy, outrageously decadent
Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars – just 3 ingredients!
And for Cookie Monsters 🙋🏻♀️
Byron Bay copycat cookies – Choc Chunk, White Choc Macadamia and Chewy Choc Fudge
Watch how to make it
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World’s Best Easy Peanut Butter Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup / 265 g peanut butter , smooth or crunchy – commercial spread, NOT pure peanut butter (I use Bega) (Note 1)
- 200 g/ 1 cup , packed, brown sugar (Note 2)
- 1 egg
Instructions
- Place ingredients in a bowl and mix to combine. It will be soft, too soft for scooping. Refrigerate for 10 minutes.
- Meanwhile, preheat oven to 180C / 350F (standard) or 160C/320F (fan / convection).
- Line 2 trays with parchment paper.
- Place 1 tbsp scoops of the dough onto the trays (I use a cookie scoop) 5cm/2″ apart.
- Dip a large fork in a bowl of hot tap water (stops fork sticking to dough). Press down on the dough, then press 90 degrees the other way (watch video) so the cookie is 1 cm / 2/5″ thick. Re-dip fork in water as required.
- Put both trays in the oven and bake for 10 minutes, swapping the trays halfway through, or until light golden on the surface and golden on the edges. (Or longer if you want crisper cookies)
- Leave to cool on the tray. Store in an airtight container for up to 4 – 5 days.
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
LIFE OF DOZER
He was so focussed on the peanut butter cookie in my hand, he didn’t realise I left the other half on his head when I gave him a pat….. 😂 SO MEAN!!!!
My husband spends every weekend cooking for our Grandchildren, I have given him this recipe and he is going out to make them right now, Thank you so much. Love Dozer’s cute face.
Ohhh I love hearing that Pamela! What a wonderful grandfather! ❤️ Hope everyone loves these! N xx
Hi Nagi,
Is the sodium only coming from the peanut butter and the egg?
Hi Denise! Yes so if you would like to reduce it, you can use salt reduced peanut butter. 🙂 N x
I make my own nut butters so that works out perfectly! Thanks, Nagi ❤️
Absolutely fabulous!!! Made these with crunchy peanut butter and they turned out wonderful!!!
HIGH FIVE!!!! I think you’re the first to report in on these Inara – SO GLAD YOU LOVED THEM!!! N x
Ok I gotta try these. I love peanut butter cookies . Mine has cream cheese so if this one does it I’m making them for everyone. And yes brown sugar makes a huge diffetence. I think I told you my Aunts recipe for scotch bread was white sugar but it was brown. And I have a choclate fudge cookie bar, I ran out of white sugar so I filled the rest with brown. Viola, the crust was better to me. Dozer , I just want to hug him♡♡
Scotch fingers with brown sugar! I never thought of that 🙂 Love the idea of PB cookies made with cream cheese, absolutely FABULOUS! 😂 N x
This looks so amazing!! I’ll have to try them out soon!
Also, Dozer looks adorable and saddened by the cookie on his head. Hopefully he got to snack on it after the photo was taken!
He never realised it was on his head until he moved and it fell off!!! BA HA HA!!!
So, I have been making these for my gluten free pals for a long while now. I have added a couple of things..
1. half white, half brown sugar (organic)
2. vanilla
3. a grind of himalayan salt to the top of the cookies before baking
and when I am in the mood for it, melted chocolate spread on the warm cookie
LOVE your version, I am trying that next time I make these (currently out of PB!) Especially love the half brown half white sugar – great touch! N xx
Sooper dooper! more so with some coarse salt sprinkled over. Salted peanut butter munchies 🙂
YUM! I am totally trying that next time!
Brown sugar, in my opinion, makes everything taste better. These look delicious, quick and easy to make. Can’t wait to try them out!
Dozer looks so intent on having his portion of cookie. Such a cute look on his face!
I think that look on his face is confused – 100% focussed on the cookie in my hand, trying ignore whatever it is that’s on his head…. 😂
I do cooking classes with kids in the neighbourhood and we are so making these next time around. Just as a side note I made your Salted Caramel Tart last weekend for company and it was to die for. One guest who doesn’t even eat dessert had two pieces….rich, delectable and insanely delicious.
I’m so thrilled to hear the salted caramel tart was a hit!!! And I love hearing that you teach neighbourhood kids how to cook – how wonderful! N x
Looks yummy. Can you use whipped peanut butter in same amount?
Hi Lanet! I’m afraid I’m not sure, whipped peanut butter has more oil and other things in it to keep that fluffier texture so I’m not sure what affect that would have on these cookies. I would LOVE to know if you try it though! As a side note, I’d probably add an extra 1/4 cup because it’s lighter so once mixed in, it will probably equal 1 cup of normal PB. 🙂 N xx
Hi Nagi! We love chewy pb cookies! I’ve seen similar recipes, but was a little wary of them, I mean, no flour? Obviously
I was wrong as you’ve proved with these fabulous cookies!
I hear you Dorothy! I was so cynical the first time, but after I went a little mad on my PB stash when they were 50% off (50% off!!!), I decided to give it a go. I didn’t really like the white sugar version that is the one that everyone seems to publish, but when I switched to brown it was amazing! N xx
These are pretty amazing Nagi! No reason not to have a homemade cookie around the house – haha! Have a lovely weekend.
EXACTLY!!! 😂