Peanut Butter Cookies (Reduced Sugar)
By America's Test KitchenPublished on April 16, 2020
Time
40 minutes, plus 30 minutes resting and 20 minutes cooling
Yield
Makes 24 cookies
Sugar
8 grams (down from 12)
Ingredients
Before You Begin
You can learn more about Sucanat in this article. The type of peanut butter you use here makes a difference; our recommended brand of crunchy peanut butter is Jif Natural Crunchy Peanut Butter Spread. Other brands may contain different amounts of sugar. You can skip grinding the Sucanat in step 1; however, the cookies will have a speckled appearance. Do not shortchange the dough's 30-minute resting time in step 3 or the cookies will taste slightly bland.
Instructions
- Pulse peanuts in food processor until finely ground, about 14 pulses; measure out and reserve 2 tablespoons ground peanuts for topping. Working in 4 batches, grind Sucanat in spice grinder until fine and powdery, about 1 minute.
- Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in bowl. In large bowl, whisk ground Sucanat, peanut butter, milk, egg and yolk, melted butter, and vanilla together until combined. Using rubber spatula, stir in flour mixture until combined. Fold in ground peanuts.
- Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let rest at room temperature for 30 minutes. Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Working with heaping tablespoon dough at a time, use your wet hands to roll into balls and space 2 inches apart on prepared sheets (dough will be sticky). Sprinkle reserved ground peanuts over tops of cookies. Press dough to ½-inch thickness using bottom of greased drinking glass.
- Bake cookies until just beginning to brown and firm, about 12 minutes, switching and rotating sheets halfway through baking. Let cookies cool completely on sheets. Serve.
Time
40 minutes, plus 30 minutes resting and 20 minutes coolingYield
Makes 24 cookiesSugar
8 grams (down from 12)Ingredients
Ingredients
Ingredients
Why This Recipe Works
We started by using honey as our sweetener; tasters loved the flavor of honey with the peanut butter, but we found it gave the cookies a tough, cakey texture that we couldn’t overcome. Switching to Sucanat was the best solution: Because a granulated sweetener like Sucanat is more hygroscopic (water-retaining) than honey, it holds in more moisture from the dough throughout baking, resulting in a chewier cookie overall. Additionally, the Sucanat’s deep flavor gave the peanut butter a nice backbone; resting the dough before baking produced the deepest, roundest flavor since the Sucanat had time to dissolve and distribute. But our work was far from done. The traditional creaming method yielded pale, dry cookies; a one-bowl mixing method using melted butter contributed a better density and texture, and cutting down on the amount of butter ensured the cookies weren’t greasy. Further hydrating the dough with an additional ¼ cup of milk encouraged spread. A splash of vanilla rounded out the cookies’ flavor, and a sprinkle of ground peanuts on top added a subtle crunch to our perfect low-sugar peanut butter cookies.
Before You Begin
You can learn more about Sucanat in this article. The type of peanut butter you use here makes a difference; our recommended brand of crunchy peanut butter is Jif Natural Crunchy Peanut Butter Spread. Other brands may contain different amounts of sugar. You can skip grinding the Sucanat in step 1; however, the cookies will have a speckled appearance. Do not shortchange the dough's 30-minute resting time in step 3 or the cookies will taste slightly bland.
Instructions
- Pulse peanuts in food processor until finely ground, about 14 pulses; measure out and reserve 2 tablespoons ground peanuts for topping. Working in 4 batches, grind Sucanat in spice grinder until fine and powdery, about 1 minute.
- Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in bowl. In large bowl, whisk ground Sucanat, peanut butter, milk, egg and yolk, melted butter, and vanilla together until combined. Using rubber spatula, stir in flour mixture until combined. Fold in ground peanuts.
- Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let rest at room temperature for 30 minutes. Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Working with heaping tablespoon dough at a time, use your wet hands to roll into balls and space 2 inches apart on prepared sheets (dough will be sticky). Sprinkle reserved ground peanuts over tops of cookies. Press dough to ½-inch thickness using bottom of greased drinking glass.
- Bake cookies until just beginning to brown and firm, about 12 minutes, switching and rotating sheets halfway through baking. Let cookies cool completely on sheets. Serve.
Gift This Recipe
Enjoyed this dish? Let others know by sharing it as a gift recipe.
Appears In
Key Equipment
Keep Exploring
0 Comments