Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

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This week is the one year anniversary of the discovery of aquafaba, the simple little bean brine that revolutionized the world of egg-free cooking.

To celebrate, I’m sharing my recipe for perfect chewy chocolate chip cookies. I used to make these with flax seeds as the egg replacer and they were great, everyone loved them. Then, on a whim, I used some chickpea aquafaba because I’ve just been using it for everything to see what happens and I am so glad I did!

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The recipe wasn’t perfect that first time but after a few more, very determined test batches (and after I ate waaay too many cookies and cookie dough, because hey, no worries about getting sick from raw eggs!) they came together in the most wonderful way: moist, chewy, and loaded with chocolate chips.  It is really quite remarkable, the difference between the flax seed egg replacer and the aquafaba. The aquafaba makes them thinner and chewier and very much like the store bought cookies I remember buying in my pre-vegan days.

I missed those cookies a lot but got used to the thick, dense, doughy cookies that seemed to be the vegan way. But no longer, that’s for sure. You know that brand of cookies that comes in a white box with a see-through top, those cookies that are the perfect chewy density and taste so good because they are chock full of preservatives to keep them that way? These are reminiscent of those. Except no gross preservatives. And no gross animal by-products. Just perfect chocolate chip cookie-ness.

dough 2

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There are a couple of tricks to making the perfect cookies, but the number one thing to know is don’t bake them too long. Take them out before they look done as they will continue to cook while on the baking sheet. Second, let them cool about 5 minutes on the baking sheet before moving them to a wire cooling rack to cool completely. Transferring them sooner will cause the cookies fall apart.

 

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Come celebrate the amazing discovery of aquafaba over at Vegan Meringue Hits and Misses, the Facebook group that started it all and with 40,000 members is so full of inspiration, ideas and encouragement, you will find you have no more use for eggs anymore :-).

Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
 
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Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies (makes approx. 36 cookies)
Jenny Dunklee | The Lazy Vegan Baker:
Recipe type: Cookies
Serves: 36
Ingredients
  • 1 cup vegan butter or margarine
  • ¾ cup cane sugar
  • ¾ cup light brown sugar
  • ⅓ cup aquafaba
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 2 teaspoons molasses
  • 2¼ cup all purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon salt (omit if aquafaba is salted)
  • 1½ cup vegan chocolate chips
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 375F. Line baking trays with parchment paper or spray lightly with oil.
  2. In a large bowl, beat the butter and both sugars until fluffy, about 1 minute.
  3. Add the aquafaba, vanilla and molasses and beat until well combined. Scrape down sides as needed. It will look a bit curdled but that's ok. Beat it on high until it comes together.
  4. Add the flour, baking soda and baking powder and mix until completely combined.
  5. Stir in the chocolate chips.
  6. Scoop dough onto cookie sheet. I used a 2 tablespoon cookie scoop for medium size cookies. You can make them smaller or larger if you wish, just be sure to adjust the baking time.
  7. Bake for 9 minutes. They will be very lightly browned and still puffy when you take them out (see pictures below). If you like a darker, crunchier cookie, bake them 1-2 minutes longer. If you are baking two sheets of cookies at a time, rotate the trays ½ way through.
  8. Let cool on cookie sheet for 5 minutes, then with a spatula gently move them to a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
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dough 3

scooped

 

out of oven
9 minutes in the oven, puffy and lightly browned. The will de-poof and become super chewy as they cool.
out of oven 2
Still cooling.

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Chocolate Chip Cookies pin

 

 

 

29 thoughts on “Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies”

  4. I’ve been beating my aqua faba mixture forever and it still looks wonky. I’m scared. I think I might start over with the flax version because I know those work and they rock. I don’t know what I did wrong. Is it possible that my cheap little hand mixer is not up to the task? Or do I need to use a specific brand of chick peas for the aqua faba?

    1. Oh no! Do you mean after you’ve creamed the butter and sugar, then added the aquafaba? Hmm, there’s no need for a specific brand of beans. Did you beat it on high for several minutes? It should come together. I used a kitchenaid mixer but I think your regular beaters should be ok – maybe it would just take a bit longer. I’m so bummed :-(. I’m not sure what the issue could be. I’ve made them a bunch of times w/o issue. I’d love to hear if you ended up starting over or continued even though it wasn’t going right. I wonder if they would still be ok even if the mixture is wonky when the flour is added.

  5. Yeah, I creamed the butter and sugar, then added the aquafaba. I must have beat it for at least ten minutes, hoping it would come together, but no such luck. I’m sure your recipe is fantastic (every other recipe of yours I’ve ever used has been to-die-for), so it must have been something I did. Here are some things I’m wondering about:
    *I doubled the recipe. Could it have been too much at once?
    *I used cheap vegan margarine. It was the Blue Bonnet Light. Maybe it didn’t have enough substance or fats or something to create a proper emulsion. I usually use a different kind, but they were out of it at the store.
    *High altitude? We’re over 6000 feet, so sometimes things get weird.
    I’m guessing it was the margarine. Anyway, I did end up tossing it and starting over. Normally I would have pushed through, but it was getting late and we needed to know there would be cookies for my daughter’s bake sale the next day. I wanted a sure bet.
    So we made the flax recipe from your cookbook and they came out fantastic. I did notice that the ‘butter’ mixture looked a bit watery on this batch, too. So I’m guessing the aquafaba ones would have come out fine even though my mixture didn’t look like yours. I’m going to have to try it again. I’m totally curious now!

    1. I love your detailed notes!! I think you may be right about the margarine. I use Earth Balance or the vegan Smart Balance. I didn’t even know Blue Bonnet made a vegan marg – will need to go investigate that. But it probably was because it was Light and the fat from the regular one is needed to emulsify correctly.

      I’ve actually never doubled the recipe before since it makes a boatload of cookies and then I’m just one person with no cookie self-control eating them all! If I get a chance in the next couple weeks, I’ll give it a go though and see because I am curious now too if that played any part in the problem.

      So glad to hear the flax recipe worked though :-D. I was playing around awhile ago and actually subbed out the flax egg in that recipe with aquafaba, just took it right out and used 3 tbl af in it’s place, and it worked pretty well. In case you feel like some more experimenting lol.

      I hope the bake sale was a hit! And so glad cookies happened, even if it wasn’t quite how you’d hoped. It makes me so happy to hear feedback, even when things aren’t going 100% correct. Baking can be a bit particular at times and I want everyone to be eating & enjoying cookies :-D.

  6. I have been searching for the perfect vegan chocolate chip cookie and have finally found it. I made these last night for my family and they were an instant hit. I’ll admit I was nervous about baking with aquafaba for the first time, but these cookies were so chewy and soft with a perfect amount of lift. I used a slightly larger cookie scoop and they still turned out amazing.This will be my ultimate go to chocolate chip cookie recipe! Thank you!

  8. I just made these tonight & they are delicious!!! I didn’t have molasses, so I substituted with date syrup & it worked just great.

    1. Oh what a cool idea, using date syrup – I never would have thought of that, but it’s pretty close I think. I’m so glad you liked them :-D!

  10. These were the best chocolate chip cookies I’ve ever had. I had to make some substitutions; used 1/2c earth balance and 1/2c coconut oil, instead of the 2 sugars I only had raw turbinado sugar. They still came out incredible!

    1. Woohoo!! That’s awesome they worked with the subs too — :-)…happy cookie dance…:-)

  12. This is THE best vegan chocolate chip cookies recipe I have ever made. THANK YOU! perfectly chewy and crunchy just divine.

    1. Hmm. So, if the recipe was followed exactly the only reason I can think for this is that the dough got too warm before baking. I suggest putting the cookie dough in the fridge for 30-40 minutes to chill before baking.

      1. I did put the dough in the fridge before I continued baking and they did spread a little less, but still more than normal. I just realized I used regular butter – would that do it? Maybe I need to use a bit less? I’m not an experimental baker, so not sure how I would tweak that…the other thing is I’m not confident about the aquafaba. I make my own hummus, so I want to find uses for the leftover liquid. I simmered and reduced it, then whisked it up until the top was all frothy. Is that right? Then I used it in this recipe. I chilled it a bit before adding it, but maybe I should have left it even longer?
        Sorry for all the questions – I’m clueless I’m this area! My son is allergic to eggs and sensitive to lots of dairy, so I wanted to make a delicious cookie he could have!

        1. I love all the questions! I want to figure this out too so you can have awesome cookies :-D.

          So, regular butter, as in dairy butter, is different from vegan butter although I’m pretty sure that’s not the issue. Vegan butter is like margarine, which usually means it has a higher water content than dairy butter. If anything, using dairy butter would have the opposite effect as what you’re experiencing.

          It sounds like the aquafaba is the issue. It should be the liquid straight, as is, without whipping. Using your own, you’re doing it right as far as simmering to reduce/concentrate it. However, whipping it introduces a lot more air and makes the protein less binding, which would for sure make your cookies spread more. For this recipe, and all my recipes and other recipes I’ve seen using aquafaba, you use the chilled liquid just as it is unless it specifically says to whip or froth it.

          Let me know how it goes! Cookies are a very important part to life! Especially for your kiddo :-D.

  16. I’ve just made these and they are amazing! I had to eat one while it was still cooling. Once cool, they’re soft, chewy and delicious, though maybe a little on the sweet side for me.

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