No Chill Salted Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies (Bakery Style, No Mixer!)

These salted browned butter chocolate chip cookies are by far my most-made (and most-requested) cookie recipe. If you love bakery-style cookies, but don’t own a mixer and don’t want to wait around chilling the dough, I think these will be a fast favorite! They’re thick, chewy chocolate chip cookies loaded with rich, nutty flavor that only browned butter delivers.

This has been my go-to easy cookie recipe for years, and it’s absolutely the BEST. No mixer, no chill time, no complicated steps. Just delicious results with simple techniques. I’m sharing all my tips so your homemade brown butter chocolate chip cookies turn out perfect every time.

What Makes These Different From Other Brown Butter Cookies?

Many brown butter chocolate chip cookie recipes, and even my original chocolate chip cookies, require chilling the dough overnight. Which is great in most cases but not always practical. I designed this recipe to:

• Bake right away. This browned butter cookie dough goes from mixing bowl to oven in minutes.
• Stay thick without chilling. You still get thick, chewy cookies without waiting hours.
• Deliver that same rich brown butter flavor. Browning butter toasts the milk solids until they become rich and nutty. It’s easy to do, and it makes a big difference in the flavor of chocolate chip cookies! I’ve used this technique in my skillet cookie recipe and bourbon chocolate chip cookies.
• Crunchy sea salt steals the show. Instead of kosher salt, these cookies have little bits of coarse sea salt scattered throughout. You won’t believe how delicious it is with the melty chocolate.

So you get the best of both worlds: Convenience + bakery-style chocolate chip cookies.

NB: This chocolate chip cookie recipe is actually the cover recipe from my book, and one of its most popular recipes. I decided I needed to share it here as well for everyone who doesn’t yet own the Cookies & Cups Cookbook!

Ingredients You’ll Need

This brown butter chocolate chip cookie recipe is all about simple pantry ingredients working together to create magic. Here’s what you’ll need and why, along with possible substitutions. See the recipe card below for the full recipe amounts.

• Salted Butter – I prefer salted butter in most of my baking recipes, and especially this one. The saltiness of the butter combined with coarse sea salt makes these cookies a truly balanced sweet-meets-salty experience.
• Sugar – I use a combination of light brown sugar and granulated sugar in this recipe. Brown sugar adds moisture and a deeper, more caramelized flavor.
• Eggs – Pull the eggs out of the refrigerator before you brown your butter. This gives them time to come up to room temperature. Since the butter will still be a little warm when you add the eggs, it’s best to keep all the ingredients close to the same temperature so they mix evenly.
• Vanilla Extract – Always and forever use pure vanilla extract (or vanilla paste), and not imitation vanilla.
• Baking Soda – Make sure it’s fresh and not expired.
• Coarse Sea Salt – Flaky finishing salt, like Maldon salt, is best. Any coarse sea salt works, though.
• All-purpose Flour – Spoon and level the flour, or measure using a kitchen scale for accuracy. Overmeasuring (usually from scooping directly from the bag) can lead to dry, crumbly cookies.
• Chocolate Chips – I like to use semi-sweet chocolate in my chocolate chip cookies, but milk chocolate, dark chocolate, or a mix will also work. My favorite brand is Callebaut. I order it in bulk on Amazon. I buy the chocolate disks (callets), which are a little flatter than a chip, and they melt like a dream. If I’m out of Callebaut, I’ll use Guittard or Ghirardelli.

Why Salted Butter and Coarse Sea Salt?

Well, they are salted brown butter chocolate chip cookies, after all. I love the contrast of the salted butter and crispy sea salt flakes to the sweetness of the cookies. I’ve been making my chocolate chip cookies this way ever since my mom substituted coarse sea salt for regular salt in a batch of her cookies decades ago. This was way before the flaky-sea-salt-on-everything trend started!

However, if you’d prefer, you can make this cookie recipe with unsalted butter. In this case, I suggest adding the salt yourself, about ½ teaspoon.

How to Brown Butter for Cookies

The beauty of browned butter is that it’s very easy to do, and it gives a little gourmet flair to just about any baked goods, from cookies to rice krispie treats. Before you begin your cookie dough, here’s what you’ll do:

1. Add the butter to a saucepan. Melt it over medium-low heat. I’ve always found it helpful to use an aluminum or light-colored pan so I can see the butter change color as the milk solids separate and brown.
2. Bring the butter to a boil. Swirl the pan continuously (or use a whisk or wooden spoon to stir) until the butter foams up and turns a deep amber color. It will take a few minutes for the butter to begin to brown. But once it starts, it will happen quickly, so don’t leave the stove.
3. Cool. Once the color is deep amber, remove the butter from the heat immediately and allow it to cool for about 20 minutes. You want the browned butter to cool enough that it won’t melt the chocolate chips, but don’t let it cool completely and resolidify, or it will be difficult to mix without a mixer.

If your butter cools too much and firms up, reheat it a little on the stove. Or, if it cools completely, instead of reheating it, you can also make your chocolate chip cookie dough in the mixer using the paddle attachment. There’s a lot of flexibility.

How to Make Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies From Scratch

Gather your ingredients, and it’s time to turn your browned butter into a batch of the best chocolate chip cookies. Here are the steps.

1. Get ready to bake. While your brown butter cools, line your baking sheet and preheat the oven to 350ºF.
2. Mix the cookie dough. Once the butter is cool enough, add the sugars, eggs, vanilla, baking soda, and sea salt. Stir using a rubber spatula or wooden spoon until the ingredients are creamed together and smooth. Next, fold in the flour (don’t overmix!) and finally the chocolate chips.
3. Scoop the dough. Use a large cookie scoop to portion the cookie dough onto the lined baking sheet. Leave about 2 inches in between each cookie.
4. Bake. Bake these brown butter chocolate chip cookies at 350ºF for 10-12 minutes for soft-baked, chewy cookies. When the edges are just set and lightly golden, pull the cookies from the oven. If you want, sprinkle them with a little extra sea salt! Afterward, cool the cookies on the sheet pan for 5 minutes, then transfer them to a wire rack.

The Secret to Perfect Cookie Tops

After using the pan-banging technique in my giant crinkled chocolate chip cookies for years, I recently learned this (much quicker!) trick for crinkly cookie tops. If you’ve ever wondered how bakery cookies get their perfectly ridged, crackly tops, here’s how it’s done:

1. When portioning the cookie dough, scoop the dough, release it from the scoop, and break it in half (as pictured).
2. Then, turn the broken, jagged sides upward before pressing the smooth sides of the dough back together. The dough should still be tall, as it will flatten as it bakes, but it’ll settle into a textured top. It really gives the cookies a bakery-style look!

Expert Tips for Bakery-Style Chocolate Chip Cookies

• Spoon and level the flour. Measuring the ingredients correctly is important, especially in this no-chill chocolate chip cookies recipe. If you aren’t using a kitchen scale, spoon the flour from the bag into your measuring cup. Afterward, level the flour using the back of a knife. Don’t scoop directly from the bag, or you may end up with too much.
• Choose the chocolate you prefer. Milk chocolate is sweeter, while dark chocolate is less sweet. You can always use a combination of chocolate chips or chopped chocolate, as I use for my triple chocolate cookies.
• Use a cookie scoop. This is a super helpful cookie-making tip. Using a cookie scoop ensures that all your cookies are the same size so they bake evenly. Plus, using a cookie scoop is just an easier way to portion out the dough.
• Press chocolate chips into the tops. I do this every time I bake chocolate chip cookies. As soon as they come out of the oven, gently press a few extra chocolate chips into the warm cookies. The chips melt slightly into the tops, giving the cookies a pretty, professional finish.
• Re-shape cookies that spread. Occasionally, cookies can lose their perfectly circular shape while they bake. To easily fix cookies that have spread, right when they come out of the oven, use a spatula to gently reshape the edges back into circles on the hot baking sheet. If you wait too long, the cookies will set, so do this while they are still fresh from the oven.

Storage

• Store airtight. Store these browned butter chocolate chip cookies in an airtight container at room temperature. They’re freshest within 3 days of baking.
• Freeze. You can freeze these cookies in a freezer bag or container for up to 1 month. Thaw them at room temperature.

More Homemade Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipes

• Copycat Crumbl Cookies
• Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Butter Crunch Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Air Fryer Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies