Nancy Silverton’s Peanut Butter Cookies Recipe
Description
Nancy Silverton's popular Peanut Butter Cookies from her book, The Cookie That Changed My Life.
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Ingredients
Toasted Peanuts
- 3 cups (375g) raw skin-on Spanish peanuts
- 3 tablespoons grapeseed or vegetable oil*
- 1½ tablespoons Diamond Crystal kosher salt*
Dough
- 2 extra-large eggs
- 2 tablespoons pure vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
- 1 cup (125g) unbleached all-purpose flour
- 1 cup (120g) sorghum flour
- 12 tablespoons (170g) cold unsalted butter, cubed
- 1 cup (250g) creamy peanut butter
- ¾ cup + 2½ tablespoons (180g) granulated sugar
- ½ cup + 2 teaspoons (110g) packed dark brown sugar
- 1½ teaspoons (9g) baking soda
- 1 teaspoon Diamond Crystal kosher salt*
- ½ teaspoon (3g) baking powder
To finish
- ½ cup (100g) granulated sugar
- 1 cup (250g) creamy peanut butter
- 2 tablespoons flaky sea salt
Instructions
Toasted Peanuts
- To toast peanuts, heat oven to 350ºF with rack set in middle position.
- One a large rimmed baking sheet, toss peanuts with oil and salt to coat. Arrange in an even layer and toast until dark mahogany in color, 18–20 minutes, shaking pan occasionally and rotating pan front to back halfway through toasting time.
- Remove sheet from oven and set aside to cool nuts to room temperature. (If they’re on the verge of overtoasting, transfer nuts to a plate so they don't continue to toast on hot pan.) Turn off oven.
Dough
- In a small bowl, whisk together eggs and vanilla. In a medium bowl, whisk together all-purpose flour and sorghum flour.
- Add butter to a stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment; beat on medium speed until butter is softened but still cold, 3–4 minutes, scraping down and bottom of bowl as needed.
- Add peanut butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar; beat on medium until mixture is light and fluffy, 3–4 minutes, scraping down sides and bottom of bowl as needed.
- Add baking soda, salt and baking powder; beat on medium for about 15 seconds to incorporate. Stop mixer and scrape down bowl and paddle. With mixer on medium, gradually add egg/vanilla mixture, mixing until egg is completely incorporated. Scrape down bowl.
- Add flour mixture and mix on low for about 30 seconds until combined. Using a spatula. Give dough one more mix, ensuring no dry ingredients are at bottom of bowl.
- Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until dough is firm, at least 30 minutes.
- Heat oven to 375ºF with racks set in upper-middle and lower-middle positions. Line two half sheet pans with parchment paper.
To Finish
- Add granulated sugar to a small bowl. Remove dough from refrigerator. Remove and reserve plastic wrap.
- Scoop dough into 1½ tablespoons (21 gram) portions; roll each into a ball. Coat balls in sugar then arrange 12 dough balls 1½ inches apart on prepared baking sheets. Cover and chill remaining dough.
- Press thumb in center of each dough ball and turn thumb to expand and round out divot. Spoon 1 teaspoon of peanut butter into each divot then sprinkle a generous pinch of flaky sea salt over top.
- Bake cookies, two sheets at a time, for 4 minutes. Remove baking sheets from oven and pile a mound of peanuts (about 20) in center of each cookie. Return baking sheets to oven, rotating pan top to bottom and front to back. Bake cookies until golden brown, puffed up and are just beginning to collapse, 4–5 minutes. (You want the cookies to be slightly underdone, so they will feel soft to the touch. They will firm up when they cool.) Remove cookies from oven.
- Allow cookies to cool completely before removing from baking sheet. Repeat scooping, shaping and baking process with remaining dough.
Notes
I took the liberty to condense the instructions to make them a bit shorter and to write them in Zestful Kitchen’s style. The ingredient list and method remain true to Nancy’s original recipe. A few of my notes from making the recipe are in the following notes.
If you would like to read the recipe in its original form, you can buy the book here or read the recipe on Saveur.
Peanut butter: Nancy recommends supermarket peanut butter such as Jiff or Skippy.
Sorghum flour: Nancy adds sorghum flour to the dough to add nuttiness and chew (it’s high in protein). If you can’t find it at your local grocery store or health food store, you can order it online.
Peanuts: Nancy uses unsalted raw skin-on Spanish peanuts, but if all you can find is roasted, salted Spanish peanuts, skip steps 1 and 2. I find 3 tablespoons of oil to be far too much for tossing with the peanuts. I use 1 tablespoon olive oil.
Chilling the dough: It’s key to allow the dough to chill until firm. In the recipe, Nancy recommends chilling for at least 30 minutes. I recommend chilling the dough for at least 1 hour. It’s a lot of dough and needs more than 30 minutes to chill through.
Toasting the nuts: Nancy recommends toasting the nuts for 18–20 minutes until the peanuts are a deep mahogany color. It took my nuts at least 30 minutes if not 40.
Kosher salt: For the dough, if you only have Morton kosher salt, use ¾ teaspoon. For the peanuts, use 2 teaspoons
Nutrition
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