Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

Rich and fudgy chocolate crinkle cookies are perfect for the holidays! They taste like soft brownies and are oh so pretty with their powdered sugar coating. Recipe includes a how-to video!

Chocolate Snowcap Cookies

Chocolate crinkle cookies (also called snowcap cookies) are one of my all-time favorite holiday cookies. My version has a rich, fudgy texture that reminds me of brownies, only softer and slightly less dense. And covered in powdered sugar, of course!

These cookies aren’t difficult to make, but they do take some patience. The dough needs to chill for several hours before it can be baked (sorry, I know!). This is crucial for the proper spread and makes the dough easier to roll, too!

Why You’ll Love This Recipe

• Amazingly fudgy texture, thanks to a few key ingredients and slightly underbaking the cookies in the oven (don’t worry, they will finish baking outside the oven on their baking sheets!).
• Dough can be made ahead of time, which is one of my favorite things to do during the busy holiday baking season. I provide instructions for this below!
• Perfect for Christmas, but seasonally appropriate all winter long! With their cozy, snow-capped look. My blizzard cookies and chocolate chip snowball cookies are also fantastic winter cookies!
• Easy and straightforward to make; we’ll make the dough, chill it, roll it, and bake it. This is a fun one to make with kids!

Ingredients

Before we get started, I’ll highlight a few of the key ingredients we’ll be using today. Feel free to keep scrolling if you’re eager to get to the recipe!

• Cocoa powder. I stick with natural cocoa for these crinkle cookies. Note that this is not the same thing as Dutch process cocoa (save that one for making chocolate sugar cookies or chocolate shortbread)!
• Eggs. You will need four large eggs for this recipe. This is a lot for cookie dough, but this isn’t a classic dough (it won’t feel like a classic chocolate chip cookie dough, for example). The eggs give the cookies their perfect, fudgy texture.
• Sugar. To make these crinkle cookies as chewy, fudgy, and richly flavored as possible, I substitute some of the white sugar for brown sugar. Either light or dark brown will work, though dark brown sugar tends to be sweeter. And don’t forget the powdered sugar for that snow-like coating!
• Baking powder. Yes, we are using a full tablespoon. That’s not a typo! 😉 The baking powder gives the cookies a nice little lift and helps with those pretty crinkles on top.
• Mini chocolate chips. These are optional but highly recommended. I love the little pop of flavor they add to the cookies!

SAM’S TIP: While natural cocoa is my preference and what I recommend, technically Dutch process cocoa will work in this recipe. The end result will just be different since it has a richer flavor and a darker color.

This is just an overview of the ingredients I used and why. For the full recipe please scroll down to the bottom of the post!

How to Make Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

Make the dough

Cream the butter and sugars until light and fluffy, then add the eggs one at a time. This recipe uses quite a few eggs (4!) so you don’t want to add them all at once or you could end up overwhelming the batter, causing it to curdle and making it difficult for everything to evenly incorporate.

When adding the dry ingredients to the wet, do this gradually, again to avoid overwhelming the dough and to make sure everything incorporates nicely. I usually do this in 3 or 4 parts with my mixer on low speed.

The dough will need to chill, as it’s thin and sticky once it’s first all mixed together. I’ll be honest, I’m not the most patient person and I’ve tried scooping and rolling the dough early on many occasions with mixed results. Sometimes the dough is rollable and bakes nicely after 2 hours, but to be safe I recommend at least a 4 hour chill (or better yet, make the day one day and chill it overnight or longer — it’ll keep in the fridge for up to 4 days).

Roll the dough

Scoop and roll 1 ½ tablespoon balls between your palms before rolling in powdered sugar.

Note: don’t be shy with the powdered sugar! Just like when making gooey butter cookies or snowball cookies, we’ll use as much as needed to evenly coat the cookies. I actually like to roll them in sugar, then wash and dry my hands (to get rid of all of the chocolate from the dough!) and then roll the sugared dough in my hands, pressing it into the dough and then re-rolling in sugar if needed. This helps my crinkle cookies stay well-coated in sugar after baking.

Bake and cool

Bake for 10 minutes or until the edges look set and the crackles don’t appear wet, but the centers might still be a bit underdone. It is critically important to not over-bake these cookies so they stay soft and fudgy. If your cookie seems dry the next day, they were baked too long in your oven. And, since all ovens run a bit differently and some hotter than others, your cookies may take slightly more or less time than the 10 minutes indicated.

SAM’S TIP: These cookies will be very fragile when warm, so make sure to let them stay on the baking sheet to cool completely before moving. If you try to move them to a cooling rack they may break.

Frequently Asked Questions

These are always one of the first cookies to disappear on my Christmas cookie trays. If you’re looking for some good accompanying cookie options, check out my sugar cookies, Italian cookies, Russian tea cakes, and oatmeal cookies, too!

Enjoy!

Let’s bake together! Subscribe to my newsletter to be notified of all the newest recipes, and find my free recipe tutorials on YouTube 💜

I originally shared these chocolate crinkle cookies over on my friend Holly’s website, Spend with Pennies, back in 2017. It’s stood the test of time and remains one of my favorites!

More Chocolatey Cookies to Try: