Go no further! While many have called these the best chocolate chip cookies, I assure you they are actually the worst, and this recipe might actually ruin your life.
Consider yourself warned.
The Best Chocolate Chip Cookies are the Worst
I can only assume that something must have gone horribly wrong to bring you here today.
Amidst a cherry-picked Pinterest Sea of “perfect chocolate chip cookies”, a Google Forest of the “best chocolate chip cookies”, and dog-eared cookbooks of “award winning” and your family favorites, you have somehow found yourself here, face-to-cookie with the actual worst chocolate chip cookie recipe.
Oh, I know what you’re thinking: It’s just a cookie, right?
I mean, sure, they look innocent enough. Golden with melty chocolate chips, crinkled edges and chewy, melt-in-your-mouth interiors… but one bite and you’re positively ruined for life.
These cookies will consume your life, shrink your jeans, and steal your boyfriend (I wouldn’t put it past them, anyway).
They even contain a secret ingredient.
A Secret Ingredient You’ll Wish You Never Discovered
How obnoxiously cliche, and, even more obnoxiously, intriguing.
I won’t drag it out. The secret ingredient is maple syrup. And sure, pure maple syrup (priced per ounce nearly the same as gold) would work just wonderfully here. But, if you have a sticky bottle of Aunt Jemima in your cabinet (as I happened to when I set out on the unholy quest for a secret ingredient for the worst-but-should-be best chocolate chip cookies), that will work just fine, too.
What kind of self-respecting cookie doesn’t demand purity and quality?
Only the worst kind.
Ingredients (& Secret Ingredients)
I credit (or, rather, blame) this “secret ingredient” for being the greatest offender in this positively worst chocolate chip cookie recipe. It gives the cookies a subtle, caramelized flavor as well as long-lasting chewiness and softness (these cookies stay soft for days, and the cornstarch helps with that as well), and the flavor is other-worldly.
And, while anyone who takes a bite will be able to detect the extra richness of flavor, not a single taste-tester was able to identify exactly what the secret ingredient actually is. Just that they were enjoying “really, really good cookies”.
OK, so what’s so bad about really good chocolate chip cookies?
How about the fact that they will consume you as you consume them? I’m not kidding about them wrecking your relationships.
Mom’s favorite chocolate chip cookie? Ditch it. You will snub your nose at every “favorite” cookie (chocolate chip or not) of the past and struggle to hold back scornful laughs at anyone who comments on their own personal best chocolate chip cookies. Nobody likes a cookie snob, and yet here you are.
Here comes that girl again, the one who’s too good for Chips Ahoy.
A Cookie Recipe for Ruining Your Life
Be prepared for weight gain. It creeps up slowly, the cookies gently embracing you at first, then clinging to your thighs, your stomach, tighter and tighter until yoga pants are your only way out of the house. If you’re worried about your significant other noticing, don’t bother. They don’t notice anything anymore, only whether or not there are more chocolate chip cookies readily available for consumption.
Perhaps worst of all is that this recipe can be made so easily. There’s no stand mixer or even an electric hand-held one required. They can be stirred by hand, dirtying only two bowls.
They do need to chill for at least 30 minutes, which would only serve as a deterrent if 25 of those minutes weren’t spent sneaking copious chunks of cookie dough from the refrigerator.
If you’ve made it this far, I fear it may already be too late for you.
It’s too late for me, sadly, and I’ve made these cookies nearly a dozen times in the past two weeks. I’m swapping gym time for cookie time to keep my refrigerator well-stocked with dough, and the photo shoot for this post took three times as long as it should have because I kept eating the subjects.
If you can, stick to the “best” chocolate chip cookies. Stick to Grandma’s chocolate chip cookie recipe and the old family favorites. Those cookies are safe, your friends, made to be consumed by you.
These cookies will consume you, instead.
Good luck out there. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Frequently Asked Questions
Did you run into cookies that spread all over the baking sheet in the oven? Here are your most likely culprits:
The butter was too hot when you added your sugar, causing the sugar to melt and creating a greasy cookie dough that never stood a chance.
You didn’t add enough flour. If the flour was under-measured, your cookies could spread when baking.
Your baking powder/baking soda was bad. These need to be stored properly and often will expire after 6 months, if yours is old, that could be the problem.
The dough didn’t chill long enough. If your dough is still very sticky after 30 minutes, let it chill longer.
You put your cookie dough on a hot cookie sheet. It actually starts to melt before it can even begin baking.
If your cookies are spreading too much, you can try stirring in a bit more flour or just chilling them (covered) for longer.
It could be that your flour was over-measured. Never scoop your flour directly into your measuring cup, it packs the flour into the cup and you end up with way more than the recipe actually calls for. Instead, use a scale (this is the scale that I use) or use a spoon to pour the flour into your measuring cup and then level off the top with a straightedge (like the back of a knife).
Honey or light or dark corn syrup would work instead of the syrup, just note that the flavor will be slightly different.
Easily one of the most-asked questions that I get, I suspect those who ask this question were merely so distracted by the siren call of these cookies that they were unable to read the blog post. Just know that they would be the best chocolate chip cookies… if they didn’t turn you into a cookie obsessed monster at first bite.
If you’re looking for something a little tamer but still delicious, check out my best chocolate chip cookie recipe, instead.
Let’s bake together! Subscribe to my email list to be notified of all my newest recipes and find my video tutorials on YouTube.
The WORST Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 cup (226 g) unsalted butter melted and then cooled until no longer warm to the touch (see note)
- 1 ½ cups (300 g) light brown sugar firmly packed
- ½ cup (100 g) granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs room temperature preferred
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ¼ cup (60 ml) maple syrup²
- 3 ⅓ cups (415 g) all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons cornstarch
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 cups (340 g) chocolate chips I used half regular semisweet chips and half mini semisweet chips
Recommended Equipment
Instructions
- In a large bowl, stir together melted butter and sugars.1 cup (226 g) unsalted butter, 1 ½ cups (300 g) light brown sugar, ½ cup (100 g) granulated sugar
- Add eggs, one at a time, stirring until combined.2 large eggs
- Stir in vanilla extract and maple syrup.1 teaspoon vanilla extract, ¼ cup (60 ml) maple syrup²
- In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.3 ⅓ cups (415 g) all purpose flour, 2 teaspoons cornstarch, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 1 teaspoon baking soda, 1 teaspoon salt
- Gradually add flour mixture to wet ingredients, stirring until completely combined.
- Stir in chocolate chips.2 cups (340 g) chocolate chips
- Cover bowl with clear wrap and allow to chill for at least 30 minutes (chilling!? I told you, this recipe is the worst) and up to 3 days (the cookies look and taste even better after a longer chill. Note the dough will be harder to scoop after a longer chill time, just let it sit at room temperature a bit until it's scoopable)
- While the dough is chilling, preheat oven to 350F (175C) and prepare cookie sheets by lining with parchment paper (if you don’t have parchment paper, you can bake directly on an ungreased cookie sheet).
- Scoop about 2 Tablespoons of cookie dough and roll into balls, making them slightly taller than they are wide. Place them at least 2 inches apart on prepared cookie sheet.
- Bake about 13 minutes (cookies will appear to be a bit underdone, but edges should be just beginning to turn golden brown).
- Allow cookies to cool completely on cookie sheet. If desired, gently press a few chocolate chips on top of the warm cookies.
- Keep unbaked cookie dough in fridge while waiting to put the next batch in the oven, and do not place cookie dough on a hot cookie sheet.
Notes
¹Butter
You do not want your butter to be too hot or it may melt the sugar and you’ll have a very runny dough. Best practice would be to cut the butter into about Tablespoon-sized pieces, microwave in 10-second increments (stirring after each) until it is just completely melted, and then allow it to sit for 5 minutes. If your butter is too hot it could make your cookie dough or resulting cookies greasy.²Maple Syrup
I don’t recommend leaving out the maple syrup, it is critical to the flavor and is what makes these truly the “worst” chocolate chip cookies. In a pinch, honey or even corn syrup or golden syrup will work as a substitute to give you the same texture, but the flavor will not be the same. Pure maple syrup and imitation “pancake syrup” both work just fine here, the former lends itself to slightly flatter cookies and the latter to slightly thicker ones.Storing
Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to a week. Cookie dough may be chilled, scooped, individually wrapped in plastic wrap and then frozen in an airtight container for up to 6 months.Gluten Free
A number of readers have commented that this recipe works well when substituting the flour 1:1 with Cup4Cup Gluten Free Flour, but I have not tested this myself.Nutrition
Nutritional information is based on third-party calculations and should be considered an estimate only. Actual nutritional content will vary based upon brands used, measuring methods, cooking method, portion sizes, and more.
Related Cookie Recipes That are Also Pretty Terrible But Not As Bad:
I originally published my chocolate chip cookie recipe on 3/21/16. I have since updated it to include new photos and a video, but the recipe has remained unchanged.
Megan
I can’t wait to make these! Dumb question but does the recipe call for unsalted butter or just regular butter?
Sam
Unsalted, but if you only have salted butter that’s perfectly fine, just reduce the salt in the recipe to only 1/2 tsp instead of 1 tsp. I hope you love them!
kelly
Hi just wondering if you ever made these with m&m’s?
Sam
I haven’t, but I think an even substitution of m&ms for the chocolate chips would work out perfectly!
Christina Perez
Can you use milk chocolate chips instead of semi sweet chocolate chips?
Sam
Definitely! It’ll make them pretty sweet but it’ll work!
Melly
I am on my second batch in less tHan a week.. the above description is 100% TRUE! These cookies are dangerous! Thanks for sharing Sam!!
Sam
This makes me so happy to hear! So glad that you loved them, Melly!! 🙂
Amy Cook
Fantastic recipe! I’ve been making chocolate chip cookies for decades now and these are some of the best I’ve ever had. Nice job on them and I love the addition of syrup! Even when you know it’s in there, it’s hard to tell, but you know something is a tiny bit different. Loved them. Just loved them. My husband said they were some of the best he’s ever had too. I had to send my kids to bed so they didn’t eat the rest of them! I had zero issues with the recipe and I’ll be making them again. And funny post too by the way.
Sam
Wonderful! I’m so glad that you liked them so much, Amy! They’re definitely a favorite with my family, too. Thank you so much for coming back and commenting, I really appreciate it! 🙂
Paige
So I followed this recipe to a T. I cooked the butter to just over a minute. I set a timer once the butter was out of the microwave. I mixed everything like you said. Chilled the dough. Scooped two tablespoons out for each cookie. And it cooked flat and now is just a big dough blob on my pan! Didn’t rise or anything. I didn’t flatten the cookies or anything. This is the worst recipe I’ve made. I’ve never had a cookie do this. Do you know what might have happened. I just threw the entire batch in the trash!
Sam
Hi Paige,
After a minute of cooking the butter, was it very hot? I know all microwaves are different but if I microwaved butter in my microwave for a full minute it would be extremely hot, and 5 minutes may not be enough to cool it completely, and this may have something to do with your cookies spreading (if it’s too hot when combined with the sugar, the sugar may melt and the cookies will spread).
However, If everything was measured right and the butter was cooled appropriately and no substitutions were made (such as using margarine instead of butter) I suspect this is probably a problem with bad baking powder/baking soda. Your oven may also be cooking at a higher temperature than it is reading. If you look through the comments, someone else had an issue with their cookies spreading and I left a detailed list of things that may have gone wrong. I hope that these tips help! These cookies have been tested many, many (SO MANY) times and I haven’t had this issue.
Jill
OMG! These are the best chocolate chip cookies I ever had! I just made them and they came out perfectly! Thanks so much for the recipe; these are the only chocolate chip cookies I will make from now on!
Sam
Awesome!!! I’m so glad you loved them, Jill! They are my favorites, too! 🙂
Kim
I made these, followed the directions EXACTLY, got a soft by not runny dough, chilled and everything- and yours just look thicker than mine- they got really flat when I baked them. Any tips?
Sam
Hi Kim!
These cookies aren’t super puffy and thick, but they shouldn’t be extremely flat, either. Since you said you followed the instructions exactly I’ll assume you didn’t substitute the butter for margarine and you allowed the butter to cool well enough before melting, those would be the most likely culprits for too-flat cookies.
Another reader had a similar problem, so I’m going to copy and paste my response of possible things that may have gone wrong here:
1) Bad/old baking powder or baking soda — If your baking powder is expired or ill-kept it could cause your cookies to totally flatten
2) Did you chill the dough for the full 30 minutes? If it’s not chilled, the cookies could spread more than they are supposed to. Also, when you shape the cookie dough, make the balls almost egg-shaped — taller than they are wide. (the first part of this wouldn’t apply to you since you said you chilled the dough)
3) Did you use parchment paper? While these cookies *can* be made on just an ungreased cookie sheet sans parchment paper, if you happened to use a particularly dark pan it could bake the cookies too quickly and cause them to spread too thin and overbake (the same thing applies if you were to place your cookie dough on a too-warm cookie sheet that hasn’t had time to cool from the previous batch, but if this were the case for you I would expect at least your first batch to be soft and chewy).
4) Is your oven temperature reading correctly? I used to have an oven that ran 25 degrees higher than it said it was! This could cause cookie dough to spread too much, resulting in flat cookies. I recommend keeping an oven thermometer in your oven to make sure the temperature is accurate, if possible.
5) This recipe makes fairly large cookies. If you made your cookies smaller than the indicated 2-3 Tbsp, try reducing the baking time. When the cookies are done, they’ll appear to still be a bit underbaked, and they’ll finish baking completely on the pan as they cool.
Sorry this is so long but I really hope these tips help! You could also try adding an extra tsp or two of cornstarch, which always helps puff up cookies a bit.
DonnaSue
We use Hudson’s Cream flour so I always have to add about 1/4 Cup of more flour.
mallory
So i’m bringing these for my grandmas staff. Is this a bad idea (are they never going to eat normal cookies again)???
Sam
Unfortunately it will probably ruin them for life.
Stephanie
Do you flatten your cookies at all before baking or leave them in balls to flatten on their own? My dough is chilling right now and I cannot stop munching on it! Maybe I won’t bake them after all… 😉
Sam
Hi Stephanie! They flatten out on their own, in fact I make the balls of dough extra tall (more egg-shaped than round) to keep them from flattening too much. Isn’t that dough addicting! I’m not sure what’s better, the dough before or after it’s baked, so I hear you 😉
Stephanie
It is delicious! I made them vegan for my son with food allergies so we’ll see how this goes 🙂 First batch in!
Corey
So excited from reading all the comments. I am about to whip up a batch of these Worst Chocolate Chip Cookies… I will let you know shortly… Thanks in Advance
Sam
I can’t wait to hear how you like them!
Alli Reeves
Hi Sam, I stumbled upon this recipe as I was looking for cookies my daughter could make for teacher appreciation week, and was won by your description( who doesn’t want soul destroying deliciousness). I followed the recipe to the T and it was perfectly horrifying. They were gobbled up right as they came out of the oven and we were barley able to scrape enough together to make the gifts for her teachers. Thank you so much for sharing this fabulous recipes that will forever live in my cookie repertoire.
Sam
That’s awesome, Alli! I’m glad they came out perfectly horrifying for you 🙂
Thanks for coming back and letting me know, and I’m honored that you’ll be saving the recipe in your repertoire!
Sara
If you melt half the butter then cut in the rest, it cools the butter to a good temp. These taste delicious. I do not taste the extra golden from the maple syrup but I’ll bet pancake syrup does add a flavor. I might try it that way next time, just out of curiosity.
Sara
Also, I forgot to mention, I substituted non-dairy margarine, as I do in all my baking. The substitution worked great; no need for combined margarine/crisco like in some recipes. I had to laugh at the chips ahoy comments; one of my children claims he’s spoiled–he hates packaged cookies, and would rather pass at a school party than eat them. I am a cookie connoisseur and bake cookies all the time so I understand what he’s saying but I didn’t want my kids to be cookie snobs 🙂
Sam
I’m glad to hear the substitution worked! I’m always very hesitant when it comes to subbing margarine for butter. Your son is lucky to have a mom who bakes him cookies all the time, and he sounds like a child after my own heart 😉
Sam
Great tip, Sara, thank you for sharing! I’m so glad you enjoyed them, thanks for commenting!
Shaun
Best . Chocolate. Chip. Cookies. Ever! Someone brought these to a potluck at work today and I’m hooked!
Sam
Awesome! I’m so glad you loved them! Thanks for letting me know, Shaun!! 🙂
Kate
Your blog tittle pulled me in right away! Waiting the 30 minutes was the hardest, I was on my way to the fridge, cookie scoop in hand as the time went off! Then I had to wait fir what seems like forever before I could try one. I think I looked in the oven at least 3 times while the first batch was baking. They looked so amazing coming out of the oven, I was really afraid they would be too flat. Then I FINALLY got to try one…. oh. my. word. My days of trying to find the perfect CCC recipe are over. These are AMAZING. Thanks so much for sharing!
Sam
Oh man, I know that pain of having to wait for them to chill too well! It’s TORTURE!
I am so, SO glad that you loved them, Kate!! Thanks so much for coming back to comment, too! 🙂
Tonya
Lmao I was looking through pinterest for cookies and I saw the title thinking why would this person post the worst cookies
So I was curious and read your story you had me
I’m going to try these thank you for the humor
Sam
Haha, I’m glad you enjoyed the post, Tonya! Thanks for reading, and for commenting! 🙂