Soft Peanut M&M Cookies

These are soft peanut butter cookies, full of flavor and stuffed with peanut M&Ms.

These are double peanut cookies – It’s a soft peanut butter cookie dough filled with peanut M&ms. The cookie base has a lovely soft texture, and it’s a great pairing with the crunchy peanut M&ms.

Ingredients

The peanut butter

Choose a smooth and creamy processed peanut butter instead of a natural one for the best texture. The natural peanut butter tends to split and is a bit grainy in texture. They do still work in this cookie, but it results in a much dryer cookie that’s less soft.

Use salted peanut butter. This adds a great contrast to the sweet cookie. You could use crunchy peanut butter too for extra texture.

Try these small-batch peanut butter cookies next!

Chilling the dough

This cookie dough needs a little chilling before rolling – 1-2 hours, or all the way up to 3 days. You can roll the cookie dough balls and freeze them too for easy future cookies. The longer you let the cookie dough chill, the thicker the cookies will be.

Method

In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt and set it aside.

In a large bowl with a hand mixer or the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, add the softened butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar. Cream this together until light and creamy. Add in the peanut butter, egg and vanilla. Mix together until well combined.

Tip in the dry ingredients and use a rubber spatula to fold them together until nearly all are combined. There should be a few streaks of flour remaining.

Add in the peanut M&Ms (reserving a quarter of them for topping the cookies), and fold until it’s all combined into a soft dough.

Cover the bowl and chill it in the refrigerator for around 30 minutes (or more for thicker cookies.)

Preheat the oven to 350°F/176°C and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Using a cookie scoop or tablespoon, take around 1 1/2 tablespoons of dough for each cookie and roll it into a ball. Place the balls onto the lined cookie sheet, spaced at least 2 inches apart. Press a few of the reserved M&Ms into each cookie. You can also crush a few and once the cookies are baked, press pieces of m&m into the tops.

Bake the cookies for around 8-10 minutes until just golden brown around the edges, but they should still be quite soft. The cooking time will vary depending on your oven.

Don’t overbake them if you want chewy cookies.

The perfect cookie

If you would like to achieve the extra round cookie look for perfect cookies, you’ll need a circle cookie cutter or glass that’s bigger than your cookies.

Once the cookies are baked, and still hot from the oven, use the cutter or glass and place it over the hot cookie, then swirl it gently around the cookie.

This will help form it into a perfect circle. The cookies need to be hot, and not over-baked for this to work.

Let the cookies cool further on a wire rack.

Storing

Leftover cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to a week. The baked cookies or the unbaked cookie dough balls can also be frozen for 2-3 months. Store in a freezer-safe container. The cookie dough balls can be baked from frozen, but they may need an extra minute or two of baking time.

More cookie recipes

• M&M brown butter cookie bars
• Soft marshmallow cookies
• Oatmeal chocolate chip bars