Chocolate Crinkles

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Choco­late Crin­kles are fudgy, chewy, “please don’t inter­rupt me” deli­cious! This recipe is one that I made as a kid and have con­tin­ued bak­ing for my own crew. It’s a hands-down fam­i­ly favorite! I think you’ll love it, too.

How to Make Chocolate Crinkles

Choco­late Crin­kles are sim­ple to make. They require a lit­tle pre-plan­ning because the dough needs to chill, but the actu­al mix­ing of the dough requires 10 min­utes or less. Mix it up. Cov­er the dough and pop it in the fridge. Come back to it when you have time to roll them and get them baked. I have suc­cess­ful­ly kept the dough in the refrig­er­a­tor for an entire week, just bak­ing a few cook­ies at a time, as we need­ed them.

This recipe devi­ates a lit­tle from the typ­i­cal “cream the but­ter and sug­ar; add the eggs” method, so I’m includ­ing a cou­ple of pho­tos for you. Start by putting the but­ter, sug­ar, cocoa and vanil­la in the bowl of your mix­er (or in a mix­ing bowl if you’re mak­ing these by hand). Mix them until every­thing is com­bined. (The mix­ture will look grainy and choco­latey.) Then you can mix in the eggs.

Once the eggs are mixed in, you can add the dry ingre­di­ents. Then, when every­thing is incor­po­rat­ed, the dough will still seem pret­ty sticky. That’s just right. It is thick, but too soft to roll in your hand. So that’s where the chill­ing comes in.

After the Dough Has Chilled

Once the dough has chilled and you have a few min­utes to bake them, take the dough out of the fridge. Roll the dough into 1 1/2″ balls. (I use a *cook­ie scoop to make it eas­i­er to keep them uni­form, but you can def­i­nite­ly do it just by hand.) Put the balls into a bowl with some pow­dered sug­ar in the bot­tom. Roll them around to be sure the out­side of each one is com­plete­ly coated. 

This is the point where you will roll the dough into a smooth ball. The pow­dered sug­ar will help, but you’re still going to get a lit­tle messy. It’s def­i­nite­ly worth it!

Determining Doneness of Chocolate Crinkles

Once you have the dough balls rolled and shaped, place them on a greased or lined bak­ing sheet and bake. I put a time range of 8–11 min­utes on the recipe card, since I under­stand all ovens are dif­fer­ent. I want to stress how impor­tant it is not to over­bake these, though. 

Start with the short­est time and add one minute at a time until they are done. The cook­ies will puff up. The tops will be cracked and the choco­late part of the tops will be dry to the touch. The cook­ies will still seem very soft in the mid­dle, though, when you touch them. That’s exact­ly per­fect. They will con­tin­ue to set up on the cook­ie sheet, even after they’re out of the oven. 

Set the sheet on a cool­ing rack and let the cook­ies rest for 3–5 min­utes. Then, you’ll be able to put them direct­ly onto the cool­ing rack to fin­ish cool­ing and you can keep work­ing on a new pan of cookies.

Store Choco­late Crin­kles in an air­tight con­tain­er. They are cel­e­brat­ed at every gath­er­ing I’ve ever shared them and they are beau­ti­ful in Christ­mas cook­ie trays. You’ll be a hero any­where you decide to take them. Enjoy, my friend!

More Cookies to Love, for the Holidays and Every Day

If you’re look­ing for even more cook­ie recipes to add to your hol­i­day reper­toire, check these recipes.

Pota­to Chip Cookies

Frost­ed Drop Sug­ar Cookies

Melt-In-Your-Mouth Orange Short­bread Cookies