Chocolate peanut butter pudding cookies are the softest, most tender cookies you’ll ever have. It’s a peanut butter cup lover’s dream cookie and they come together in just 24 minutes.
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The cream cheese balances the sweetness and helps keep the cookies soft, and the dough tender. Instant pudding is the base for the flavor, so the combinations are endless!
Why this recipe works
These pudding mix cookies are an excellent cookie recipe to bake up with the kids like my Easy S'mores Cookie Bars. They will love rolling the dough balls and pressing baking chips into the cookies. The kiddos also love to make these Avalanche Cookies, Brownie Mix Crinkle Cookies and Peanut Butter Kiss Cookies.
Ingredients for this recipe
Ingredients Notes
- Chocolate pudding: make sure you get instant chocolate pudding mix the cook and serve kind contains a larger amount of cornstarch and it won't bake up as nicely.
- Cream Cheese: Be sure to use full-fat cream cheese and not reduced-fat or fat-free.
How to make this recipe
Step 1: Mix all the dry ingredients together in a bowl.
Step 2: Using a hand mixer cream butter, sugar, cream cheese and peanut butter until combined.
Step 3: Add in the eggs and beat until combined.
Step 4: Add the dry ingredients in and beat until combined.
Step 5: Add in the chocolate chips and peanut butter chips and mix just until combined.
Step 6: Scoop a heaping tablespoon or small cookie scoop of dough out into balls and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
Recipe Tips
- This recipe is very forgiving. You can add in all 8 ounces of the cream cheese if you’d like and they’ll still turn out perfect! You can also substitute the cream cheese for 8 ounces of mascarpone cheese, which does not need to be softened at room temp before use.
- To soften butter to room temperature quickly, cut butter into small chunks and place it on a plate in a warm spot in your kitchen for about 30 minutes. Or microwave-wrapped sticks in 4-second increments until it’s just barely soft, flipping the sticks of butter every 4 seconds.
- Measure the flour correctly by spooning the flour into the measuring cup and leveling it off the top with a knife.
- The pudding mix makes this dough difficult to mix, I recommend using a hand or stand mixer. The pudding mix is also what keeps these cookies so soft and moist!
- No need to chill the cookie batter.
- Do not over-bake take them out just when the edges start to brown they will continue to cook a bit as they cool on the baking sheet.
Recipe FAQ's
It makes the texture super soft and moist. You don't want chocolate pudding that's already ready to eat, you want the instant dry pudding mix.
Cream cheese adds richness and texture to the cookies.
Store in an airtight container for up to 1 week. To freeze baked cookies let cool completely and then place in a large ziplock freezer bag and freeze for up to 3 months.
Try out some of these flavor combinations
- Coconut cream pudding and sweetened coconut flake
- Chocolate pudding with Health bar bits
- Vanilla pudding mix with white chocolate chips
- Butterscotch with butterscotch chips
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Chocolate Peanut Butter Pudding Cookies
Ingredients
- 2 ¼ cup all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1-3.4 ounce package chocolate instant pudding
- 1 cup salted butter softened
- 1/2 cup peanut butter
- 6 ounces cream cheese softened
- 1 cup white sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ¾ cup semi sweet chocolate chips
- 3/4 cup peanut butter chips
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350℉ and line two large baking sheets with parchment paper or baking mat. If you don’t have parchment paper, you can just drop the cookies onto an ungreased sheet pan, they won’t stick.
- In a medium bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, and instant pudding mix. Set aside.
- In a large bowl using a hand mixer (or a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment) cream together the butter, peanut butter, cream cheese, and sugar until light and fluffy, about 1 minute. Scrape bowl with a silicone spatula.
- Add the egg and vanilla, and mix until combined. Scrape bowl with a silicone spatula.
- On low, add half of the dry ingredients and mix until mostly combined. Add the remaining dry ingredients and mix on low until just combined. The dough should be difficult to mix.
- Fold in the chocolate peanut butter chip mixture.
- Use a cookie scoop to drop balls of dough onto the sheet pans 1” apart. Press down down to flatten the cookies slightly. If you’d like a uniform edge on your cookies, roll the dough balls briefly in your hand before pressing chips into them. The cookies will not spread much in the oven, it’s important to pat them down a bit.
- Bake for 12-14 minutes, or until the edges of the cookies look dry and are starting to brown. Let them cool on the sheet pan for 3 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack to cool completely.
1/2 cup of peanut butter
hi you show peanut butter how much do you need?