If you love a thin, crisp chocolate chip cookie, this is the one. Buttery, golden, and packed with toffee-like flavor, these Tate’s-style cookies bake up with that satisfying snap that gets rave reviews.
If you love Tate’s thin and crispy chocolate chip cookies, you’re absolutely going to flip for this recipe. The cookies bake up super crisp and buttery, and taste even better than the store-bought ones!
What readers are saying about these thin and crispy cookies
➡ Ummm, okay — this recipe is from heaven. Thank you!
➡ Sue. I just deleted every other chocolate chip cookie from my Pinterest! This recipe is the best I’ve ever made.
➡ I’ve been searching for a favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe for YEARS…this is it!
➡ These are PERFECT! They’re actually better than Tate’s.
What’s your chocolate chip cookie style? Soft and plush, classic, or thin and crisp? If most of us are honest, we’ll take a chocolate chip cookie any way we can get it ~ but thin and crispy chocolate chip cookies have been on my radar ever since I grabbed a bag of Tate’s at the supermarket. They’re light, snappy, buttery, and dangerously easy to keep eating. I’m so glad I nailed this recipe because mine have that same delicate crunch, with even better homemade flavor.
The secrets to a truly thin and crispy chocolate chip cookie
Most of the time I’m aiming for a nice chewy cookie, like my Favorite Chewy Ginger Cookies or my Oatmeal Cranberry Cookies. But here the goal is different: crisp all the way through.
- Thin, crispy cookies usually have a higher proportion of butter and sugar, which encourages the dough to spread in the oven. As the cookies bake, that thin layer sets into a golden, crunchy texture with lots of buttery toffee flavor.
- The other key is baking them long enough for moisture to evaporate ~ pale cookies will stay bendy, while golden cookies cool into that crisp snap.
- And don’t judge them too soon ~ they’ll be soft when they first come out of the oven, then crisp up as they cool.
A few ingredient notes
The ingredient list will look familiar because it’s basically the same as most chocolate chip cookies. The difference here will be in the proportions.
- Quality counts: Use good-quality butter for baking any cookie recipe. Cheap brands add water and won’t bake up as well.
- Ditto for your vanilla extract: quality really matters here; the flavor of discount brands is flat and artificial.
- Cinnamon! A tiny amount of cinnamon adds a je ne sais quoi to my thin and crispy cookies, many readers have commented on this!
Tips for baking Tate’s-style cookies
Baking details that matter
- Be precise; don’t be tempted to mess with the ingredients or amounts.
- Line baking sheets with parchment.
- Bake one pan at a time.
- Make sure your oven temperature is accurate.
Getting the spread right
- Don’t chill the dough. Chilled dough won’t spread as well.
- Use a slightly heaped tablespoon of dough per cookie. It looks small, but the cookies spread quite a bit.
- Give them plenty of room on the baking sheet. I can only fit 5–6 cookies at a time.
- If your first tray spreads too thin or looks greasy, stir 1–2 tablespoons of flour into the remaining dough before baking the next tray.
Cooling and storing crispy cookies
- Let the cookies cool for 5 minutes on the baking sheet before moving them. They need that time to firm up.
- Transfer them carefully to a rack and let them cool completely.
- Store loosely covered at room temperature once fully cool. A cookie tin is ideal ~ you want to protect them without trapping moisture.
- If they lose a little crunch, pop them in a 300°F oven for a few minutes, then let them cool again.
So which is better, Tate’s or my cookies?
I have the utmost respect for Tate’s, and in fact our ingredient lists are exactly the same. But if you love to bake, these homemade cookies make sense on a few different levels.
They’re cheaper! You could spend up to $18 buying the same amount of cookies.
Homemade cookies can use higher quality ingredients (butter, chocolate) than commercial recipes baked at scale.
The flavor of homemade cookies always trumps store-bought, no matter how good the store-bought ones are.
And once you’ve mastered this thin and crispy chocolate chip cookie, you can have them anytime you want, and you can customize them in all sorts of ways. I’m planning to tackle Tate’s coconut crisps next 🙂
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Thin and Crispy Chocolate Chip Cookies
Video
Equipment
- parchment paper
Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature and soft but not melted
- 3/4 cup white sugar
- 3/4 cup light brown sugar, lightly packed
- 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour, measured carefully: fluff, spoon into the cup, and level off. Too much flour will make chewier cookies.
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 large egg
- 1 Tbsp vanilla extract
- 1 1/2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F and line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Note: the parchment paper is important for preventing sticking, and getting the right texture in these cookies. Don't substitute silicone mats.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer or with electric beaters, cream together the butter and sugars until well combined. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as necessary.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon.
- Add the egg and vanilla to the butter mixture, and mix until well combined.
- Add the flour mixture to the bowl in two batches, mixing after each addition just until everything is combined. Add the chocolate chips, and mix briefly once more to incorporate them evenly.
- Scoop the dough into portions a little larger than 1 tablespoon, then roll into balls. Space them evenly on your baking sheet, leaving about 2-3 inches between each cookie to allow for spreading in the oven.
- Bake for about 14-15 minutes until the cookies are a rich golden brown.
- Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes. They will be very soft when they come out of the oven but will crisp up as they cool. Transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.
- Store loosely covered at room temperature once completely cool.
Notes
Nutrition
More thin and crispy cookie recipes
Double Chocolate Thin and Crispy Cookies
Double chocolate thin and crispy cookies are just like the Tate’s cookies you love (but hate to pay for!)
Thin and Crispy White Chocolate Cranberry Cookies
Thin & Crispy White Chocolate Cranberry Cookies have the perfect balance of sweet, tart, and CRUNCH!
Thin and Crispy Sugar Cookies
Thin and Crispy Sugar Cookies are a Tate's style crunchy cookie that are deliciously easy (it's a no-chill no-roll drop cookie dough.)
This really was the perfect cookie recipe, didn’t need to adjust a thing including bake time. Definitely saving this in my forever recipes pile 🙂
I made this recipe and my husband loves these cookies and I wanted to ask you if these cookies have to much calories and sodium and how much should we eat from gaining weight?
The calories and nutritional info is at the bottom of the recipe, so you can see that info there. You can cut down on sodium by omitting the salt in the recipe.
The bake time is far too long. 14 minutes turned them a dark brown, and the second batch of ten minutes still crisped up the edges darker than I’d like. Make sure to check them 9-10 minutes in, especially if you have a convection oven
If you use a convection oven you will always need to convert baking times since most all recipes are written for regular ovens. To convert for convection you’ll need a lower temp as well as shortened time.
Why have a print button if you can’t print!?
Not sure what you mean Anne, all my recipes are printable.
These turned out pretty good. My oven ran a bit hot so my first batch was very crisp. I adjusted my bake time to 11 minutes and they turned out great. I did dock a star because I wanted to use metric measurements since I personally find it easier but I read a review from someone earlier that said the cookies won’t turn right so that’s sad.
Anyways, I appreciate the tip about using parchment paper because I tried a similar recipe using silicone mats and they didn’t turn out well.
I used metric weights for this recipe and I’m happy to say they were perfect – thin, crispy and buttery at exactly 14 minutes. The metric weights seem spot-on to me!
These cookies are phenomenal!! One of the times i made them, i realized i was out of vanilla so i used a tablespoon of whiskey instead and NOW my husband won’t let me make them any other way. I usually do 1/2 tbsp vanilla and 1/2 tbsp whiskey. So good.
Omg now I can’t think of anything else!
I’m making these now. First sheet is in the oven. Fingers crossed!
How many cookies does this make. I’m trying to calculate nutrition
The yield and calories are in the recipe Janice ~ this makes 36 cookies.
Please help! I was really excited for this recipe because I’ve been looking for a crispy cookie, but the cookies spread so much they were thin enough to see through them in places. They felt all greasy and got dark, but not crispy. I measured all my ingredients by weight and followed the recipe exactly, including using parchment paper and baking one sheet at a time with no more than 6 cookies per sheet. What went wrong?
It’s hard to know without all the details Shirley. It could be not enough flour. Also make sure your butter is soft but not melted. And I used a large egg, not extra large or jumbo. That’s all I can think of, but feel free to email me and we can troubleshoot further.
Thank you for the advice! I measured my flour so I don’t think that was it, and my egg was large, but the butter might’ve gotten too warm by the time the cookies went in the oven. I’ll try chilling the dough before baking next time!
Crispy and Yummy , followed recipe and they were perfect. Be careful not to overcrowd or too large. A nice change from my usual cookies, but crispy was the request and this recipe nailed it.
This is one of my favorite cookie recipes! These cookies are delicious!
Thanks Deb!!