**This post contains affiliate links**
I’m a sucker for a great chocolate chip cookie, but over spring break I decided to try something a little bit different! My mouth started watering when I saw these salted caramel chocolate chip cookies from le Creme de la Crumb on Pinterest, from the gooey caramel and milk chocolate to the fact that these cookies are literally GINORMOUS.
Just look at the perfect crinkle on the edges of these beauties.
And when you open them…BOOM. It’s life changing.
When you heat these cookies up, the caramel literally explodes out of them. Add some melted chocolate wrapped in the perfect straight-from-a-bakery cookie and you’ve got yourself one heck of a dessert mid-day snack. I’ve never been to heaven but I’m 87% confident that they serve these cookies when you get there.
All I can say is WOW. And I know I say that about every baking post that we’ve ever written. But these are on a whole other level. I’m going to stop writing about them now, because it’s actually torture to have to look at these photos and not have a nice warm cookie sitting next to my computer! The next time you make cookies, MAKE THESE. Make them, and then mail me some all of them. What are you waiting for?? The recipe is below, with my comments in bold.
Salted Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookies
Prep time: 15 minutes // Cook time: 13 minutes // Makes: 16
- 12 tablespoons butter, softened
- ¾ cup brown sugar
- ¼ cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 egg
- 2 cups flour
- 1 small box instant vanilla pudding mix – dry, not prepared (one 3.4 ounce box, it must be INSTANT – not cook and serve, etc)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 cups semi sweet chocolate chips
- 24 soft caramels (such as Kraft square caramels, unwrapped) This recipe only makes ~15 cookies, but feel free to unwrap more for snacking!
- optional: coarse sea salt 10/10 would recommend
- Start by beating butter and sugars together for 1-2 minutes until very fluffy (2 minutes is a must). Add vanilla and egg and mix well. In a separate bowl whisk together flour, pudding mix, baking soda, and salt. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix until incorporated and dough comes together. Stir in chocolate chips. Cover and chill for at least 1 hour. (I hate doing this but it makes the next step way easier!)
- Preheat oven to 350 and very lightly grease baking sheets. (I lightly mist mine with cooking spray, then wipe it off with a paper towel, too much grease will yield very flat cookies!) Roll about 3-4 tablespoons of the chocolate chip cookie dough into a ball , then repeat with 3-4 more tablespoons of dough. Press a caramel square into the center of one dough ball. Gently smash the two dough balls together and roll into one single ball. Repeat with remaining dough and place dough balls at least 3-4 inches apart on the baking sheet (I only did 6 cookies per sheet). Poke additional chocolate chips into the top of each cookie if desired (this is just for looks). Flatten the cookies down a little bit just so they cook more evenly!
- Bake cookies for 10-13 minutes (mine took around 15 minutes) until set but still slightly undercooked. Remove from oven and (optional) sprinkle immediately with coarse sea salt (highly recommended!). Allow to cool at least 10 minutes on baking sheet, then transfer to a cooling rack and allow to completely cool to room temperature. Store in airtight container.
Make sure to cool the cookies completely and then heat them back up! If you try to break open the cookies after they’ve cooled for a few minutes, the caramel won’t spill out like it does in the photos! After the cookies cooled, I popped mine in the microwave for 5 second increments until the caramel started coming out the top! Make sure to eat with a nice glass of cold milk! (Looking for ways to make your cookies even better? Check out my 6 tips for making the best chocolate chip cookies ever!)
Is there anything you’ve been dying for us to bake? Let us know in the comments or tweet us (and follow us on Pinterest and Instagram) @theswirlblog. Have a great week, Swirlers!
