Monster cookies are the cookies that I am required to bring to every party, BBQ, camping trip, and family gathering. These cookies are dangerously delicious and addicting. For those of you who are bakers, BEWARE! You will likely be making these for the rest of your lives!!! Not that that’s a bad thing; these monster cookies are amazing, and I don’t think you’ll ever get tired of baking (or eating) them. These are the cookie of all cookies, the ultimate combination of chocolate, oatmeal, and peanut butter.
My mom has the recipe for these monster cookies and my dad insists on having one in his lunch every day. So my mom always has monster cookies in the freezer, always. They’re each in their own little sandwich bag so my dad can grab one every morning for his lunch. If we’re over at my parents’ house and any of us kids (kids all being at least 24 years old) sneak out to the garage freezer and eat one of his monster cookies, he seriously gets so upset about it! He doesn’t like to share his monster cookies!
I love these cookies because they’re the perfect harmony of chocolate and peanut butter….M&M’s, chocolate chips, and peanut butter. I’m addicted to chocolate and peanut butter, or chocolate and almonds, or chocolate and walnuts, or chocolate and cashews. I love the combination; the nuts balance out the chocolate. When I’m craving sweets and we have nothing in the house, I will fill a ramekin with mixed nuts, M&M’s, and chocolate chips; it’s like all the best parts of trail mix.
I can almost justify calling these cookies healthy because of the peanut butter and oats. And when I make them with dark chocolate chips, I can put extra emphasis on the “healthy” because dark chocolate has more antioxidants and less sugar than milk chocolate. Sometimes I use dark chocolate M&M’s too…. And, another selling point is that these are gluten-free, no flour! Be careful when you make them, though, the dough is so good, I can’t help myself…hard not to just eat all the dough…
When I bake these cookies, I do tend to almost under bake them because I like them soft and gooey. If you like a more crisp cookie, feel free to leave them in the oven for another minute or two. And if you don’t eat the whole batch at once, monster cookies are just as good frozen. In fact, I almost prefer them frozen, which is bad because I usually put things in the freezer to hide them from myself, the whole, “out of sight, out of mind”…. yeah, doesn’t work for monster cookies.
For the peanut butter in these cookies, I like to use a natural chunky peanut butter and usually go with Adam’s. I was raised on Adam’s peanut butter, and it’s always my go-to peanut butter. Jiff and Skippy, just taste too sweet to me. I definitely prefer natural peanut butter, even if it is a pain to stir in the oil.
I do have a confession, bear with me for a moment. Hopefully no one holds this against me. I first started making monster cookies in college. I remember a girl from high school made some amazing monster cookies, and I was trying to find a similar recipe online. There are a lot of recipes for monster cookies online. I tried to find the recipe I used as the basis for my recipe to link back to but apparently recipezaar.com no longer exists and is now food.com, and I couldn’t find the original. So just a disclaimer, I did not develop this recipe, just modified it.
Anyway, when people started asking me for my monster cookie recipe, I thought I had it memorized and would just jot it down real fast for people, trying to be all cool and whatever. But then people would tell me that when they made monster cookies, they never turned out the same as when I made them…. Hmmm, I would think, secretly thinking of myself as such a superior baker….shame on me, haha! Eventually I realized that I was giving people the recipe with just a tiny mistake. I was telling them to use 1 1/2 cups of white sugar and 1 cup of brown sugar instead of 1 1/2 cups of brown sugar and 1 cup of white sugar. You wouldn’t think a 1/2 cup of brown sugar makes that big of a difference, but brown sugar has magic powers! The brown sugar sort of caramelizes when the cookies bake, adding another depth of flavor. So, so good. I’m sorry to all of you out there who got the recipe with 1 1/2 cups of white sugar.
I hope that if (when) you make these cookies, you fall in love with them and that you’re stuck making them to your grave!
- 3 eggs
- 1 cup of white sugar
- 1 1/2 cups of brown sugar packed
- 2 tsp baking soda
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 1 tsp corn syrup
- 1/2 cup butter (one cube) room temp
- 1 1/2 cups natural chunky peanut butter
- 4 1/2 cups old fashioned oats
- 1 cup of chocolate chips
- 1 cup of M&M's
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Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
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In an electric mixing bowl, beat eggs until slightly foamy, about 1 min
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Add in white and brown sugar, beat on high speed until eggs and sugar are light and airy, about 3-5 minutes.
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Turn mixer off and add in baking soda, vanilla, and corn syrup. Mix on low speed for 1-2 minutes.
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Add in 1/2 cup of butter, mix on medium speed until well incorporated.
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Next, add in peanut butter and mix on medium speed for 1-2 minutes.
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With mixer on low speed, slowly add in old fashioned oats, about half cup to one cup at a time.
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Next add chocolate chips.
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Finally, add in M&M's and mix until just incorporated.
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Scoop cookie dough with a large spoon (generous tablespoon) onto cookie sheet. (I do 9 cookies per baking sheet). Slightly flatten the cookies before baking.
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Bake for 8-9 minutes, turning halfway through. Bake for 10 minutes if you like more of a crisp cookie. Let cookies cool on baking sheet for about 5 minutes and then move to wire rack (or newspaper, my mom always put her cookies on newspaper, so that's what I use, or I cut open a brown paper bag)
Ha! Ha! Hmmmm. Do you think you subconsciously gave them the wrong recipe so that your monster cookies would always and forever be superior? Just kidding. . .it was an easy mistake to make. At least you didn’t confuse the sugar for salt.
And can I say that these cookies are pretty darn spectacular? I mean what’s not to love with a three cookie mashup? . . .a triple threat so to speak. 😉
Hahah, let’s just say I didn’t immediately correct my mistake… In fact, some people might read this and realize they still have the 1 1/2 cups white sugar recipe…
Thanks 🙂 These are my favorite cookies, so good, never get tired of them!