Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies

In the bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or a large bowl using an electric mixer), combine butter, peanut butter, sugars, eggs, and vanilla. Beat on medium-high speed until creamed and well combined, about 4 minutes.

Stop the mixer and scrape down the sides of bowl. Add flour, pudding mix, and baking soda and beat on low speed until just combined, about 1 minute.

Stop the mixer and again scrape down sides of bowl. Add chocolate chunks (or chips) and mix briefly with mixer on low speed, just until combined. This could also be done by hand with a spatula.

Using a cookie scoop or spoon, form dough into balls and flatten slightly. How much dough you use depends on how big you want your cookies; the original recipe calls for 1/4 cup dough per cookie. However, I used about between 1-2 tablespoons of dough per cookie, give or take a little, and they baked into a good size.

Place balls of dough onto a plate, container, or tray and chill in fridge for 2 hours (or up to 5 days).

Preheat oven to 350°F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Place balls of dough onto baking sheet, spaced at least 2 inches apart. Bake for about 11 minutes, or until edges have set and tops are just set. They will probably look underbaked, but do not over-bake! The cookies will firm up as they cool.

Let the cookies cool on baking sheet for about 10 minutes before serving.

Note: For the chocolate, I absolutely love Trader Joe’s 72% Cacoa Dark Chocolate. It’s a bittersweet chocolate. I love it because it’s delicious in cookies (uh, chocolate in every bite #win, it’s easy to chop (and this is coming from the girl who will always elect to use chocolate chips when possible to avoid chopping chocolate), and it comes in 1-pound bars! At a reasonable price!

Recipe adapted from Averie Cooks.