These Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies are everything you love about soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies with a holiday twist! These delectable holiday cookies are chewy and gooey and loaded with both white and dark chocolate chunks and bits of candy canes. They’re perfect for a cookie box or cookie swap!

I love these for Christmas cookies because they stay soft and don’t get stale. The peppermint and chocolate is the perfect flavor combo! The peppermint is subtle and not overwhelming, resulting in the perfect holiday chocolate chunk cookie.

Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies

I love baking during the holidays! Normally I’m not big on complex desserts, but I love simple desserts like cookies and crisps and the like. These Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies are right up my alley! They’re low effort and only take about 10 minutes to throw together.

If you’re participating in a cookie swap this year, these Peppermint Chocolate Chip cookies are perfect! They’re all the soft, chewy, and gooey goodness that you love about chocolate chip cookies with a hint of candy cane. The combination of white and dark chocolate is so, so good.

The cream cheese in the dough keeps these cookies soft but they’re also perfectly chewy from both kinds of sugar. You can have these cookies made and baked in 30 minutes because there’s no chilling required! You don’t need any fancy equipment, just a hand mixer and a mixing bowl.

Add these Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies to your holiday baking list and you definitely won’t regret it!

Why You’ll Love this Recipe

Festive – These peppermint chocolate chip cookies have just the right amount of holiday flair without going overboard on the peppermint flavor.

Quick and Easy – All you need is a hand mixer and 10 minutes to whip up these easy and delicious cookies. No stand mixers, no chilling dough.

Freezer-friendly – Who doesn’t love having a stash of cookie dough just waiting to be baked in the freezer? You can store the cookie dough in the freezer and let it come to room temperature before baking.

How to Make Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies

These Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies are so easy to make and a total crowd pleaser. No fancy equipment required!

Tools Needed

• Hand Mixer
• Mixing Bowl
• Sharp Knife
• Cutting Board
• Cookie Scoop

Ingredients and Substitutions

• Butter. Classic unsalted butter is best here.
• Cream cheese. Mixing butter and cream cheese make these cookies extra soft.
• Sugar. Granulated sugar for body and brown sugar to add chewiness.
• Eggs. Make sure the eggs are room temperature.
• Flour. All-purpose flour is best here.
• Baking soda. Perfect for fluffy cookies!
• Cream of tartar. Cream of tartar makes these cookies soft and helps leaven them.
• Chocolate. Despite the name, I never recommend using chocolate chips. They have stabilizers in them that keep them from melting properly. Go for a couple of quality chocolate bars and chop them by hand.
• Candy canes. Use rolling pin to smash them into small shards.

The Process

1. Cream the butter, cream cheese, and sugars. In a mixing bowl, use a hand mixer to cream the butter, cream cheese, and both sugars together until light and fluffy. Mix the eggs in one and a time and mix in the vanilla.
2. Fold in the dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt together. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix until just barely combined.
3. Mix in the chocolate and peppermint. Using a rubber spatula, fold in the chopped chocolate and candy canes until evenly dispersed.
4. Scoop. Use a cookie scoop to create uniform cookie dough balls so that they bake evenly. Use a 3 tablespoon scoop to scoop the cookie dough into balls. Arrange them on a parchment lined baking sheet, giving some space between each cookie.
5. Bake. Bake for 12-14 minutes, until puffy but still soft in the center. Let them cool and then drizzle with melted white chocolate, if desired.

Baking with Room Temperature Ingredients

You’ve probably heard this before, but using room-temperature ingredients in baking is so important! In this instance, you really need your cream cheese, butter, and eggs to all be at room temperature for the filling.

When I know I want to make Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies, I set the ingredients out overnight to bake in the morning. Having room-temperature ingredients lets them combine easier with a much better texture. Don’t skip this step!

When at room temperature, eggs, butter, and other dairy ingredients form an emulsion which traps air. While baking in the oven, that trapped air expands and produces a fluffy baked good.

Tips for Making Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies

These cookies are so easy to make, but I’ve got some expert tips for making them perfect every single time. Follow my pro tips and you’ll bake like a pro!

1. Use room temperature ingredients. As mentioned above, this is an essential step! Room temperature ingredients mix better and ensure soft cookies that are never tough.
2. Use a cookie scoop. I always use a cookie scoop to scoop cookie dough! This gives you a uniform size to all your cookies so that they bake at the same rate.
3. Use chocolate chunks instead of chocolate chips. Chocolate chips have stabilizers that keep them from melting properly. I always buy a couple of high-quality chocolate bars and roughly chop them up with a knife before adding them to my cookie dough. It’s a game changer!
4. Crush the candy canes small. You want small shards of peppermint here! The larger pieces melt if they’re at the edges of the cookie so smaller is better.
5. Always, ALWAYS make sure that your baking soda is fresh. Old or expired baking soda can make your cookies flat. No one wants a flat cookie!

That’s it! Now go forth and bake!

Storing and Freezing Peppermint Chocolate Chip Cookies

Once baked, these Peppermint Chocolate Chip cookies are best stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 4 days. They stay soft without going stale.

Once you have the dough together, you can freeze the dough balls.

To freeze the dough, scoop the cookie dough onto a parchment lined baking sheet in a single layer. Freeze for 1 hour. Transfer to a freezer-safe ziplock bag and freeze for up to 3 months.

To defrost, place the frozen dough balls on a parchment lined baking sheet and let them come to room temperature before baking.

More Holiday Cookie Recipes

Gingerbread Cookie Sandwiches
Eggnog Snickerdoodle Cookies
Cranberry Bliss Bars
Slice and Bake Chocolate Pecan Cookies

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