Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

Name: Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 8 min
Total time: 88 min
Ingredients: 2 ½ Cups Flour; 2 teaspoons Baking Powder; ½ teaspoons Kosher Salt; 1 Cup Dark Hershey Cocoa Powder; 4 large eggs; 1 Cup sugar; ½ Cup vegetable or canola oil; ½ Cup powdered sugar

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These Chocolate Crinkle Cookies are wildly popular around the holidays. We’ve decided they are too delicious for one month a year, so we make them all year long!

When it comes to cookie exchanges or desserts to bring to all those fun holiday gatherings, you can’t go wrong with these cookies.

Other favorites for parties and gift-giving are these Christmas Peppermint Brownies, cookie dough balls (no-bake!), soft molasses cookie recipe, crispy Snickerdoodle cookies, and these amazing white chocolate biscotti.

Table of Contents

Why We Love these Cookies

The first bite of these classic chocolate crinkles is all it took for us to know they would be on our list of Christmas cookies every year.

As the confectioner’s sugar coating cracks when baking, it gives these cookies a wintery look. This is why they are often called snowball cookies, too.

Ingredients

Flour
Baking Powder
Dark Hershey Cocoa Powder
Eggs
Sugar
Powdered sugar

See the recipe card at the end to get the full printable grocery list and instructions.

Variations and Substitutions

We made this chocolate crinkle cookie recipe to have a cake-like texture, very similar to the original Snackwell cookies. We loved those cookies and plan to try to make them next time with this recipe! 8-9 minutes will get you that texture.

If you would rather have fudgy chocolate cookies, simply change the baking time to 7 minutes. The result will be a rich, brownie-like cookie.

Replacing a quarter or half of the granulated sugar with brown sugar gives a bit of a caramel flavor to these cookies. You could add vanilla extract or peppermint extract to give this recipe a different flavor.

Chocolate chips, white chocolate chips, or Peppermint Crunch Baking Chips would be so good, too. Why not add a Hershey’s Kiss right in the center of each cookie for more chocolatey goodness?

You could also add a mini Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup in the middle of these cookies right after baking to give them a peanut butter blossoms vibe! Tip: Freeze the peanut butter cups to prevent them from melting once they hit the cookie.

The best part about baking is being able to experiment and maybe even create something new!

How to Make Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

Whisk the all purpose flour, baking powder, salt, and unsweetened cocoa powder together in a medium bowl.

Beat the eggs and sugar in a large bowl mixer or using a hand mixer until combined.

Add the vegetable oil and mix until well incorporated.

Gradually add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients.

Continue to mix until well combined.

Cover the batter with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for about an hour.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. You’ll need 3 for this recipe, or you’ll need to bake a dozen at a time.

Pour the confectioners’ sugar into a small bowl.

Scoop out some dough and form it into a ball using a small ice cream scoop. The right amount of dough is a rounded tablespoon.

The dough will be sticky, so do this quickly. You may be tempted to wet your hands. Don’t! The key is to get the dough into the powdered sugar quickly.

Roll the cookie dough balls in the powdered sugar, placing each one on the prepared baking sheet once they are coated, twelve to a sheet.

Chocolate dough balls covered in powdered sugar on parchment on baking tray.

If you don’t want your cookies rounded, press down on each cookie before baking for flat cookies.

This should give you about three dozen cookies.

Bake in the oven until the cookies puff up a bit and are firm around the edges, 7 minutes for a fudgy cookie and an extra minute or two for a cake-like cookie. Check them at 8 minutes with a toothpick in the center. If it comes out clean, they’re ready!

Remove the cookies from the oven and allow them to cool for 5 minutes. For best results, move to a wire rack after 5 minutes to let cookies cool completely. This wire rack stores easily!

FAQs

My cookies didn’t crack. What did I do wrong?

More than likely, your oven did not preheat to the full temperature. Many people don’t realize the importance of this. If you don’t think it’s your oven, check the expiration date of your baking powder.

How long do these cookies keep?

These cookies will stay fresh for about 5 days in an airtight container at room temperature.

Do these cookies freeze well?

They do! You can make these in advance and store them for 3 months in a freezer bag or freezer-safe container.

Top Tips

When scooping out flour, don’t stick the whole cup in the flour container. Instead, use a smaller cup to scoop flour into the larger cup. Directly scooping flour can pack it, which can result in much more flour than the recipe requires, and a failed dessert.

I’ve spoken to so many people who don’t line their baking sheets, thinking parchment paper is a waste of money. What they don’t understand is that parchment paper is not just for keeping your cookie sheet clean. It regulates the temperature of whatever is baking on it. It really can make a huge difference in your baking!