Chewy Sourdough Monster Cookies

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I live for a nostalgic, bakery-case cookie moment.
So I started testing these because I had a very specific monster cookie craving – a big, chunky, chewy, colorful kind of cookie that felt like a throwback, but better.

Peanut butter, old fashioned oats, melty dark chocolate, M&M’s, butterscotch chips, and the sourdough discard magic that makes them extra chewy and absolutely milk-dunking worthy.

For these Monster Cookies, I leaned on brown sugar and a touch of honey to add caramel notes and keep them moist, which pairs perfectly with creamy peanut butter. The peanut butter ratio took a few tries — too much and the cookies tipped into dry, crumbly territory, so getting it just right was key. The end result was a perfectly chewy center just like that of my bakery style Sourdough Peanut Butter Cookies.

Oh, and the one mix-in I won’t skip? Butterscotch chips. To me, they’re what takes a monster cookie from good to i-can’t-eat-just-one. They add this deep, buttery sweetness that rounds everything out. Once you notice them, you miss them when they’re gone!

I highly recommend using chopped chocolate rather than chocolate chips

When I was developing my reader favorite chewy gooey Sourdough Chocolate Chip Cookies, I did a lot of experimenting with using chocolate from a bar and chocolate chips to see how it affects the texture of the cookies. Hands down, chopped chocolate (chips don’t melt well!) was the winner, so that’s what I recommend for these monster cookies too.

Chopped chocolate melts into gooey pockets, creating a more melty and decadent texture in the finished cookie. The irregular shapes and sizes of the chocolate pieces give you some bites with tons of chocolate and others with just a hint. Plus, the cookies have so much more visual interest and texture.

Chocolate chips are made with emulsifiers so they hold their shape. This means the chips do not melt well, resulting in puffier, taller cookies that spread less. And that’s not the cookie I want.

Just so you know, sourdough discard doesn’t mean it’s actually discarded, or thrown away.

Sourdough discard in simplest terms is excess sourdough starter that has run out of food to make new CO2 (gas). And since it isn’t producing CO2 anymore, it can’t make a loaf of bread rise as it should. However, it’s still a great ingredient that can be used in other ways, like these cookies!

As a sourdough starter rises and falls, it expresses acids and alcohol that if not used or left in the jar, can negatively affect the balance of your starter. So before feeding your starter, you remove and “discard” a portion of it each time to refresh the acidity levels.

I keep sourdough discard in your refrigerator for about 10 days. 

The discard will become more sour the longer it stays in the fridge. For that reason, when I’m making something sweet like these cookies, or my lemony sourdough discard rhubarb cake where I don’t want the sourness to come through, I use discard that is less than 5 days old.

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Best Chewy Sourdough Monster Cookies

Chewy in the middle, generously chunky, and loaded with mix-ins, these sourdough monster cookies are completely irresistible. They have great peanut butter flavor, use sourdough discard for moisture, and old fashioned oats for chew. Chopped dark chocolate, M&M's, and butterscotch chips give you something delicious in every bite. A no-fuss recipe.

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Prep Time :11 minutes minutes

Cook Time :14 minutes minutes

Refrigeration Time :40 minutes minutes

Yield: 18 cookies

Author: Amanda Paa

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Ingredients

• 100 grams softened unsalted butter
• 160 grams light brown sugar
• 75 grams sourdough discard, preferably at room temperature
• 1 large egg
• 80 grams creamy salted Jif or Skippy peanut butter (not the natural, drippy kind)*
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 2 teaspoons honey
• 100 grams old fashioned oats
• 80 grams all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon fine salt
• 110 grams chopped chocolate* (I prefer a semisweet to dark chocolate, around 60 to 70%)
• 100 grams M & M chocolate candies
• 70 grams butterscotch chips

Instructions 

• Cream butter for 1 minute on medium high. Stop and scrape down sides of bowl. Then add brown sugar; cream for at least 2 more more minutes, until light in color and fluffy. Scrape down sides a few times during mixing, as needed.
• Add sourdough discard, egg, peanut butter, vanilla, and honey and mix on medium for about 45 seconds, scraping down the sides once, until the mixture is mostly homogenous. It doesn't have to be perfect. We don't want to overmix.
• Add oats, mix on low just to combine.
• In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt. Whisk to combine.
• Add flour mixture to the wet ingredients on stand mixer and mix on low for 30 to 40 seconds. You want some of the flour to be mixed in, but some dry streaks can remain. We are avoiding overmixing.
• Take bowl off of your stand mixer and add the chopped chocolate, M&M's, and butterscotch chips. Use a spatula and incorporate by hand, making sure to scrape everything off the bottom of bowl, until just combined and distributed. Refrigerate dough, covered, for 1 hour, up to 24 hours.
• When ready to bake, preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Scoop dough 55 gram dough balls. Place 8 dough balls on a parchment lined baking sheet with room in between.
• Bake for 12-14 minutes, until they are just set in the middle but slightly underbaked when you pull them out of oven to ensure chewiness. (Start checking at 12 minutes, your oven’s temperature may run different than mine). Remove cookies from oven and and let cool on pan 5 minutes before transfer to cooling rack.

Notes

* Do NOT decrease the amount of sugar; they are not too sweet. The amount of sugar used makes them perfectly salty sweet and allows them to achieve the superbly chewy texture.

*I love natural peanut butter for toast, but it’s a no-go for these cookies. Its lack of stabilizers causes oil separation, leading to greasy, crumbly results. Instead, the creamy conventional peanut butter results in the perfect spread and chewy center.

*I highly recommend using an inexpensive oven thermometer when you are baking, as no oven is calibrated exactly precise, even one that is brand new. Your other likely runs hotter or cooler than it actually reads, and this can determine how much your cookies spread or do not spread and if they will look and taste like the recipe was written for. Using an oven thermometer allows you to slightly adjust the temperature to make it correct.