My soft and chewy butter pecan cookies are made with toasted pecans, brown sugar, and plenty of butter. They are incredibly easy to make with NO mixer and NO chilling required! Recipe includes a how-to video!
The BEST Butter Pecan Cookies
Fans of my recent butter pecan cake will be thrilled to discover these equally buttery, rich, and flavorful butter pecan cookies! These cookies make a great treat year-round (I love bringing them to parties and potlucks!), but I especially love them during the fall when pecans are in-season. Definitely save this one for your holiday baking!
What’s to love:
- Quick: No chilling required and just 25 minutes of prep including the scooping and rolling (if you decide to roll them!).
- Easy: Since we start with melted butter instead of softened, there is NO MIXER REQUIRED! Melted butter also really infuses the butter flavor throughout the dough, which is important since these are butter pecan cookies!
- Incredible flavor: Toasted pecans, toffee bits, plenty of vanilla, and a sprinkle of sea salt…are you swooning over these cookies yet?!
- Soft & chewy results: My carefully chosen ingredients (melted butter, dark brown sugar, and an extra egg yolk) and baking technique (slightly underbake) ensure these cookies stay soft and chewy for days. On the other hand, if you’re looking for crunchy, buttery cookies, try my butter crunch cookies!
If you are a pecan lover (have you tried my Italian cream cake?!), you are absolutely going to love these cookies. I can’t wait to hear how you like them!
What You Need
All of these ingredients are pretty basic (okay, toffee bits might not be basic) and should already be in your pantry. Here are a few key players in today’s recipe.
- Toasted pecans. Toasting your pecans first is optional, but it will give your cookies the best flavor. I always recommend toasting your nuts and then chopping them; this helps them toast evenly and minimizes the chance of burning in your oven.
- Melted butter. Let your butter cool to the touch before adding your sugars, or you could melt the sugars and ruin your dough. No amount of chilling will fix this, unfortunately.
- Dark brown sugar. Dark brown sugar contains more molasses, which complements the flavors of the pecans.
- Egg + egg yolk. An extra yolk creates tender, moist, and chewy cookies. Adding a full extra egg would make the cookies spread more and would require a chilling step, which I wanted to avoid here. Save the leftover egg white for candied pecans!
- Toffee bits. These are optional, but I love the extra flavor and texture they add. Feel free to crush up some homemade toffee, or use toffee bits sold in the baking aisle at your grocery store. If you grab the store-bought version, you can even use the kind that is coated in chocolate–yum!
SAM’S TIP: Measure your flour properly, or you could end up with a difficult, tough dough. This dough is already stiff, so adding extra flour could make it VERY hard to work with. I also recommend you add your flour gradually for this very reason.
Remember, this is just an overview of the ingredients I used and why. For the full recipe please scroll down to the bottom of the post!
How to Make Butter Pecan Cookies
- Stir the sugars into the cooled melted butter until combined.
- Add the eggs and vanilla and stir well, then set aside.
- Combine the dry ingredients in a separate bowl, then gradually add them to the wet ingredients. I like to do this in three parts and recommend you do the same.
- Add the toasted chopped pecans and toffee pieces (if using) and stir until incorporated. The dough will be stiff–this is normal!
- Scoop the dough into rounded 1 ½ tablespoon balls and roll between your palms, if desired. Place 2″ apart on parchment lined baking sheets and bake for 10-12 minutes at 350F. Let the cookies cool completely on their baking sheets before enjoying.
SAM’S TIP: Do not over-bake your cookies! The edges should be a light golden brown but the centers should still seem soft and even just a hint under-baked. Let them cool completely on the baking sheet, where they’ll finish baking as they cool. This will keep your cookies soft and chewy as opposed to pulling them out of the oven when the centers are firm and fully baked, which will actually result in over-baked, hard cookies.
Frequently Asked Questions
This will happen if your butter is too warm when you add your sugars. Just like when making brown butter toffee cookies, you must let the butter cool to the touch (don’t let it re-solidify though) before adding the sugars, or the sugars will melt and the dough will be ruined. No amount of chilling will fix this unfortunately, so the best thing to do is prevent it from happening in the first place!
This is a stiffer dough, but if yours is overly dry and won’t come together, you may have accidentally added too much flour. I recommend using a kitchen scale to prevent this.
Dry dough can also be caused by adding the dry ingredients all at once instead of gradually, which is why I recommend doing this step in a few parts. Lastly, if your cookies are so stiff they won’t spread, just flatten them on the baking sheet before baking them.
Yes! These butter pecan cookies freeze well. Just follow the instructions for drop cookies in my how to freeze cookie dough post.
Just look at that perfect soft and chewy texture! My favorite 🥰
Enjoy!
Let’s bake together! I’ll be walking you through all the steps in my written recipe and video below! If you try this recipe, be sure to tag me on Instagram, and you can also find me on YouTube and Facebook
Butter Pecan Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 ½ (175 g) heaping cups pecan halves
- 1 cup (226 g) unsalted butter melted and cooled until no longer warm
- 1 ¼ cup (250 g) dark brown sugar tightly packed
- ½ cup (100 g) granulated sugar
- 1 large egg + 1 egg yolk room temperature preferred
- 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
- 3 cups (375 g) all purpose flour**
- 1 teaspoon cornstarch
- ¾ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ¾ teaspoon salt
- ½ cup (120 g) Heath Toffee bits optional, but recommended!
- Flaky sea salt for sprinkling, optional
Recommended Equipment
Instructions
Toast Pecans (optional)
- Preheat oven to 350F (175C) and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- Spread pecan halves evenly over cookie sheet and bake on 350F (175C) for 3-5 minutes.
- Remove from oven (do not turn off your oven) and set aside while you prepare your cookie dough.
Cookie Dough
- In a large bowl, combine melted butter and sugars. Stir well.1 cup (226 g) unsalted butter, 1 ¼ cup (250 g) dark brown sugar, ½ cup (100 g) granulated sugar
- Add eggs, egg yolk, and vanilla extract and stir until well-combined.1 large egg + 1 egg yolk, 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
- In a separate, medium-sized bowl, whisk together flour, cornstarch, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.3 cups (375 g) all purpose flour**, 1 teaspoon cornstarch, ¾ teaspoon baking soda, ½ teaspoon baking powder, ¾ teaspoon salt
- Gradually add flour mixture to wet ingredients until completely combined.
- Coarsely chop your pecans then stir in the pecans and toffee bits until combined.1 ½ (175 g) heaping cups pecan halves, ½ cup (120 g) Heath Toffee bits
- Line cookie sheets with parchment paper and drop cookie dough by heaping 1 ½ Tablespoon onto prepared cookie sheet, spacing at least 2" apart.
- Transfer to 350F oven and bake for 10-12 minutes. Cookies should still look soft/slightly under-done in the centers. Sprinkle with sea salt while warm.
- Allow cookies to cool completely on baking sheet and they will finish baking through as they cool but will stay nice and soft!
Notes
**How to measure flour
If you are using cups, the best way to measure out your flour is to stir it in its bag/container then spoon it into your measuring cup and level off the measuring cup. Packing in your flour (over-measuring it) will leave you with a dry/crumbly cookie dough.Storing
Store any leftover, cooled cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for 3-5 days.Nutrition
Nutritional information is based on third-party calculations and should be considered an estimate only. Actual nutritional content will vary based upon brands used, measuring methods, cooking method, portion sizes, and more.
Related Recipes
Recipe originally published December of 2018. Post has been updated with new photos and a new video, but recipe remains the same.
Charese
I baked these cookies once before and they were AMAZING! I thought I posted my review before. I want to bake them again but I would like to double the ingredients. Do you recommend doing that or should I just whip up an extra batch?
Sam
Hi Charese! I’m so glad you enjoyed them! You can certainly make a double batch of these. 🙂
kelly
I absolutely love these cookies. I made my own Toffee with the link provided last time… but it isn’t the same link anymore… The one I was sent too was super easy with just butter and brown sugar.. Do you have that link? I would love to get it!
Thank you!
Sam
Hi Kelly! I don’t have a different toffee recipe. I haven’t changed that recipe since it was published. I’m glad you enjoyed the cookies though! 🙂
Rosemarie van Leeuwen
I usually mix baking soda, powder, salt with my flour because adding separately sometimes you end up with baking soda/powder not distributed enough and you can taste it. I do fluff up my flour before measuring and I don’t pack it. Should have used the gram measurement.
When I came to the end of my dry ingredients it looked like too much but figured I had to use it because of the leavening agents in the mixture. The dough came out crumbly and wouldn’t stick together. I added some cream and managed to make one test tray of cookies that didn’t fall apart. I’m now chilling the dough and hopefully that will help. I chose this recipe because you didn’t have to chill the dough. Very disappointing when everyone else’s comments were wonderful!
Sam
I’m so sorry to hear this, Rosemarie! I just want to double check that you used 1 egg and an egg yolk in this recipe? Did you make any other substitutions?
Kenyadah Prime
I have made this cookie multiple times and I am having the same issue. I have to add an extra stick of butter but the texture isn’t what I’m wanting. Do you have any other suggestions?
Melissa Pyle
These are AMAZING! I didn’t even use the toffee chips. They’re so soft and buttery! These are definitely going on my Christmas Cookie list from now on! These advice to take them out just as they’re set and to finish baking on sheet made them just the perfect texture. Thanks again for another great recipe!
Bobbie Foster
I was wondering if I can use light brown sugar instead of dark brown sugar?
Sam
Hi Bobbie! You will lose some flavor and richness but you can.
Jennifer Lorensen
I tried these for the first time Thanksgiving weekend 2024.😛 Wonderful taste and texture, will be a keeper recipe for sure. I appreciated the excellent instructions too.
dks64
I made these cookies yesterday and they turned out so good! The texture and flavor are perfect. I didn’t have heath pieces, but I may pick some up for next time. Thanks for sharing!
Vivian
Hi,
If I wanted to make the cookie dough in advance a day before baking, would I need to modify the recipe in any way?
Thanks!
Sam
Hi Vivian! The nuts in the dough can dry out the dough a little bit so there’s a chance the cookies won’t spread properly if chilled that long in the refrigerator. I would do a test run with a few cookies and if they don’t spread when baking simply flatten the dough balls out before baking. 🙂
Janitze
Approximately how many cookies does the recipe yield please?
Sam
Hi Janitze! This will make 28 cookies. For future reference this is always listed right above the video in the purple box. 🙂
TA
Excellent recipe. I was in intrigued about your comments of using the scale and decided to use one this time. When I was weighing the toffee, it was taking more than 1/2 bag of a 226 gram bag. When it didn’t look right, I poured it into a 1/2 measuring cup (the written amount in the recipe) and it was much less. I decided to use the half cup rather than the 120 g that was listed which was ~80g. Was this a typo or were my toffee bits too light or do you think my scale is in error?
Sam
That’s interesting that it’s so different. I think it can probably depend on the size of the bits in your bag. I personally use the 120g but either measurement will work. 🙂
Colmerauer
Love this recipe! I live in France and was looking for the taste of American cookies I missed so much, there it is!
Congrats and thanks for sharing !
Carol
I have been baking for many years and I’m generally not one to post comments or reviews. I came across this recipe and thought I would give it a try. OMG!! These cookies are beyond incredible!! Easy to make and bake up beautifully. I baked at 10 mins and they were perfect! Thank you for this recipe!!!
kreative1
I would love to make these but I keep getting Chinese Toyota ad going through content, like right now as I am typing this. I can’t see what I’m typing so I hope there aren’t too many misspelled words.
Bummer, I’m not going to be able to make any of your recipes because of this and many other ads going across the screen continuously.
Sam
Oh no! I am so sorry! You should absolutely not have an ad pop up and cover your screen! I will look into it and try to get that ad removed. I am truly sorry and do not want these kinds of overly intrusive ads. 🙁
Janice
Flavor, texture added pop of sea salt…….absolutely perfect and I didn’t have the Toffee bits but didn’t miss them at all. A really delicious cookie
Jim Plowman
These are awesome! Couldn’t stop eating them.