These are the perfect chewy White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies! This white chocolate macadamia nut cookie recipe makes cookies that are thick and chewy and packed with toasted macadamia nuts and white chocolate chips.
There is something about the flavor combination of white chocolate chips and toasted macadamia nuts in a chewy brown sugar cookie that is unparalleled. Growing up, these were the cookies that I could not resist at Subway. I would order a veggie sub sandwich just so I had an excuse to treat myself to two cookies! Perhaps that helped augment my CCC obsession, but there are worse fixations to have! Imagine with me a cookie jar filled with these, some Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip cookies, my favorite Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies, and maybe some Triple Chocolate Chip cookies?! {Sounds like a dream...or maybe sounds like next week! ?}
I think the magic of this white chocolate macadamia nut cookie recipe lies in the salty sweet pairing. The salty macadamia nuts paired with the sweet brown sugar is addicting! Plus, when they are perfectly baked, the white chocolate caramelizes just a touch, which adds a depth of flavor that tops even Subway’s white chocolate macadamia nut cookies!
Table of Contents
Should you toast macadamia nuts for cookies?
I either buy roasted salted macadamia nuts or toast the macadamia nuts myself for this white chocolate macadamia nut cookie recipe. Once toasted they become crunchy and develop a deep, rich flavor. The crunch and salt adds a beautiful contrast to the soft, chewy white chocolate macadamia nut cookies.
What makes these the best white chocolate macadamia nut cookies?
These white chocolate macadamia nut cookies are soft, chewy and thick! They are packed with toasted macadamia nuts and white chocolate. The salty, crunchy macadamia nuts balance the sweetness of the chewy brown sugar cookie base.
Ingredients
- All-purpose flour: All-purpose flour has just the right amount of gluten to make a soft, chewy cookie.
- Baking Soda: Baking soda reacts with an acid, the molasses in light brown sugar in this instance, to leaven the cookies. It reacts more powerfully than baking powder and will create a more dramatic rise, but will not continue to react in the heat of the oven or without the presence of an acid.
- Kosher Salt: Kosher salt is lass salty than table salt and a teaspoon weighs less than other finer ground varieties. It heightens the flavor here and will keep your cookies from tasting dull or flat.
- Butter: I use unsalted butter for baking, because you want to control the amount of salt you are adding. Every brand is different and it makes adjusting the recipe a challenge.
- Light Brown Sugar: Using light brown sugar adds sweetness along with a little moisture. This will keep the cookies softer while adding a nice, rich molasses flavor.
- Granulated Sugar: Granulated sugar is obviously here for sweetness, but if you add too much in proportion to the butter and flour, the cookies will spread rather than stay tall and chewy
- Whole Egg: The eggs are here to add fat, moisture and leavening. The fat from the yolk adds richness and helps keep the cookies chewy. Beating in the eggs just enough will add a little or a lot of leavening depending on the desired texture. Eggs also emulsify the batter and keep everything texturally perfect.
- Vanilla Extract: Vanilla Extract adds a beautiful flavor itself but it also boosts the flavor of other ingredients around it like white chocolate and brown sugar.
- White Chocolate Chips: Quality makes a big difference when it comes to white chocolate chips. I prefer Ghirardelli Classic White Chocolate Chips or Guittard if you want to splurge, but, honestly, Tollhouse makes a good white chocolate chip.
- Macadamia Nuts: This recipe is written for unsalted macadamia nuts, but if you can only find roasted, salted macadamia nuts, then reduce the salt in the recipe by a ¼ teaspoon.
Variations
- Pistachio White Chocolate: Substitute 1 cup of toasted pistachios for the macadamia nuts, and you’ll have a delightful variation!
- Mixed Nuts: This cookie dough is the perfect base for a mixed nut cookie! Make a custom mixture of your favorite toasted nuts. I suggest pistachios, pecans and walnuts. For an extra easy variation, reduced the salt to ¼ teaspoon and used canned mixed roasted nuts!
- Bar Cookies: Press the cookie dough into a small rimmed baking sheet (half the size of the ones you bake on) and bake in a preheated oven until the center no longer looks doughy, the edges are a nice golden brown, and the center has browned slightly. Cool completely before slicing.
Substitutions
- White Chocolate: You can also chop bars or larger chunks of white chocolate for this recipe. They will create beautiful melty pools of chocolate. Some might even caramelize for an extra special treat!
- Caramelized White Chocolate: Rather than hoping your chocolate chips or chunks caramelize, you could caramelize your own white chocolate! You can also buy caramelized white chocolate now. It is sometimes called “Dulce.”
- Baking Powder: The recipe is written with baking soda but it will work with baking powder as well. In this particular recipe substitute ½ teaspoon baking powder for the 1 teaspoon of baking soda. The baking powder will react on its own and will add more leavening than the baking soda. Baking soda is only reacting with the little bit of molasses in the light brown sugar. That limits its potency.
- Dark Brown Sugar: If you don’t have light brown sugar on hand, you can absolutely substitute dark brown sugar in equal amounts. The flavor will just be a bit more robust but you will still get all the benefits of the added moisture and caramel notes.
- Salted Nuts: If you use roasted, salted macadamia nuts like I did in the YouTube video, reduce the kosher salt in the recipe to ½ teaspoon.
How to ensure chewy white chocolate macadamia cookies?
- Cold yet pliable butter: The biggest secret to chewy cookies is keeping your butter cold yet pliable. It should be softened to the point where you can press your finger easily into it, but it should still be cold. This will help in the next important point.
- Under creaming: Beat the butter and sugar together just enough to where it makes a paste. Then beat in the eggs individually, but very thoroughly. This will incorporate just the right amount of air.
- Baking soda: In these cookies the only acidic ingredient is the light brown sugar. Using 100% baking soda ensures less of a reaction and less fluffy cookies than baking powder would. The baking soda will react one time when it comes into contact with the brown sugar rather than twice like baking powder. Baking powder reacts with the acidic ingredients and again when it is heated.
- Chilling the dough: The thickest, chewiest cookies come from chilled dough. I scoop and roll the dough before refrigerating so that it chills faster. Baking the dough from frozen will also keep the cookies nice and thick and chewy.
- These are all the aspects of the recipe that you can control to ensure chewy white chocolate macadamia nut cookies; however, there is a whole different list of reasons why the particular ratio of ingredients in this recipe produces thick, chewy cookies. But that is a story for another time.
Frequently Asked Questions
I store white chocolate macadamia nut cookies in an airtight container at room temperature or frozen.
These white chocolate macadamia nut cookies will keep up to 10 days at room temperature or several months frozen.
You can freeze the baked cookies for up to 2 months, or freeze the cookie dough balls. That way you can bake them fresh at any time.
Yes! Roll the frozen cookie dough balls in granulated sugar right before baking. Bake at 325°F for 10-14 minutes straight from frozen! Bake until the edges have begun to brown, the centers are puffed and the outside has begun to crack. The center should look matte rather than shiny.
You can make as large a batch of these white chocolate macadamia nut cookies as your mixer can manage. These are in my bake shop Pastry Creation’s classic cookie tins, so we’ve made 49Kg at a time!
These cookies ship wonderfully. Package in a decorative tin or just place in a zip-top bag in a mailer box. They keep for 10 days and they stay chewy for almost as long. The larger the macadamia nut cookie, the longer they stay chewy!
I would advise you to, yes. Chilling the macadamia nut cookie dough before baking will create thicker, chewier cookies.
Chef Lindsey's Recipe Tips
If you want an even distribution of macadamia nuts and chocolate chips on top, add a few extra to the ones who received less right before baking. Your secret is safe with me!
Recipe
Perfect Chewy White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies
Ingredients
- 2 ⅔ cups All-purpose Flour (325g)
- 1 teaspoon Baking soda
- ¾ teaspoon Salt
- ¾ cup Butter (cold but pliable)
- 1 cup Light brown sugar (very well packed)
- ½ cup Granulated Sugar
- 2 Eggs
- 2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract
- 1 cup White Chocolate Chips
- 1 cup Macadamia Nuts (chopped)
Instructions
- In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda and salt just to distribute the salt and baking soda. Set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, add the butter, light brown sugar and granulated sugar. Beat on medium high until a smooth paste forms that lightens slightly. The key is not to over-cream the butter and sugars, in order to keep the cookies chewy!
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating each one in completely. I like to scrape down the sides of the bowl in between, paying extra careful attention to the bottom. Sugar and butter like to collect there!
- Beat in the vanilla extract.
- Reduce the mixer speed to low and then slowly add in the flour mixture. To minimize gluten development, I add the next bit of flour before the last one has incorporated completely. Adding too much at one time will take longer to mix in and, thus, develop more gluten.
- After the flour has been incorporated, add the white chocolate chips and macadamia nuts. Mix to combine and distribute the mix-ins.
- Scoop or portion dough into balls approximately the size of a golf ball. Refrigerate at least 2 hours or until firm. Cookie dough balls can also be frozen at this point. For perfectly shaped cookies, chill the dough then roll the balls perfectly round before chilling again.
- Preheat the oven to 325°F convection or standard.
- Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Bake cookies approximately 10 minutes for the convection setting. Cookies baked non-convection might need another minute or two. You are looking for a nice golden brown around the edges and the centers to look matte (not shiny or doughy).
- Cool completely…or don’t!
Video Instructions
Notes
Before You Go!
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