Packed with real strawberry flavour and white chocolate chips, these chewy strawberry white chocolate cookies require no extracts, flavourings or cake mix to give that authentic strawberry taste!
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I’ve been working on a classic chewy chocolate chip cookie recipe over the last few weeks. Today’s strawberry white chocolate cookies were developed from that recipe, but I felt I had to post these first as they are perfect for Valentine’s Day!
This recipe was much more challenging than I was expecting, mainly due to wanting to flavour them naturally with real strawberry flavour. No extracts, flavourings or flavoured box cake mix here!
My first few test batches involved the use of strawberry jam, but no matter how much jam I added, the flavour was non-existent. I did consider reducing some real strawberries down to make a purée but worried the moisture would prevent a chunky cookie.
Then I considered what turned out to be the winning ingredient – freeze-dried strawberries!
Freeze-dried strawberry white chocolate cookies
This suddenly made so much sense! They are real strawberries with the authentic flavour I was after. By blending them in my food processor they turned into strawberry dust which incorporated brilliantly into my cookie dough. It took a few batches to work out exactly how much strawberry dust I needed but I got there. I’m so happy with them!
(Other recipes where I use fresh strawberries for that real strawberry flavour include my No-Bake Strawberry White Chocolate Cheesecake and my No-Churn Strawberry Cheesecake Ice Cream!)
Strawberry White Chocolate Cookie Ingredients
Full measurements can be found in the recipe card at the bottom of this blog post, but here’s a quick summary! To make this easy strawberry and white chocolate chip cookies recipe you’ll need the following ingredients:
- Plain flour for structure
- Cornflour for softer cookies
- Bicarbonate of soda helps with thickness by slightly leavening the cookies
- Salt to balance the flavours
- Freeze-dried strawberries for real strawberry flavour without the excess moisture from fresh strawberries!
- Caster sugar for sweetness and to help the cookies spread
- Butter also helps with spread, as well as making the cookies soft and chewy
- Egg yolks make the cookies extra chewy
- White chocolate chips complement the strawberry flavour perfectly
- Red/pink food colouring is optional but I like to add a touch to make them extra pretty!
The great thing about using softened butter instead of melted butter? The dough doesn’t require any chilling before baking!
(If you want extra chocolatey cookies, check out my Chewy Triple Chocolate Chip Cookies or my Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies. Or, for a delicious chocolate and nut combination, try my White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies)!
Real strawberry flavour in cookies using freeze-dried strawberries
Don’t get freeze-dried and dried strawberries confused! We’re not using the soft, jelly-like strawberries here. I was a little concerned about the ease of finding this ingredient as I want this recipe to be user-friendly.
I bought a large bag as I needed a lot for recipe testing. But after some research, I found freeze-dried strawberries are available in supermarkets such as Sainsbury’s, Waitrose and Tesco, usually in 7g packs. I’ve found the cheapest to be Tesco, where I found 7g packs for £1 each.
However, I bought a 100g bag for £8.99 and it has a long expiry date. So if you think you’ll use them for other things (great sprinkled on cereal, or making lots of these cookies! 😉) then this may be more cost-effective for you!
How to make strawberry white chocolate chip cookies from scratch
Full instructions with step-by-step photos can be found in the recipe card at the bottom of this post, but in summary:
- Preheat your oven to 180°/160° fan and have your baking tray(s) ready. I love using silicone baking trays as I find that cookies bake more evenly on them and they don’t need lining. If you don’t have silicone baking trays, simply line your chosen baking tray with baking/parchment paper or a silicone baking mat
- Place your freeze-dried strawberries into your food processor and pulse to a fine strawberry dust
- Measure out your plain flour, cornflour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and strawberry dust into a medium-sized bowl. Whisk together and set aside
- Add the softened butter and caster sugar to the bowl of your stand mixer (or a large bowl if using a hand mixer) and with the beater attachment fitted, beat for one whole minute on medium speed until pale and fluffy
- Next, add the egg yolks and some red or pink gel food colouring (more advice on food colouring can be found further down this post), then beat again on medium speed for around 10-20 seconds until combined
- Add half of the dry ingredients to this bowl and beat on low speed until just combined. Repeat with the final half of dry ingredients
- Finally, add the white chocolate chips to the bowl and again, beat on low speed until just combined
- Measure out two level tablespoons of dough per cookie. Press them together and roll into a cookie ball in the palms of your hands. Place around 7-8 cookie dough balls per tray to allow space for them to spread in the oven.
- Bake in your preheated oven for 10 minutes. They will look slightly pale and underbaked in the middle when you remove them but this is ok
- Place the baking tray on a work surface and leave the cookies on the tray for around 5-7 minutes. The heat from the tray allows the cookies to finish baking in the centre; this technique keeps the centres soft instead of cakey.
- Whilst the cookies are on the tray and still warm from the oven, press 2-3 more white chocolate chips on top of each cookie. This is mainly for appearance but I think it makes them look so much better!
- After leaving the cookies on the tray for 5-7 minutes, carefully remove them with a spatula and place onto a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
The best food colouring for strawberry white chocolate cookies
In terms of adding colour to these cookies, I definitely recommend only using gel food colouring. If you use a liquid type you risk ruining the consistency of the dough. This will result in a flatter, thinner cookie.
For my batch, I dipped a cocktail stick in my red gel food colouring once and it gave a pale pink colour. I did test it with three cocktail sticks of colouring and they were more of a hot pink colour! I love the subtle pastel colour but feel free to go bolder! The strawberry dust will add some colour too so just keep that in mind when adding your gel colouring.
Tips for making the best chewy strawberry white chocolate chip cookies
- Using room temperature ingredients is important to allow all the ingredients to combine together smoothly. Measure out your butter first; I cut it into small cubes on a plate to come to room temperature more quickly. For the eggs, if you store yours in the fridge, simply place them in a bowl of warm water after weighing out your butter. This will slowly bring them to room temperature!
- Measuring out your flour accurately is also important for cookies. A little too much flour can make the cookies dry, cracked and limit their ability to spread in the oven. Using too little flour will cause them to spread too much in the oven.
- Don’t put too many cookie dough balls on your baking sheet as they may spread into each other! I tend to bake no more than 7-8 at a time to give them plenty of room to spread.
- Using two level tablespoons of dough per cookie gives a nice medium-sized cookie. If you want slightly larger cookies, simply add an extra level tablespoon of dough and bake for around 2 minutes longer.
- My trick for perfectly round cookies? As soon as you remove the baked cookies from the oven and place the tray on your countertop, grab a spatula and gently push any misshapen cookie edges inwards to look more rounded. This is easy to do in the first minute or two as they’ll be super soft straight from the oven!
- To finish I always like to press 3-4 extra chocolate chips on top of my cookies as soon as they are out of the oven; this is purely for appearance but I think it makes such a difference!
- I do highly recommend using a silicone baking tray for the most evenly baked cookies. It doesn’t need lining and is easy to clean – I have two trays so I can keep a nice rhythm when baking batches of cookies!
COOKIE FAQS
WHY ARE MY CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES CAKEY AND NOT CHEWY?
The main issues might be too much flour, overbaking, or if not enough butter was added. Overbaking is tempting as the cookies will look slightly underbaked in the centre after baking for 10 minutes. However, leaving the warm tray on your countertop for 5-7 minutes after removing from the oven allows the centres to continue baking through, whilst keeping the centre slightly softer than the edges.
‘Cakey’ cookies can also result from overbeating the butter and sugar or using baking powder instead of bicarbonate of soda. These can over-leaven the cookies making them more cake-like in the centre.
WHY AREN’T MY COOKIES SPREADING IN THE OVEN?
Causes include adding too much flour or not enough butter or sugar. Another cause can be the oven temperature being too low; the correct temperature is needed to melt the butter and sugar in the dough, allowing the cookies to spread properly.
Why are my cookies spreading too much in the oven?
Too little flour or too much butter, sugar or egg can cause overspreading. Remember, this recipe calls for egg yolks only, no egg whites! Also, if your oven temperature is too high it can cause the butter and sugar to melt too quickly, causing overspreading.
CAN I FREEZE UNBAKED AND BAKED COOKIES?
Unbaked cookie dough balls freeze really well! Simply place them in an airtight container (if stacking on top of each other, place a piece of baking/parchment paper between them) and freeze. They can then be baked from frozen, just give them an extra 1-2 minutes in the oven!
Baked cookies also freeze well, again stored in the same way as unbaked cookie dough balls. They don’t take much time to defrost when individually placed on your countertop, but you could always pop it in the microwave briefly if you can’t wait!
CAN I USE BAKING POWDER INSTEAD OF BICARBONATE OF SODA IN COOKIES?
Unfortunately, no – baking powder will make the cookies cakey rather than chewy, so I wouldn’t recommend it.
CAN I USE MELTED BUTTER INSTEAD OF SOFTENED BUTTER IN THIS COOKIE RECIPE?
I’ve tested this recipe using softened butter so that the dough doesn’t require chilling before baking. I’ve not tried it with melted butter so I wouldn’t recommend it as I imagine you might end up with flat, greasy cookie puddles!
So, to summarise, these cookies are:
- Soft and slightly chewy with a crisp edge
- Full of real strawberry flavour
- Packed with white chocolate chips
- Quick and easy to make
- Ready to bake straight away without chilling the dough
If you try this recipe I’d love to see! You can show me by tagging me @bakerjoblog or using #bakerjoblog!
Other cookie and biscuit recipes to try:
- Nutella Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Triple Chocolate Chip Cookie Pizza
- White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies
- Chewy Triple Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Peanut Butter Banana Dog Treats
- Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Welsh Cake Shortbread
- Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
Strawberry White Chocolate Cookies
Equipment
- Electric stand or hand mixer
- Whisk
- Baking tray (silicone best for most even baking)
Ingredients
- 260 g plain flour
- 2 tsp cornflour
- 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 28 g freeze-dried strawberries food processor required to blend to a strawberry dust
- 190 g unsalted butter softened
- 230 g caster sugar
- 2 medium egg yolks room temperature
- 1-3 cocktail stick dips of red or pink gel food colouring
- 140 g white chocolate chips plus extra to press on top once baked
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 180°/160° fan.
- In a food processor, pulse the freeze-dried strawberries into fine strawberry dust.
- Add the plain flour, cornflour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and strawberry dust into a medium sized bowl. Whisk togther until combined and then set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment (or a medium/large bowl if using an electric hand mixer), beat the softened butter and sugar on medium speed for 1 minute. It will look slightly paler in colour and will be a little fluffy.
- Add the egg yolks and your chosen amount of red/pink gel food colouring and beat on medium speed until incorporated (about 10-15 seconds).
- Add half the dry ingredients and beat on low speed until just combined, then repeat with the remaining half.
- Add the white chocolate chips and beat on low speed until just combined (around 10 seconds).
- Scoop 2 level tablespoons of dough per cookie. Press each tablespoon together and then roll into a ball. Evenly space out no more than 8 dough balls on a baking tray.
- Place the tray into the oven for 10 minutes. The centres will look slightly underbaked at this point but that's ok.
- Once removed from the oven, place the tray on a work surface for 5-7 minutes as the centres will continue to bake on the warm tray. While they're still warm, for perfectly round cookies use a spatula to lightly push any misshapen cookie edges inward to look more rounded. You can also lightly press a few extra white chocolate chips on top while they're still warm. This is optional but I think it makes them look prettier!
- After 5-7 minutes, remove cookies from the tray and place on a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
- Store in an airtight container at room temperature. Best eaten with 3 days.
These look absolutely amazing! The pictures are so beautiful I’m going to make these this weekend for sure!
Author
Thank you so much Brittney that means a lot! I’d love to see them if you do make them! You could use #bakerjoblog on Instagram or Twitter 😊
Any questions let me know!