Rye Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe

These chocolate chip cookies have a crispy exterior with a chewy center, and the rye flour gives a nice nutty complexity to balance the chocolate.

Does anyone need another chocolate chip cookie recipe? Probably not. But do you want one? Seeing as you’re reading this right now, I feel it’s same to assume the answer to that question is yes. I can guarantee that these rye chocolate chip cookies are certainly worth taking up space on the internet and deserving of your time and energy to bake them.

What Is Rye Flour?

Rye flour (obviously) comes from rye grains (as opposed to wheat). It is commonly used in the production of rye and sourdough breads. When shopping for rye flour, you may notice that it is labeled either light, medium, or dark. These classification refer to the amount of bran and germ that has been removed, with dark rye flour containing the most bran and germ left intact. (You may also see bags labeled pumpernickel flour, which hasn’t had anything removed.)

What Does Rye Flour Taste Like?

If you’ve ever had rye bread, then you should have an idea of what rye flour tastes like. To me, there’s a nutty, slightly sour, earthiness to it that adds a good deal of complexity to something so common as a chocolate chip cookie. In this recipe in particular, it really balances the sweetness and plays off the chocolate.

What Is the Difference Between Rye and Wheat Flour?

Aside from the flavor differences noted above, in general, rye flour is more nutritious than wheat flour, particularly the darker it is. This is because it tends to be less processed, meaning that more fiber and nutrients are left intact. And for those concerned with their gluten intake, rye flour does contain the protein, but not as much as wheat.

Rye Flour Substitutions

Rye flour is obviously the star of this recipe. I used a dark rye flour from Bob’s Red Mill. But if you can’t find it or don’t want to wait to order it, the folks from Milk Street say that whole-wheat or graham flour is a suitable substitute. And if you don’t have either of those, then regular all-purpose flour will work just fine in this recipe, but this may not be the case for all recipes.

What Chocolate Should I Use for Cookies?

I’m always of the mindset that you should use the best ingredients that you can afford. This doesn’t necessarily mean it will be the most expensive, and sometimes the difference is negligible for certain ingredients—but chocolate isn’t one of those items. I recommend skipping the bags of chocolate chips in the baking aisle and instead grabbing a couple of bars of the “fancy chocolate” to chop up and add to the cookie dough.

As you can see, I opted for Ghirardelli Chocolate Intense Dark with 86% cacao because I happened to have them leftover from another recipe I was testing. If that is too bitter for you, then feel free to go with a lighter chocolate. But at the end of the day, you can really use whatever chocolate you feel like—milk, semi-sweet, dark, chips, wafers, or bars. Most of my recipes are mere suggestions listing what I think you should use, but I give you the authority to make the decisions that are best for you.

How to Make Chocolate Chip Cookies

Start by mixing softened (room temperature) butter with white and brown sugar.

Stir in a large egg along with some vanilla extract to the butter and sugar.

Add all of the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, and salt) to the bowl and stir together.

Chop up the chocolate bars and add to the cookie dough.

Portion the cookie dough, place on a parchment-lined baking sheet, and sprinkle with some flaky sea salt before baking.

Let the cookies cool for a couple of minutes on the baking sheet before transferring to a wire rack to cool further.

How to Make Cookies Look Professional

Though cookies will taste the same regardless of how they look, we eat with our eyes first (as the saying goes.) To make professional-looking, photo-worthy cookies, it all starts with making sure they’re the same size, and the easiest way to do this is with a food scoop. For these large cookies, I used a #20 food scoop that fits between 3 tablespoons and 1/4 cup. (And for reference, I use the #40 scoop when I want smaller cookies.) Making sure they’re uniformly sized also help insure that they bake evenly, which is another necessary characteristic.

The second most important thing I’ve learned over the years is that the way they look before they go into the oven will impact the way they look when they come out (which seems very obvious when I type it out). In the images below, I tested out a few different methods—just scoop; scoop and roll with my hands to smooth it out; and scoop, roll, and flatten. I found the last option most aesthetically pleasing, but you can feel free to pick whichever one you like most. (And different methods might look best with different types of dough, so this topic might be worth exploring further with different recipes.)

More Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipes

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Coffee and Sea Salt
Chewy Chocolate Chunk Cookies
My Original “Perfect” Chocolate Chip Cookies