Name: Brown Butter Snickerdoodles
Prep time: 45 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 55 min
Yield: 20
Cuisine: American
Ingredients: 1/2 cup unsalted butter, diced; 1/2 cup granulated sugar; 1/2 cup dark brown sugar; 1 teaspoon cinnamon; 1 egg + 1 egg yolk; 2 teaspoon vanilla extract; 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour; 1 teaspoon cream of tartar; 1/4 teaspoon baking soda; 1/4 teaspoon salt; 1/3 cup granulated sugar; 1/2 tablespoon cinnamon

Perfectly chewy and sweet brown butter snickerdoodles made with toasty brown butter and plenty of cinnamon sugar!

The Best Brown Butter Snickerdoodles

Brown butter, warm cinnamon, and sweet sugar? Put it all together and you have the recipe for the best brown butter snickerdoodle cookies.

Growing up, snickerdoodles were one of the first cookies that I learned to make from scratch on my own. During the holidays, I would use my mom’s classic recipe to make the little balls, roll them in cinnamon sugar, and then bake until perfectly chewy and golden.

Watch How to Make This Recipe

If you’re a regular All the Healthy Things reader then you know we love brown butter around here. (These brown butter chocolate chip cookies are both a personal and reader favorite!) So, you know we had to add a little of that golden brown buttery goodness to these snickerdoodle cookies and trust me…they do not disappoint!

There’s nothing like a really good snickerdoodle cookie with all that toasty cinnamon sugar and this recipe is one of the best. I hope you love them as much as we do!

Ingredients in Brown Butter Snickerdoodle Cookies

Butter – I can’t stress enough the importance of using a butter that actually tastes good in this recipe. This is the time to splurge a little on that grass-fed butter if you can.
Dark Brown Sugar: we’re using a little dark brown sugar to give the cookies extra flavor.
Granulated Sugar
Cinnamon: literally my favorite thing about snickerdoodles is all of the delicious cinnamon.
Eggs
Vanilla: I include a measurement in the recipe, but feel free to go with your heart, haha!
All Purpose Flour
Cream of Tartar: this gives the snickerdoodles that classic tang and also helps to make them chewy and delicious.
Baking Soda
Salt: a pinch of salt is so important in baking to really give your baked goods the right flavor.

Can I Make This Recipe Dairy Free?

I have not tried making this recipe dairy free but if you have experience with using vegan butter when baking, go for it and let me know how the cookies turn out!

Flour – if you need to make this recipe gluten free, I recommend using a 1 to 1 all purpose gluten free flour. King Arthurand Cup 4 Cup are two great options that I have used personally.

Can I Swap Almond Flour or Coconut Flour for AP Flour?

Nope! Replacing the all purpose flour with almond flour or coconut flour, 1-to-1 will not work in this recipe.

Helpful Cookie Baking Tools

What is Brown Butter?

What makes these cookies a bit different from traditional snickerdoodle cookies is the brown butter. If you have never made brown butter before you are in for a real treat. It’s absolutely delicious and so easy to make!

Brown butter is melted and cooked until the milk solids in the butter have become toasted. Gently cooking the butter removes the water content while also browning the milk solids hence the name, brown butter.

Browned butter has a deep, rich, nutty, and toasted aroma and flavor that pairs perfectly with the cinnamon and sugar in these cookies.

Want a full tutorial on browning butter? Check out our guide on HOW TO MAKE BROWN BUTTER

How to Make Brown Butter Snickerdoodles

Step One: Make the brown butter and set aside too cool.

Step Two: Whisk together the sugar, eggs, cinnamon, vanilla, and brown butter.

Step Three: Sift in the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt into the wet ingredients and then stir together until you have cookie dough.

Step Four: Let the dough chill for 30 minutes!

Step Five: Make the cinnamon sugar topping my mixing together the granulated sugar and cinnamon.

Step Six: Once the dough has chilled, use a cookie scoop to scoop the dough and roll it into balls. Then, roll those balls into the cinnamon sugar topping until they are completely coated. Place the cookie dough balls onto a baking sheet that’s been lined with parchment paper, 2 inches apart.

Step Seven: Bake the cookies at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Sprinkle a bit of extra cinnamon sugar on top of the cookies before they cool for extra goodness!

How to Freeze

Cookie Dough: scoop the cookie dough into balls and place them on a parchment lined baking sheet. Transfer the sheet pan to the freezer and freeze the cookie dough balls for an hour or until solid. Once the cookie dough balls are frozen solid transfer them to a freezer safe storage bag and store for up to 3 months. You can bake the cookies from frozen, just add a few extra minutes to the cook time.

Baked Cookies: once the cookies have baked, let them come to a complete cool. Transfer the cookies to a freezer safe storage bag and freeze for up to 3 to 4 weeks.

Tips and Tricks for the Best Cookies

Measure your flour properly – be sure to spoon and level the flour into your measuring cup when measuring out your flour to prevent adding too much flour to the recipe.
Don’t skip chilling the dough – I know it can seem like a pain, but don’t skip chilling the dough. It makes such a difference in the overall flavor of the cookies!
Change the thickness – if you like a thicker puffier snickerdoodle then you can bake the dough straight from balls. If you want a thinner cookie, press them down a bit before baking.
Use parchment paper – to prevent the cookies from sticking, line your baking sheet with parchment paper or a nonstick silicone baking mat. It will make the cookies even easier to remove and clean up will be a breeze.
Don’t over bake – speaking of baking, don’t over bake your cookies! the bottoms should be golden, the edges set, and the tops should still look fudgy or slightly underdone. The cookies will continue to firm up as the cool. Check the cookies after 6-7 minutes and keep a close watch on them.
Let the cookie sheet cool – depending on the size of your cookie sheet you will likely have to bake the cookies in multiple batches. For the best results let the sheet pan come to a complete cool before adding more cookie dough.