Levain Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe is a homemade version of the famous Levain Bakery cookies. Delicious giant chocolate chip cookies with a crispy outside and gooey inside, these cookies are the best ever!
Levain Cookies are a giant thick chocolate chip cookie that is claimed to be the world’s greatest chocolate chip cookie. Its thick and bakes at a high temperature to give the outside a crusty crispy outside shell and keep the inside nice and gooey!
The original levain bakery cookies are 6 oz, and are as big as your hand, gigantic cookies. I like making mine about 3oz instead because they are still HUGE, but now the recipe makes twice as many cookies, which is perfect for sharing, and keeps the cookies a little more manageable so you don’t mind eating the whole thing at once.
Weigh out the cookie dough on a digital food scale, or scoop the dough evenly into 15 or 16 dough balls.
This levain bakery chocolate chip cookie recipe is adapted from a few different recipes I found online, firstly from A Bountiful Kitchen. I always make the cookies with just chocolate chips (and no walnuts) to keep them perfectly chocolatey throughout, but check out Si’s recipe if you like walnuts as well!
Now, I want complete honesty, I’ve actually never tried a Levain cookie! I know I know 🙁 Its on my food bucket list, but we have a local cookie place that also makes 6oz giant gooey chocolate chip cookies that is modeled after Levain. I’ve adapted my recipe to be a little like theirs by using only Guittard Milk Chocolate Chips, but the original Levain chocolate chip cookies use semi sweet chocolate instead. Adapt the recipe to your preference!
If you have or haven’t tried the original New York City cookies, you need to make these cookies at home! Even if you live in NYC you can now make these at home, without spending 4$ a cookie and standing in line for who knows how long!
Tips and Tricks
- Cold Butter: Make sure to use cold butter, slice it and then add it to cream with the sugar. This is one step to help keep your cookies thick, and from spreading out.
- Don’t Skimp: These cookies are loaded with chocolate chips. If you don’t use a full 3 cups of chocolate chips you will need to add nuts, or extra flour to make up for the difference.
- Chill the Dough: I can usually bake these immediately and they turn out thick, but if you bake a test cookie and it spreads more than you like, scoop the dough into the portions, and place them on a pan and chill in the fridge for 1 hour.
- Don’t Lower the Oven Temperature: I know 400 F seems high, but this allows the outside of the cookies to crisp up first, and helps the cookies rise taller, without giving them more time to spread as they cook. This will also keep the centers nice and gooey, which we love!
Mini Levain Bakery Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup butter (cold, unsalted, two sticks)
- 3/4 cup brown sugar (packed)
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 1 TBS cornstarch
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 3 cups chocolate chips
Equipment
- Large Mixing Bowl
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
- Cut your butter into slices.
- Place butter slices into a large mixing bowl and beat with mixer (stand mixer is preferred if you have it – use the paddle attachment) until it starts to smooth.
- Add in the sugars and beat for about 1-2 minutes until smooth.
- Add in the eggs and beat until just incorporated.
- Dump in the flour, cornstarch, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
- Mix on low speed until the wet and dry ingredients are combined.
- Pour in the chocolate chips and pulse the mixture 7 or 8 times until they are mixed evenly throughout the batter.
- Measure out the batter to be 3 to 3.5 oz, grabbing and placing the dough with your hands. Don’t pack it or roll the dough into a tight ball.
- Place 6 cookies per cookie sheet. (A silicone liner works great)
- Place in the oven to bake for about 8 minutes, or until the cookie top and bottom are golden.
- Allow the cookies to rest on the pan for about 10 minutes. (I know you’ll want to bite into them sooner, but be patient or the cookie will fall apart.)
- Store cookies in an airtight container, or ziplock bag for 1-2 days.
Video
Notes
- Cold Butter: Make sure to use cold butter, slice it and then add it to cream with the sugar. This is one step to help keep your cookies thick, and from spreading out.
- Don’t Skimp: These cookies are loaded with chocolate chips. If you don’t use a full 3 cups of chocolate chips you will need to add nuts, or extra flour to make up for the difference.
- Chill the Dough: I can usually bake these immediately and they turn out thick, but if you bake a test cookie and it spreads more than you like, scoop the dough into the portions, and place them on a pan and chill in the fridge for 1 hour.
- Don’t Lower the Oven Temperature: I know 400 F seems high, but this allows the outside of the cookies to crisp up first, and helps the cookies rise taller, without giving them more time to spread as they cook. This will also keep the centers nice and gooey, which we love!
Kelly says
No vanilla in this recipe?
Aimee says
The original levain recipe does not have vanilla. You can add some though!
Patti says
I make these for farmers markets and they disappear quickly. I’m a weirdo in that I don’t like chocolate BUT the customers and kids rave about these
Thanks for great recipe
Aimee says
Oh love that!
Ellen says
I have made these cookies 3 times in the last 2 weeks. Once for my family, we gobbled them right down. Once for my book club, they couldn’t get enough of them. And once for a friend and her family, she called them “deadly” and said they were so soft. They are my favorite cookie.
Amy Wills says
I made these cookies and they were magical. They were melt in your mouth and gooey. The flavour was PERFECT- sweet, rich, and mildly… milky? Either way, these were great! If you’re someone scrolling through the comments contemplating whether you should make this or not, this is your sign to make them. It’ll be worth it!
One thing- these were NOT mini. They were enormous; in fact, everyone had just half a cookie.
I will definitely make these again!
Aimee says
Yay! I’m so glad to hear you loved them! They are definitely not mini cookies, sorry for the confusion! But they are mini of actual levain cookies, since those are about double the size of these, believe it or not 😉
Shreya says
What kind of brown sugar do you recommend for this recipe? Light, or dark, or medium?
Aimee says
I usually just buy light, but any should work!
Marie says
Hello! Just want to clarify if you use All Purpose flour OR Cake flour in this recipe? And if I add walnuts to it, is the baking time remains the same? thank you!
Aimee says
I use all purpose flour, but adding the cornstarch makes it a bit like cake flour. I would just substitute some of the chocolate chips for the walnuts, so the baking time shouldn’t change!
Abby says
We’ve made these on repeat for the last year! They freeze well (either in dough or baked). We typically only use semisweet chocolate chips and they’re still delicious.
Aimee says
Any chocolate chips work great! I also like doing a mix of semi sweet, white chocolate and milk chocolate. Yum!
Jean Claudette Rosales says
Hi, is it okay to use half all purpose flour and half cake flour? Thanks!
Aimee says
I haven’t tried it, you might not need as much or any added cornstarch, but I’m not sure. Let me know if you try it!
Ellen says
Since I discovered this cookie recipe, it has been my go to recipe. Besides that they are so delicious; I love the gooey chocolate and how soft they are; it is nice to have a recipe I don’t need to worry about if I forgot to take out the butter because you use cold butter. The cookies are so good. If you love chocolate chip cookies, you will love these.
EmilyDC says
Hello! I’m planning to make these for a dinner party I’m attending but I have a couple questions. First, I don’t have an electric mixer do you think it’ll be ok to store by hand or will that mess with the results. And secondly, why do you keep the butter cold? Can I melt the butter and let it come to room temperature then mix it in? (Since I’m not using an electric mixer?) thanks!!
Aimee says
You should be fine mixing with a hand mixer, though it may just take longer for everything to come together. The butter is kept cold because it helps the cookies to stay big and thick. If you melt the butter the cookies will probably spread more and not have their traditional thick and gooey shape. Instead of melting it I’d try just letting it warm a bit at room temperature, and see if your mixer can handle that
Judi says
OH my goodness!!! The absolute BEST chocolate chip cookie ever. I used 2 cups of choc chips – it was plenty for my taste, but, these cookies are amazing, and, this is the only recipe I will use from now on. Thank you so much!!!
brooksms says
Have you ever baked these with chilled dough? I’d like to make the dough in advance but find the centers end up way underbaked when these types of recipes are cold!
Aimee says
I’m not sure, I’d recommend thawing it some before making it if you don’t like the middles to be gooey.
Mariya says
Hi
I just wanted to know was ir blog previously named like mother like daughter. Net in full form
Because i used to follow that website n now its gone n instead when I type that it brings me here..ur reply will be highly appreciated
Thanku
Aimee says
Hi Mariya, we’ve been Like Mother Like Daughter since 2010 or 2011, our url used to be likemother-likedaughter-food.blogspot.com, but there is another site called like mother like daughter that is likemotherlikedaughter.org I’m not sure which one you’re looking for
Sarah @Whole and Heavenly Oven says
Oh gosh, these cookies! They look nothing short of perfect, Aimee! Love how ultra-soft and chewy they look. 🙂