Chocolate Crinkle Cookies have a rich, fudgy center with a crisp powdered-sugar coating. They taste like hot chocolate in cookie form and disappear faster than I can plate them. These cookies are perfect any time of the year, but look especially festive served on a holiday cookie platter.
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Helpful Reader Review
“I tried these cookies 5 years ago, and they’re still one of my favorites! Thank you, Natasha, for such masterpiece recipes! I love your blog! 😍😘” – Dina ★★★★★
Easy Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
You know I love easy desserts with simple ingredients. This Chocolate Crinkle Cookies recipe is no exception, since there aren’t any fancy ingredients or techniques here. Mix, refrigerate, and scoop–done!
Chocolate Crinkle Cookies are like a cross between fudgy Brownies and Chocolate Chip Cookies that are rolled in powdered sugar to form “crinkles” as they expand in the oven. Crinkle cookies are perfect for gifting, since they get better the next day, and they are so good, you’ll want to make a double batch!
Did You Know?
Chocolate Crinkle Cookies first premiered in Betty Crocker’s famous cookie cookbook, “Cooky Carnival”. Crocker recounts being served the cookies by home chef Helen Fredell and begging her for the recipe.
Chocolate Crinkle Cookie Ingredients
Check your pantry and fridge for all you need to make my delicious chocolate crinkle cookies. Be sure to measure correctly so the cookies expand and rise correctly.
- Unsweetened Cocoa Powder – fluff the powder with a fork, then spoon it into the measuring cup to be sure you have the right amount of cocoa.
- Wet Ingredients – sugar, vegetable oil, eggs, and Vanilla Extract
- Dry ingredients – Flour, baking powder, and salt
- Confectioner’s sugar – for rolling the dough and creating crinkles. For a more festive look, try swapping with holiday sprinkles (Halloween-themed sprinkles look great, too!) or colored sugar.
How to Make Crinkle Cookies
Chocolate Crinkle Cookies are a blast to make because rolling the chocolatey dough and coating it in powdered sugar is good, messy fun, similar to making Russian Tea Cakes.
- Whisk the sugar, cocoa powder, oil, vanilla extract, and eggs together in a bowl.
- Whisk the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, and salt) in a separate mixing bowl. Add the dry mixture to the wet mixture and mix well.
- Cover the dough and refrigerate for 3 hours or up to overnight. This is essential for making a rollable and rising dough.
- Roll – Preheat the oven to 350°F. Shape cookie dough into balls (a cookie scoop makes it easy to portion) and roll in powdered sugar (wet hands make it easier to handle).
- Bake – Space the cookies on a lined baking sheet, and then bake for 10-12 minutes. Remove from the oven to cool on the sheet. Once cookies are slightly cooled, move them to a wire rack to fully cool down.
Pro Tip:
Chocolate crinkle cookies come out of the oven soft, but the outside hardens as they cool. In fact, they continue to get crispy as they sit, but the inside stays fudgey.
Chocolate Crinkle Cookies are just as important as Sugar Cookies and Gingerbread Cookies on your holiday cookie tray, so place them next to my Christmas Snowball Cookies and Homemade Baklava for a decadent, well-rounded dessert table!
Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil, (or canola, or light olive oil)
- 2 large eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup confectioner's sugar
Instructions
- Whisk – In a mixing bowl, combine granulated sugar, cocoa powder, oil, vanilla extract, and eggs. Whisk until the mixture is smooth.
- Mix – In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Add the flour mixture to the cocoa mixture and stir to combine.
- Cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 3 hours and up to overnight.*
- Roll – Preheat the oven to 350°F. Scoop dough with a cookie scoop for even portioning into 20 cookies, then roll cookie dough into even-sized balls (it's easier to roll with wet hands) and generously roll each into powdered sugar.
- Bake – Place cookies on a parchment-lined baking sheet, being sure to leave space between each of the cookies. Bake for 10-12 minutes, depending on the size of the cookies. Cookies will come out soft but will harden on the outside as they cool down. Cool on the baking sheet for a few minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to fully cool.
Notes
- Room Temperature: Keep your Chocolate Crinkle Cookies stored in an airtight container on the counter. They should stay fresh for up to a week.
- Freezing: Freeze your dough balls for up to 2 months in an airtight container. When you are ready to bake, remove them from the freezer and allow them to thaw overnight in the fridge before rolling them in powdered sugar, or bake from frozen, adding 1-2 minutes to the bake time.
Nutrition Per Serving
Filed Under
More Cookies Recipes You’ll Love
Cookie recipes, like my chocolate crinkle cookies, are so fun to make and share, so once you try this recipe, check out these other sweet treats:
- Peanut Butter Cookies
- Meringue Cookies
- Madeleine Cookies
- Macaroon Cookies
- Toffee Recipe
- Cranberry Cookies
- Snickerdoodles
- Palmiers Cookies
- Rugelach
- Biscotti
Hi! I’m Natasha Kravchuk, a New York Times bestselling cookbook author, recipe developer, food photographer, and writer. Here you’ll find delicious, reliable recipes made with simple ingredients, plus easy step-by-step photos and videos to help you cook confidently at home. 
I loved the cookies!!
They are sooooooo good!!! I am ten year old and they are soooo easy to make !! What do I use to scoop the dough if I don’t have a cookie scooper?
So glad you love them! A tablespoon or your hands would be fine to use. The scooper just makes this so much easier and cleaner.
These are my favorite christmas cookies! I tried them on a whim last year and we couldn’t get enough. I ended up making them 2 more times that week and printed the recipe to keep for this year. They were the perfect cookie recipe for my kids to help with and this year they started asking to make them immediately. So easy and fudgy.
I’m so happy these were a hit with everyone, Becky! Thank you so much for sharing that with me!
Would it cause issues to substitute the oil with butter?
Hi Lauren, I honestly haven’t tried using butter to advise. I’ve tried vegetable oil (or canola, or light olive oil) successfully.
Would I use the same amount of oil if I used coconut oil or would I use less?
Hi Kayleigh! You should be able to use the same amount in the written recipe. Let us know how it works with coconut oil.
Perfectly perfect ! Exactly as described ,- fudgey and crispy and better and better each day. This is my holiday crinkle from now on without a doubt !
Spectacular! By far the best crinkle cookies we have ever had! Maybe the best cookies in general, and we do a lot of baking. We will make these again, I am sure of it. Thank you!! 🙂
I’m so happy to hear that, Jennifer!
Hello Natasha! We made these Chocolate Crinkle Cookies once, and they’ve quickly become a family favorite! The soft, fudgy center with the powdered sugar coating is simply delicious. They’re so easy to make, and everyone loves how sweet and satisfying they are. Thank you for sharing such a fantastic recipe! Merry Christmas to you and your family, and enjoy the New Year ahead!
I’m so happy to hear that. Thank you.
We made this recipe twice in two days because they were gone in seconds. The second batch we rolled the cookie around 4 Ghirardelli bittersweet chocolate chips before baking. They spread out a little more, but it was like eating a molten lava cookie. My family is hooked.
That’s so great to hear. I’m glad it’s been a hit. Thank you for your review.
Easy recipe and the cookies were so pretty and delicious!
I’m so glad you enjoyed it, Karen!
So easy and delicious! This is definitely a keeper!
Cookies came out exceptionally well!
I did substitute avocado oil instead of olive oil and it was lighter and just perfect.
Otherwise I followed the recipe exactly- next time I will double the recipe because they disappeared quickly 🙂
They stuck to the pan; horrible. This has never happened before. Does the pan need to be greased?
Hi Lisa, if your baking sheet isn’t non-stick, I would use parchment paper or a Silpat non-stick liner.
Why is when you wet your hands to roll the dough it get flat. It a mess with wet hands and you can’t roll them without wet then the dough is sticky. Any ideas or tips to stop the messy process? I put the dough in the refrigerator over night still sticky and or wet hands were a mess!!
Hi Eloise. That is a common challenge with these cookies. If you live in a humid environment, this can make it more challenging to roll. You could try using a thin layer of oil on your hands instead. You can also try coating your hands in cocoa powder or powdered sugar. Disposable gloves can be helpful to make the process easier or less messy. Be sure to work quickly, as the dough can soften in your hands and become more tricky to roll. Additionally, you can consider freezing the dough for a little while before rolling if the dough still seems too sticky after refrigeration.
These have been a Christmas tradition for my family ever since I found this recipe. Such an easy recipe to follow, with simple ingredients we always already have on hand. My kids love rolling them in the “snow” for me.
These are the best cookies I ever had in my life. It is worth the struggle of mixing it and the 3 hours wait for the dough to chill.
Made these and froze the balls and decided to test bake before Christmas Eve and day as one of the many desserts on this site, and they are absolutely so easy to make, taste sooooo good and they froze and thawed nicely. It truly is one of the easiest things I have ever baked. So good! Thank you! Merry Christmas!
Thanks for sharing about your success with freezing! Merry Christmas to you and your family!
The hardest part was letting the dough chill.
Easy to make. Tastes great.
(and I put a little olive oil on my hands before rolling the dough and it made it effortless).
Yes! I won’t use water I will dev use olive oil next batch around.
Make these cookies for the first time. They turned out amazing. I will definitely make again.
Great recipe. Loved them as a kid and now my [adult] kids make me promise to have them on the cookie tray. Yes they are gooey. A little trick i learned over the years is to drop your scoop of dough directly into the powdered sugar, toss around to coat, then pick up to roll into balls. I then toss in the sugar one more time and place on the cookie sheet. It makes the process quicker.
They spread I didn’t substitute anything – it’s frustrating to spend that much time and use all the ingredients for it to spread.
ROLLING TIP!! These are amazing and I make them every year. Even with wet hands though, the dough was sticky, difficult to roll and a lot would get left on my hands. This year, game changer. I sprayed my hands with a little bit of PAM and the cookies rolled beautifully without loosing any dough. It helped to roll a bit tighter.