Trick or treat? I don’t know about you, but I would choose treat EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Especially when the treat is these Fun Salted Chocolate Halloween Cookies.
Their decadent chocolate flavor, crispy texture, and festive finish make these my go-to every year.
Salted Chocolate Halloween Cookies Tips and Tricks
Gather Your Ingredients
These cookies load up the chocolate flour with cocoa powder, chocolate chips, and chocolate M&M’s.
Green tip: Make sure your chocolate is sustainably sourced. Look for Fair Trade, Rainforest Alliance, or UTZ certifications as opposed to self-proclaimed sustainability labels that sometimes falsely advertise “sustainably sourced”.
Outside of all the chocolate, here’s everything you need:
“I’m MELLTTTTINGGGG”
The wicked witch of the West won’t be the only one melting this Halloween! You’ll need 2 sticks of melted butter, and some melted chocolate for this recipe.
You can use a double boiler, but the microwave works great, too.
Microwave your butter first, in 30-second intervals and stirring in between, until it’s completely liquid. Melted butter generally lends to a crunchier, less cake-like cookie, and that is no exception here.
After you combine your sugar with the melted butter, it’s time to add your melted chocolate.
Back to the microwave! Use the same melting technique for the chocolate. You’re a microwave melting pro by now.
Creepin’ It Real This Halloween
You don’t need any fancy gadgets for these cookies. No hand mixers, stand mixers—just your trusty ole whisk.
When you’re going for a chewy on the inside, crunchy on the outside cookie (hint: that’s exactly what we want here), there is one thing you want to avoid: overbeating.
If you overdo it, you will beat too much air into your cookie dough, resulting in a cake-like texture. Especially in a fudgy chocolate cookie, you want that chewy crunch, not that crumbly, stuck-to-the-roof-of-your-mouth kind of bite.
Mix the sugars, butter, and melted chocolate first. Wait until it comes down to room temperature before adding your eggs and whisking to integrate.
Green Tip: When sourcing ingredients for this recipe, look for pasture-raised eggs (over free-range or cage-free) to support agriculture that is less reliant on chemicals and fossil fuels.
Add The Rest Of the Ingredients
Once your egg is integrated, you can add the dry ingredients before mixing in the milk. You’ll be left with thick and sticky cookie dough.
Gimme, gimme More
Once you’ve mixed most of your ingredients together, you’re ready to add… you guessed it, even more chocolate!
Half your chocolate chips are melted and added directly to the batter, but the other half stay whole for added chocolate chunks inside your cookie.
Let The Ghoul Times Roll
Okay, so your batter is ready. You’ll notice it’s pretty sticky and wet. So how do you roll it into cute little balls without it all sticking to your hands? Just wet them!
Wetting your hands will allow you to shape the dough without making a crazy mess. I use a heaping tablespoon of dough for each cookie to keep them relatively uniform in size.
Roll them up in your hands and leave a couple of inches in between each cookie—they will definitely spread in the oven!
You can also opt to use a cookie scoop to avoid using your hands altogether.
I usually only bake 6 cookies on each baking sheet to allow them plenty of room to spread.
It’s A Boo-tiful Day For Some Freezing
Once you shape your cookies, stick them in the freezer for at least an hour, or up to overnight.
Skipping this step will result in a super-thin, super-spread cookie. Freezing will still result in some spreading, but a manageable amount.
Witch Way Do I Add The Candy?
You’ll fold your chocolate chips into your batter as you normally would, in the last step of the dough-making process, but I recommend waiting to add your M&M’s until after your cookies come out of the oven.
When they’re still hot, take 5 or 6 M&M’s and just press them right into your cookies. We want those pops of orange for a Halloween-y look! But adding the M&M’s to the cookies before baking will cause them to sink.
This dough is also pretty wet, so it will spread—and even more so if your dense M&M’s are inside.
Why You Should Make these Salted Chocolate Halloween Cookies
- They’re festive. What’s more Halloween than orange and black?
- They’re super chocolatey. Cocoa powder, melted chocolate, chocolate chips, and M&M’s.
- The texture! Chewy with a subtle outer crunch.
For my fellow cookie monsters, check out this Cakey Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake, Cookie Dough Ice Cream Cups, and Rosemary Shortbread Cookies with Lemon Glaze.
Salted Chocolate Halloween Cookies
PRINT PIN RATEEquipment
- Cookie Scoop (optional)
Ingredients
- 1 cup butter, melted (1 cup butter usually = 2 sticks)
- ¾ cup brown sugar
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 1 ½ cups chocolate chips
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 1 ½ cups flour
- ½ cup cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ cup milk, room temperature
- ½ cup orange M&M's
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F.
- Melt your butter in 30-second intervals in the microwave until completely liquified. Use a whisk to combine the melted butter with both sugars.
- Melt 1/2 cup of chocolate chips in 30-second intervals in the microwave and add to butter and sugar. Add vanilla extract, mix well, and set aside.
- Make sure the butter/sugar/chocolate mixture has cooled to room temperature and beat in eggs.
- Add flour, cocoa, powder, salt, and baking soda and mix well.
- Add the milk and fold in your chocolate chips.
- Use wet hands or a cookie scoop to shape 1 heaping tablespoon of dough into a ball and place it on a baking sheet. Leave a couple of inches in between each cookie for the dough to spread.
- Freeze the shaped dough for at least an hour or overnight before baking.
- Bake for 14-16 minutes until the edges are crispy. While cookies are hot, push 5 or 6 orange M&M's into each cookie.
Pro Tips
- This dough is wet and sticky, so wet your hands for easier dough-shaping!
- These cookies will spread, so leave space between each. I usually only put about 6 on each cookie sheet.
- Push your M&M’s in your cookies when they are hot and fresh out of the oven!
- Cookie monsters are always happy at my house with this delicious selection of my best cookie recipes to choose from! Nom nom nom!
4 thoughts on “Fun Salted Chocolate Halloween Cookies”
I’d very happily get spooked by some of these – they look great!
Boo hahah! Thank you!
I ate these cookies that Marley baked. They are delicious and quite addicting. Love them with a cup of tea!
Thank you! They do go well with a cuppa ☕