High Altitude Loaded Coconut Almond Butter Cookies! These rich, moist little beauties were inspired by a recent Costco find. While perusing the snack aisle I stumbled upon a giant bag of coconut-and-chocolate-coated almonds, which I immediately swooped into my cart. Crunchy salted almonds coated with lush coconut and swathed in dark chocolate … hello, heaven. I started thinking about what a cookie version might look like, and since minimalism isn’t really my thing, I just kept adding stuff according to what I thought would taste good. After about five? six? iterations, I settled on a divine combination of white chocolate, dark chocolate, milk chocolate-covered almonds, and shredded coconut, all stuffed into a moist, lightly salted almond butter cookie. I haven’t missed a day of eating one (or more) in about two weeks.
The dough is fairly basic. It’s easiest with a stand mixer but a hand mixer will do just as well. Like many cookie recipes, this one requires thorough creaming of room-temp salted butter and sugars until fluffy and light. Then beat in eggs (three, for moisture and texture) before swirling in a hefty scoop of almond butter.
Things move quickly from there: all-purpose flour, a little baking soda and salt, some unsweetened coconut, and alllllll the add-ins. Splinters of dark chocolate. White chocolate chips (I like the mini ones). And a hefty handful of chopped chocolate-covered almonds. Help me, Rhonda.
These cookies have a lot going on, so I experimented a bit to get the right size. The exact right size, in fact, turned out to be two tablespoons of dough per cookie, or the amount that fits in a medium cookie scoop. Any smaller and there wasn’t enough real estate for all the goodies. Any larger and you’d spoil your dinner with just one.
These don’t spread much, so to get nice thick round cookies – as opposed to tall domed ones – it helps to flatten them a bit before baking. I like to use the bottom of a drinking glass for a nice even surface.
Sprinkle some flaky sea salt on each and bake ’em for 10 minutes. The cookies are slightly fragile right out of the oven, so I recommend leaving them on the pan until they’ve cooled enough to set, about five minutes. Then you can transfer them to a baking rack to finish cooling (and okay, go ahead and eat one now. You know you’re going to). Once they’ve cooled completely, they’re sturdy enough to store together in a plastic bag or other sealed container.
My husband, who for the record claims to not like coconut, has declared these the best cookies I’ve ever made. Is he a man known for hyperbole? Completely. But that does not mean he is wrong. Judge for yourself, and let me know what you think.
Craving other flavors in tiny round form? Check out more of my cookie recipes here!
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High Altitude Coconut Almond Butter Cookies
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 25 minutes
- Yield: approximately 5 dozen cookies 1x
Description
Lusciously dense, moist, almond-buttery cookies are stuffed to bursting with chocolate-covered almonds, dark and white chocolate, and plenty of coconut. A sprinkle of flaky sea salt on top makes them swoon-worthy.
Ingredients
- 1 cup ( 16 TB or two sticks) salted butter, softened
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup brown sugar (packed)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract (not imitation)
- 1 1/4 cup natural-style unsweetened almond butter*
- 3 large eggs, at room temperature
- 2 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 3/4 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- I cup unsweetened finely shredded coconut
- 2 cups total add-ins (I use a mix of chopped chocolate-covered almonds, mini white chocolate chips, and roughly chopped dark chocolate).
Instructions
- Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer (or a medium bowl if using a hand mixer), cream the softened butter with the sugars until light and fluffy, about three minutes.
- Beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing thoroughly after each.
- Stir in the vanilla and almond butter into the batter until fully incorporated, with no streaks of almond butter remaining.
- In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and salt. Fold this gently into the butter mixture, mixing just until incorporated.
- Stir in the coconut, then the chocolate-covered almonds, dark chocolate, and white chocolate.
- Using a medium cookie scoop or two tablespoons, form two-tablespoon balls, placing them about two inches apart on the cookie sheets. With the bottom of a water glass, flatten each slightly.
- Sprinkle with flaky sea salt (optional, but recommended).
- Bake cookies for about 10 minutes, until the edges are just beginning to brown.
- Remove from oven and allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes, then transfer to a rack to cool completely.
- Store in a plastic zip bag or other airtight container for up to five days.
Notes
… use only natural almond butter with no added sugar, salt, or other flavorings. Otherwise your flavor and texture will be wildly off.
… this dough freezes beautifully. If you’d like to save some or all of your dough for later, follow the instructions up to step #7 and then freeze the dough balls/disks by placing them on a cookie sheet, freezing until solid, and storing them in a freezer bag until you wish to bake them. You can bake them straight out of the freezer; just add an extra couple of minutes to the designated time.
What if I don’t have salted butter? How much do I adjust the salt?
If you’re using unsalted butter, increase the salt in the dry ingredients to 1 1/4 tsp.
Would these cookies do well as GF? Just sub a gf flour mix with xanthum gum…any other suggestions? Or do you have a GF chocolate chip cookie recipe for high altitude?
They should work well with a flour mix such as Measure-For-Measure.
I made them with Bobs Redmill 1 to 1 baking flour and they taste good but came out dry…wondering if I should use a little less flour or how I could make them less dry- any ideas
I was looking for a high-altitude banana chocolate chip cookie recipe and decided to play around with this one. Because bananas are so sweet, I used just 1/2 C brown sugar and used 4 ripe bananas in place of the almond butter. I did 2 1/2 cups of flour (used gluten free) and skipped the coconut. I flattened the balls with a fork and baked them for 11 minutes. This last batch I baked a little longer – they look better (more brown) but I haven’t taste tested them yet to see if that dried them out!
The texture is a cross between a cookie and cake, but they are really good! Thanks so much for all your high-altitude recipes.
Could I use natural smooth peanut butter in place of the almond butter?
I have not tried peanut butter in these cookies but I think it would probably work fine.