Coffee Cake Cookies are soft, chewy cinnamon cookies topped with a buttery streusel crumb topping and a drizzle of vanilla icing.
Coffee Cake is a buttery, cinnamon breakfast cake served with coffee. These cookies taste just like your favorite breakfast cake, but in cookie form.
COFFEE CAKE COOKIES
Coffee Cake Cookies are made with butter, coconut oil, cinnamon, and several other basic cookie ingredients. Before baking, top the cookies with a simple crumb topping made of butter, flour, brown sugar, and cinnamon. Once the cookies are baked, drizzle a simple vanilla glaze on top before serving.
HOW TO MAKE THE BEST COFFEE CAKE COOKIES:
Here are several important tips for making the absolute BEST Coffee Cake Cookies!
- Make sure that you have enough flour in the dough. If the dough is too sticky, you may need to add a little bit of flour.
- Spend a little extra time when you mix the butter and sugars. Creaming them together for 2-3 minutes will improve the consistency of your cookies.
- Preheat the oven. This will help your cookies turn out right every time!
- Use a cookie scoop! If you want all your cookies to be perfectly shaped and have them all be the same size, a cookie scoop is the way to go.
- Use parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. Doing this will make it so easy to remove the cookies from your cookie sheet so that you don’t have to scrape them off the pan – they will just slide right off in perfect shape!
- Don’t overbake the cookies – when I take mine out of the oven, they still look slightly underbaked but they will continue to bake on the cookie sheet for a couple more minutes so that’s ok!
INGREDIENTS IN COFFEE CAKE COOKIES
Butter – For best results, use real butter and make sure it is softened to room temperature before adding to the dough.
Coconut oil – Melt and cool ½ cup of coconut oil. It melts very quickly in the microwave.
Brown sugar – For best results, make sure the brown sugar is soft and fresh.
Egg – One large egg will bind all of the other ingredients together.
Vanilla extract – The higher the quality of the vanilla, the better.
Cinnamon – You can’t make coffee cake without cinnamon!
Baking soda and baking powder – These act as the leavening agents in the cookies. For best results, make sure that they aren’t old or expired.
Salt – Just a little bit of salt will help all of the other flavors to pop.
Flour – All-purpose flour works best in cookies. You can use a gluten-free alternative if needed.
STREUSEL TOPPING:
Butter – Again, real butter works best. Make sure the butter is softened before mixing with the other ingredients.
Brown sugar – Make sure the brown sugar is soft and fresh. Adds the most delicious richness to the crumb topping.
Flour – This is what makes the streusel topping perfectly crumbly. You can use a gluten-free alternative if needed.
Cinnamon – Just a little bit of cinnamon adds so much delicious flavor to the topping!
ICING:
Powdered sugar – Powdered sugar adds the sweetness and smoothness necessary to make the perfect glaze.
Milk – You can use any variety of milk, even a non-dairy alternative.
Vanilla – Again, the higher the quality of the vanilla, the better.
HOW TO MAKE COFFEE CAKE COOKIES
Preheat the oven to 350°.
MAKE COOKIE DOUGH
In a large bowl, use an electric mixer to mix the butter, oil, and brown sugar for about 2-3 minutes.
Add the egg and vanilla and mix for another 2-3 minutes.
Add the cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and flour and mix just until combined.
MAKE THE STREUSEL
Combine all of the streusel ingredients in a small bowl and mix together with a fork.
If the mixture is too sticky/not crumbly, add a little more flour, 1 tablespoon at a time.
SCOOP & TOP THE COOKIES
Use a large cookie scoop to scoop the dough onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or a silicone baking sheet. Use the back of a tablespoon to press a slight indentation on top of each ball of dough.
Sprinkle some of the streusel on top of each indentation. Bake the cookies for 10-12 minutes or until just barely golden brown on the edges. Let the cookies cool for a few minutes on the baking sheet before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
MAKE THE ICING
While the cookies are baking, make the icing.
Whisk the powdered sugar, milk, and vanilla together in a small bowl. Drizzle the icing on the cookies while they are still warm (immediately after transferring to the wire rack).
HOW DO YOU SOFTEN BUTTER TO ROOM TEMPERATURE?
The best way to soften butter is to set it out for a few hours before you make your cookies. Since most of us (or maybe just me!) aren’t that prepared or don’t think that far in advance, there are a few tricks to softening butter perfectly in just a matter of minutes.
My favorite way to soften butter is in the microwave. It’s definitely fast, but you do have to be very careful not to melt it. Just put the whole stick of butter in the microwave (as long as it isn’t wrapped in foil!) and microwave for about 6-7 seconds. If the butter is still really cold, try another 5-7 seconds and check it again. You may need a few intervals, and if the butter is starting to feel soft, you can shorten the final interval to just a few seconds to make sure it doesn’t start melting.
I actually prefer to use the defrost setting on my microwave – I don’t know exactly what that mode does differently, and it takes a little bit longer (closer to 30 seconds), but it seems to be easier to get the butter to soften without melting.
WHY DO MY COOKIES BURN ON THE BOTTOM BUT AREN’T DONE IN THE MIDDLE?
If your cookies are always burning on the bottom, it is probably a cookie sheet issue! If you are using really dark cookie sheets, the bottoms of your baked goods will tend to burn before they are actually cooked all the way through. If you use a lot of cooking spray, the same result can happen. I prefer to use lighter colored non-stick pans so that I don’t have to use cooking spray at all. As mentioned above, I have been converted to silicone baking mats over the last couple of years and I love how easy it is for cookies to come off the tray – no sticking ever!
MORE DELICIOUS CINNAMON COOKIE RECIPES TO TRY:
- CHUNKY APPLE CINNAMON COOKIES
- CINNAMON ROLL SNICKERDOODLES
- APPLE CINNAMON SCOOKIES
- ALMOND CINNAMON CRESCENT COOKIES
- APPLE CINNAMON OATMEAL COOKIES
- SNICKERDOODLE APPLE PIE BITES
- CRUNCHY WHITE CHOCOLATE CINNAMON COOKIES
- CINNAMON ROLL COOKIES
- CARAMEL APPLE SNICKERDOODLES
- CINNAMON OATMEAL COOKIES
- SNICKERDOODLE COOKIE BARS
- PEACH SNICKERDOODLE COOKIES
- FROSTED SNICKERDOODLES
Coffee Cake Cookies are soft, chewy cinnamon cookies topped with a buttery streusel crumb topping and a drizzle of vanilla icing.
Staci says
What does the coconut oil bring to the recipe? Can I substitute the oil for more butter?
Jessica says
So I’ve done lots of testing swapping out butter for oil and vice versa… oil in baked goods makes them lighter and fluffier. Butter adds better flavor, but it yields a more dense, coarse baked treat. So that’s why I often use a blend, so that we get better flavor and texture.