Homemade Red Velvet Cookies with Chocolate Chips - Made From Scratch

Fancy making your own homemade red velvet cookies from scratch? Here is an easy recipe you can try.

These red velvet cookies are soft and crunchy and filled with a delicious combination of dark and white chocolate chips as well as butterscotch chips.

My initial plan was to use only white chocolate chips in the cookies, but I had a special request from my 7-year-old boy to include all three types, hence the dark, white, and butterscotch chips in the red velvet cookies. You can also limit these to just one or 2 types, it’s entirely up to you. To complement the crunchy texture of the red velvet cookies, I have also added some roasted almond nibs to the cookie dough and I must say, the nuts add a lovely nutty crunch to these homemade red velvet cookies.

The cookies have a light chocolate flavor to which I added some red gel food coloring. I prefer my red velvet cookies to be in a deep maroon hue, so I chose a maroonish tint food color i.e Americolor Crimson. This is not a bright red hue but more of a brownish-red tone.

The chocolate chips are added as the final step in mixing the cookie dough. And right before baking them, I pressed some more white ones onto the top of each cookie. The white color against the deep maroon color of the cookies gives these cookies a lovely contrast.

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How to Make

Ingredients

• All-purpose flour
• Butter
• Unsweetened cocoa powder
• Granulated sugar (white sugar)
• Egg yolk
• Vanilla extract
• White and dark chocolate chips
• Butterscotch chips
• Red food coloring

Mixing the dough

First step is to toast the almond nibs. You can do this in an oven or over the stovetop. Toast the nuts until they turn golden brown and are crunchy to bite. Leave them aside to cool while you mix the cookie dough.

1. Second step is mixing the cookie dough. For the dough, cream the butter and sugar until creamy in a large bowl on medium speed with an electric mixer.
2. Add in the egg yolk and vanilla extract into the creamed sugar and butter mixture and beat until well combined.
3. Add red food coloring. Start adding the color, a few drops at a time until you achieve the depth of color you want for your cookies. I use gel-based Americolor Crimson for my cookies for a deep maroon colored red velvet cookies. Generally, you would require lesser amount of coloring when using gel-based food colors as they are more concentrated as compared to water-based ones.
4. Next to go into the red velvet chocolate chip cookies is the flour mixture (flour and cocoa powder). You can sift these dry ingredients first so that they are well combined before adding into the creamed mixture. Or you can also just mix them up with a hand whisk before adding to the butter and sugar mix. Either way, combining them before adding to the creamed mixture helps to ensure the cocoa powder in well distributed in the cookie dough. That will save you time from having to mix the cookie dough for a longer time to well distribute the cocoa powder in the dough.
5. And finally, add in the toasted nuts and all the chocolate and butterscotch chips.
6. Give the red velvet cookie dough a quick mix with a spatula to even them out in the dough.

Shaping the crunchy cookies

1. This dough is not too sticky and so you can easily shape it into cookie dough balls by hand. Start by scooping the dough into 1 tablespoon size with a measuring spoon or a cookie scoop. I use my measuring spoon to do this.
2. Once the dough is all scooped up, form them into round balls by rolling them between your palms, one at a time.
3. Place the round red velvet chocolate chip cookie dough onto a baking sheet or parchment paper lined baking try. Leave some space between each cookie as the cookies do spread a little during baking. Flatten each red velvet cookie dough ball slightly with your hands.
4. Press in the remaining white chocolate chips on top. Bake cookies for 15 minutes at 170 degrees Celsius.

Remove cookies from oven and transfer them onto a wire rack (cooling rack) to cool completely to room temperature.

Store the baked red velvet chocolate chip cookies in an airtight container to maintain their crunch.

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Notes

Liquid Food coloring

• You can use either gel-based food coloring or water-based ones to tint your red velvet cookies. The gel-based colors are thicker and a lot more concentrated hence, you only need to add a few drops of them to get a deep hue of the color. Water-based ones are more diluted and would need to be added in a slightly increased quantity. However, adding too much water-based color can change the consistency of your cookie dough due to the addition of more liquid.
• There are various hues of reds in food coloring, and your choice is dependent on the final color you wish to achieve for your red velvet cookies. I prefer a deep, maroon-like red for my red velvet cookies hence I chose Americolor Crimson which is not a very bright red color. If you prefer brighter red velvet cookies, use a brighter red food color. For deeper, maroon tones, use deeper colors like maroon to tint your cookie dough.

Chocolate chips

• I used 3 types in my red velvet cookies – white chocolate, dark chocolate, and butterscotch chips.
• You can change this combination to one that you like. In any case, try to keep the quantity to 60g as indicated in the recipe (or the corresponding amount if you increase or decrease the recipe yield). You can add more if you like, but that might change the consistency of the cookies too.
• In addition to the chips added in the cookie dough, this recipe also calls for extra white chocolate chips to top each cookie. This is optional, and the choice of chocolate chips to use can be varied to suit one’s liking.

Nuts

• I used almond nibs in my red velvet chocolate chip cookies. These are sold in tiny chopped form so it’s easy to just use them without having to chop them up first. You can substitute with any other nuts if you like, or can even totally omit the nuts in the recipe.
• The nuts are best toasted first before adding to the red velvet cookie dough. That way, they are nice and cruncy after baking. If you don’t toast first, the nuts will not be crunchy after baking.
• To toast the nuts, you can place them in a dry pan over the stove with low heat and keep stirring them until they are lightly browned and crunchy. You can also toast them in the oven by spreading them on a parchment-lined tray and bake them in the oven for about 3 to 4 minutes until they are lightly browned.

Cookies size

• You can increase or decrease the cookie size. I shaped mine into 1 tablespoon size. If you want smaller bite-sized red velvet cookies, you can use a 1 teaspoon measure but be sure to reduce the baking time slightly. Also, if you want to make larger red velvet chocolate chip cookies, scoop the dough into larger balls and increase the baking time accordingly.
• These red velvet cookies spread very lightly during baking, so if you want flatter cookies, flatten them slightly before baking. You can do this with your fingers, or use the back of a glass to press them down.

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Like this cookie recipe? Here are my other posts you might want to check out

• Lemon Chocolate Chip Cookies
• How to Color Gum Paste Flowers
• Coffee Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Peanut Butter Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Crunchy Chocolate Chip Cookies - Mini & Bite-Sized
• Christmas Sprinkle Cookies - Pretty Festive Cookies

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Recipe (Printable)

Here is the full printable version of my easy red velvet chocolate chip cookies. And while you are at it, if you have not read my recipe notes just above, do check them out for tips to make adjustments to your red velvet cookies.

And that's my super easy homemade recipe for crunchy red velvet cookies with chocolate chips.

Enjoy!