These Nutella stuffed cookies are simple and use a soft cookie dough which requires just a few steps to grace its center with rich, creamy Nutella. Use my secret ingredient to ensure a gooey center long after they finish cooling. A delicious (and buttery) vanilla cookie worthy of all of us Nutella-loving bakers.
A Delicious Buttery Base
The testing that went into this tender vanilla cookie with creamy Nutella filling involved a good bit of butter. I was feeling fairly indulgent about all the butter passing through my kitchen (and the number of not-quite-“it” cookies being pawned off on friends and co-workers) until Frank sent me the New York Times’ slideshow on the Iowa State Fair, featuring Deep-Fried Butter.
These addictive cookies that do, admittedly, include some butter, could never compete with an entire stick of the stuff, deep-fried and doled out as a single-serving snack.
Just sayin’.
When this (this!) batch of Nutella stuffed cookies emerged from the oven, it was everything I could do not to shout “TA-DAAAA” with jazz hands flailing. I have been on a mission, several weeks in-the-making, to create a cookie worthy of all of us Nutella-loving bakers. And this, I am happy to say, is it.
I went some much more complicated routes before settling on this extremely simple, soft cookie dough which requires just a few steps to grace its center with rich, creamy Nutella.
The Secret Ingredient: Nutella Chips
The key to these amazing Nutella stuffed cookies is the Nutella “chips” which, now that I’ve made them several times, may be a frequent find in my freezer. The secret to getting the Nutella to stay creamy after baking, is a bit of coconut oil. Nutella has a tendency to dry out when baked, so I took a hint from the chocolate hard shell and added coconut oil.
The Nutella/coconut oil combo is squeezed out onto wax paper in “chip” shape and placed in the freezer while the cookie dough comes together.
After 30 minutes, the Nutella chips are easy to handle (and very tasty).
They are also incredibly easy to roll into the center of a ball of vanilla cookie dough.
Creamy Nutella Center
In the finished product, there’s not a hint of flavor from the coconut oil that gives the Nutella filling its magic.
But, even at room temperature, the day after baking, one bite of this cookie yields easily to the creamy Nutella inside.
Make these Nutella stuffed cookies this weekend. They’ll be long gone by Monday.
Looking for other Nutella Recipes? Try these:
Sour Cream Fudge Cupcakes (gluten free) with Nutella Frosting
Vanilla Cookies with Nutella Filling
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup (220g) nutella
- 3 tsp. pure coconut oil
- 10 Tbsp. (140g) unsalted butter, softened
- 1 cup (220g) granulated sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
- 2 cup (250g) all-purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp. baking soda
- 1/2 tsp. salt
Instructions
- Line a small baking sheet with wax paper. In a small bowl, whisk together the nutella and coconut oil. Transfer the nutella to a small plastic bag. Cut off one corner of the plastic bag and gently squeeze the nutella out onto the wax paper into 24 evenly-sized chips. Place the baking sheet in the freezer until the nutella is firm, 30 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Grease a baking sheet with butter or cooking spray. Beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla and beat well. Add the flour, baking soda, and salt and stir with a wooden spoon until fully incorporated. Divide the dough into 24 even balls and flatten each into a disk. Remove the frozen nutella chips from the freezer. Working quickly, press each chip into one ball of dough and roll the dough into a ball around the nutella.
- Place the cookie dough balls 3 inches apart on the prepared baking sheet. Bake, just until the edges start to turn slightly golden, 6-8 minutes (keep an eye on them towards the end - do NOT overbake these). Allow cookies to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
Oh my goodness look at the nutella oozing out. How delicious!
These look … absolutely stunning. I mean, I’m speechless!! I’ll definitely give them a go, soon. Worth buying my very first jar of nutella!
Not sure how I missed this post! Decadent! Definitely posting this to my facebook page. My readers love cookies! I don’t think I’m getting your posts in my inbox. Looks like you moved to wordpress.org? I will re-subscribe so I don’t miss anymore posts. 🙂
Karista – I’m so glad you caught the problem with the subscriptions! I’ve heard from a few people that they stopped getting updates when I switched over to WordPress.org, even though it appeared that the subscription list transferred over. Now I’m using feedburner, so I’m hoping it never happens again.
I made these tonight! Mine didn’t quite turn out the same & I followed your instructions exactly. Mine are on the dry side. I double checked the ingredients and I made them correctly.
Any thoughts?
Oh no, Laura! Did the Nutella filling come out dry or the cookies themselves? These are definitely a cookie that needs to be pulled out of the oven the instant they start to turn golden. They will seem a bit undercooked when you pull them, but will firm up while they rest on the pan for a few minutes out of the oven. If the Nutella comes out dry, you might want to increase the amount of coconut oil you mix with the nutella by a teaspoon or so (that will keep the Nutella nice and creamy). I’ve made these a number of times and never had any trouble at all, but you make me think I might be due to make another batch. 😉
These remind me of the cookie dough in the cookies you just commented on – except less overall baking soda and mine were half and half with brown and white sugar. But I LOVE the Nutella/magic shell idea. I do it with peanut butter sauce sometimes!
Averie – they are similar and I bet those soft snickerdoodle cookies would be good stuffed with Nutella too! Actually, what wouldn’t be good stuffed with Nutella? 😉
Hi Jess,
thank you for the great recipe.. just a question. what kind of coconut oil do you use? I used several and they taste of coconut take over the Nutella 🙁
Thanks,
Hi Hala – it’s a great question, but I’m not sure that I can be much help as I use a Thai brand that I’m sure is only available locally. From what I’ve read, if you want to limit the flavor of coconut oil, don’t buy “virgin coconut oil” – the flavor is most noticeable in that type. It needs to be more refined to remove the flavor. Hope that helps a bit!
Hi Jess,
I just found your recipe and really wanna bake these Cookies! 🙂 I have one question: After rolling the dough into a ball around the nutella and putting them onto the baking sheet, do you press them flat again or just let leave them as a ball? I’m not familiar with these kind of cookies as it is more common here in Germany to bake butter cookies or other sorts, which are ‘hard’ like the butter cookies are. But I’m pretty sure that one has to flaten them, just wanted to ask you to feel certain.
Thanks! 😉
♥
Hi there! It’s a great quest – I didn’t even think to note that, but definitely do not flatten them once you put them on the baking sheet. Just leave them in round balls and then put them in the oven – they’ll flatten around the Nutella as they bake. (Make sure to pull the cookies out before they start to turn golden so that they will be nice and soft with soft centers!) Enjoy!
I wanted to make these right now but I don’t have coconut oil. Can I substitute the coconut oil with something else? If not, will leaving it out make a huge difference?
Thank you 🙂
Oh yes, Sarah – you should be just fine. The Nutella in the center of the cookies may not come out as creamy as it did in mine, but otherwise, they should work great if you make the recipe as listed, just without coconut oil.
These look great!!! But I hate coconut and can pick the flavor out of anything. Is there a different type of oil you recommend that will provide the same trick to staying moist??
Hi! Your recipe looks amazing! It’s been on my to-do list for about 3-4 years now!! I think I am going be able to try it soon but I was just wondering, when you make it do you go by volume or weight? I cannot decide and I want mine to be exactly like yours
Thanks 🙂
I do it by weight to get the exact result shown in the pictures. I find weight is the best for most of my baking recipes. Just be sure not to overcook them – when I’ve had trouble with the result in the past, it’s because I didn’t pull them from the oven early enough. Sometimes they really only do need the 6 minutes to bake so that they don’t turn at all golden on the outside. Hope you like them!!
Just found this recipe for these amazing nutella filled cookies! Had a few problems making nutella “chips” and not a sheet of nutella. Found that you needed a big enough hole in the bag and i piped them onto a frozen cookie sheet lined with parchment. Also I chilled the bag with the nutella mixture to help it hold a chip shape.
They turned out picture perfect! 🙂
Yay – thanks so much for your note Rachel! Glad they came out and that you had success with the “chips” – those are the key!