German Chocolate Cake Cookies – Soft, chewy chocolate cookies with rich caramel, coconut, and pecan frosting won’t last long on the cookie plate.
These German Chocolate Cake cookies are a delicious household staple. They make a perfect snack year-round but are an incredibly excellent holiday gift! They’re a great addition to any dessert table, but they won’t last long as they’re deliciously addictive!
Today, I am featuring one of the best cookies you will ever eat! A cookie that will become so addictive you will make them in large quantities and freeze them to have them for a week or two.
My Favorite Kitchen Tools To Make This Recipe
From trusty pots and pans to handy gadgets, I’ve curated a list of products I use and love.
Making one of the traditional cakes, German Chocolate cake, into a cookie was one of the best recipes I have ever made. How can you go wrong with caramel, pecans, and chocolate?
My favorite thing about this recipe is that everything is from scratch. This chocolate cookie is so chewy and moist, making it the best platform for the frosting. Bake them today, as they are hands down amazing, delicious, unbelievable, out of this world, and the best cookie ever, as quoted by my friends and family who tried them.
Recipe Tips
Ingredients
- 1 cup salted butter softened
- Light brown sugar
- Granulated sugar
- Vanilla extract
- Eggs beaten
- All-purpose flour
- Unsweetened cocoa powder
- Baking soda
- Salt
How do you make German Chocolate Cake Cookies?
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
Blend the butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar, vanilla, and eggs in a medium bowl.
In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt.
Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and blend until combined.
Drop the dough by tablespoonful onto the prepared baking sheets, 12 cookies per sheet, and bake for 8 to 10 minutes.
Cool on a baking rack.
Add evaporated milk, sugar, egg yolks, butter, and vanilla to a large pan and place on the stovetop over medium heat to make the frosting. Stir so that it becomes well combined.
Continue stirring until thickened; this takes approximately 11-12 minutes.
Once thickened, remove from heat and add coconut and pecans. Beat until thick enough to spread.
Spread frosting over the tops of cooled cookies.
More German Chocolate Cake inspired recipes
What brings me the most joy when making this cookie is my husband. He loves these; had I made these when we were dating, I think we would have married even earlier. He loves them so much it would have created an instant proposal.
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German Chocolate Cake Cookies
Video
Ingredients
Chocolate Cookies
- 1 cup salted butter softened
- 1 cup light brown sugar
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2 large eggs beaten
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- pinch salt
Coconut Pecan Frosting
- 1 cup evaporated milk
- 1 cup sugar
- 3 egg yolks
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 1/3 cup sweetened shredded coconut
- 1 cup chopped pecans
- Optional: ¼ cup chocolate candy coating melted for drizzle
Instructions
Chocolate Cookies
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a stand mixer or large bowl using a hand mixer, blend the butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar, vanilla, and eggs. In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt. Gradually add the flour mixture into the butter mixture and blend until combined.
- Drop the dough by tablespoonful onto the prepared baking sheets, 12 cookies per sheet, and bake 8 to 10 minutes. Cool on a baking rack.
Coconut Pecan Frosting
- Add evaporated milk, sugar, egg yolks, butter and vanilla to a large pan and place on stovetop over medium heat.
- Stir so that it becomes well combined. Continue stirring until thickened, this takes approximately 11-12 minutes. I set my timer for 11 minutes and 30 seconds, this seems to work every time.
- Once thickened remove from heat and add coconut and pecans. Beat until thick enough to spread.
- Spread frosting over the tops of cooled cookies.
- Optional: Drizzle with melted candy coating and let set up. Top with a white chocolate heart. See note.
- Note: I melted some pink chocolate candy coating, put it into a Ziplock lunch baggie, snipped off a small corner. Then on some wax paper drew hearts with the chocolate. I let them harden, then gently placed them on top of the cookies. A great decoration for upcoming Valentine’s Day.
Can you make a chocolate sugar cookie?
I would like to know if I can sub some of the sugar for apple sause or would it be too thin? I am a diabetic and want to cut the sugar in half and not lose the flavor. Thanks
You can use stevia as a substitute for the sugar and the box or pkg will tell you exactly how much to use for the amount of sugar. There is also Ting that is half sugar and half stevia, have used both for cakes and cookies and they work well and are plenty sweet. I personally don’t like the other alternative sugars because they taste so chemical when cooked with and have so many side effects. Have used stevia for over 2 yrs and love it. Some brands are sweeter though and the cheaper store brands are just as good as the high priced name brands. I use 1 to 2 pkg in 30 oz of tea. Hope this helps, I am diabetic and a nurse.
we made these cookies and they are easy to make and very delicious- I have a family of german chocolate lovers and they are a hit! thank you for sharing this recipe we will make them again! happy holidays
do you have a pecan pie cookie?
I just wanted to say, I made these and OMG!!! They were absolutely fabulous! The directions were spot on and my family LOVED them!!! Thanks!
Hi! This recipe looks amazing! I’m going to a cookie exchange and need to make 4 dozen cookies. How many does this recipe make so I can scale it from there ? Thanks!!
I was wondering if these freeze well.
How long can these stay in an air tight container?
How long can these stay in an airtight container?
Up to 5 days, they freeze amazingly well.
I would like to make these for my husband’s birthday. We are going to be stuck in a hotel that day so I’ll have to make them ahead of time. At what point should I freeze them? Just the cookie base or will they freeze and thaw OK completely assembled? Thanks for this recipe; I can’t wait!
I am planning on freezing them. Should I freeze the icing and the cookie separate and put them together after defrosting or do they do well assembled before freezing?
I made the cookies exactly like the recipe says. However my cookies are rock hard. I made them using the spoon drop. I used a teaspoon. They weren’t overly filled and i’m not sure what i did wrong. Might have to throw them away and start again. Maybe cook them less. I cooked them for 10 min. Oh well just thought i would share.
I used a Tablespoon scoop and cooked for 8 minutes. They were perfect.
Thanks. I made some German Chocolate Cake a couple of weeks back and these is going on my baking list for next year.
Hi! these look just amazing!! I want to make these but I don’t understand what is two stick of butter? 2 x 1/4 cup?
thanks
Lea 🙂
I was wondering the same thing – how much butter is in two sticks?
Each “stick” of butter is 1/4 pound, or 8 tablespoons.
Therefore, 2 sticks means 1/2 pound, or 16 tablespoons.
These cookies live up to all the hype! My dad loves German chocolate cake. Made him a batch last night. These are seriously perfect cookies! Thanks for the recipe!!
Thank you! This made my day! San
So I tried making these cookies tonight for a mother’s day party I’m attending tomorrow, and I have to say I was a little disappointed. I followed these directions to a T, which is usually not my style, and the cookies were the challenging part. My cookies didn’t flatten when I baked them, instead they stayed hard, little ball things. Luckily I was able to smush them down about halfway through baking. This recipe is flawed..
Serve them with the icing warm – mmmm
Wow!!ans I thought that the German Chocolate cheesecake recipe I have was good! These cookies are amazing! Only downside is that I’m not sure how many will make it to the family reunion this weekend. ☺️ Thank you so much for sharing!!
These were phenomenal!!! Thanks for the recipe!!!!
looks amazing’ I love German Frosting.
Does the icing and German chocolate dry rough to put on a Christmas cookie tray?
No Kelly you should be just fine once it sets.
Help please, I cooked the icing the amount of time required. It had begun to thicken, then added the pecans and coconut. Set of stove and used mixer, but still too thin to use on cookies. How do I get it thicker or thick enough now?