What’s better than a warm chocolate chip cookie? A warm chocolate chip cookie that didn’t require any effort to make.
Store-bought chocolate chip cookie dough is convenience food at its finest. Grab a package from the diary or frozen section of your grocery store, pop them in the oven for 12 minutes, and you’ve got the food equivalent of a comforting hug.
I set out to find the cookie dough that makes the best chocolate chip cookies. I rounded up as many as I could find at my local grocery stores, and baked them all on a parchment paper-lined sheet pan according to the package’s instructions. Here are the results of my gooey, chocolate-filled side-by-side taste test.
Prices and availability are subject to change.
Best. Trader Joe’s Super Chocolatey Chocolate Chunk Cookie Dough
$5.29
Trader Joe’s is my top pick for store-bought chocolate chip cookie dough. It bakes up into a classic cookie in looks and taste. The texture is fantastic, with crisp edges and a soft, gooey middle right out of the oven. Once it cools, more of the cookie will be crispy, so if you prefer a softer cookie, you might want to underbake it slightly.
There’s lots of chocolate in these — and chunks are better than chips, if you ask us. If you’re looking for a cookie that you can pass off as homemade, you’ll probably succeed with these, though you will pay a little more for the perk.
2. Doughp Cookie Dough
$8.29
I didn’t have much confidence in Doughp’s mini cookie dough bites because the fact that you can bake them seems to be an afterthought. But once baked, they’re absolutely fantastic, with a rich butter flavor and the same toffee notes I get in my homemade browned butter chocolate chip cookies. They’re thin and crispy, so if you like a soft cookie, eat them warm or store them in an airtight container with a piece of sliced bread to soften them.
There are caveats, though, which is why they didn’t win this taste test. First, they’re mini cookies, which is probably not what most people want when they buy cookie dough. Second, there’s very little chocolate in these, which is sad. And finally, they’re the most expensive of the bunch, by far. If you want the cookie that tastes the most like homemade and don’t care about looks, this is it.
3. Toll House Chocolate Chip (Tube)
$4.29
Nestle’s yellow tube of cookie dough is straight from your childhood. Squeezing it out from the package and making little mounds of dough is part of the fun, and somehow feels more genuine than the break-and-bake kind. These cookies bake up exactly like you’d expect, with plenty of rich chocolate chips and a kid-pleasing texture. They’re pretty unmistakable, and while you can’t go wrong with a tube of Toll House cookies, you can do a little better if you want.
4. Sweet Loren’s Chocolate Chunk
$7.39
Sweet Loren’s is displayed with all the other brands of cookie dough in the grocery store, which might make you overlook the fact that these are gluten- and allergen-free. Once baked, you might not realize it either, because these cookies hold their own with all the other brands, and taste like they’re made with more quality ingredients to boot.
They taste best while still warm and soft, because once they’re cool is when you’ll notice more of a sandy texture. Still, my partner in taste tests didn’t even guess these were gluten free, which is a pretty big compliment for anything GF. Thanks to molasses in the dough, they’re a little dark in color, but everyone will enjoy these, food allergies or not.
5. Simple Truth Organic Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
$4.99
Simple Truth Organic is a Kroger brand, and the only one that bills itself as an oatmeal chocolate chip cookie. The oatmeal helps them bake up beautifully without spreading much and with even browning on the tops, so they look great. But they do look like oatmeal raisin cookies, especially since there’s not enough chocolate chips in them. If anything they’re kind of bland, and also not what most people think of as a chocolate chip cookie. If you love oatmeal cookies, you might like them.
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6. Toll House Chocolate Chip Lovers (Squares)
$4.29
For some reason, the break-and-bake Toll House chocolate chip cookie dough just doesn’t taste as good as the tube dough from the same brand. It’s got a slight sourness to it that’s off putting when you taste them side by side. The best part is that this version has a lot more chocolate chips. But otherwise, you get that weird ghostly square shape on the top of your cookie, so don’t even think about trying to pass these off as homemade. Stick with the tube.
7. Specially Selected Chocolate Chip with Almond Brittle
$3.29
Aldi doesn’t carry plain old chocolate chip cookie dough (at least not right now), so I went with the version that includes almond brittle. I was hoping for a nice nutty, toffee flavor from the brittle, but these just taste kind of plastic-like. You can see the almonds, but they’re tiny little pieces that don’t add flavor. If you want to try them, definitely eat them warm from the oven, because they get much less enjoyable as they cool.
8. Crav’n Place and Bake Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
$5.99
You know that mysterious yet very distinct “birthday cake” flavor? That’s what these taste like, and you can’t escape it. They look great, but they taste like an artificially flavored frosted sugar cookie. Even worse, the chocolate is just kind of devoid of any flavor at all. It’s a bummer because I love the convenience of frozen cookie dough, and these seemed like a good value… and then I tasted them.
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9. Pillsbury Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
$3.99
How is it that the Pillsbury Dough Boy can let me down this much?! These cookies taste like Play-Doh with an astringent aftertaste. It kind of hits you in the face when you eat the dough raw (you can safely eat this brand raw, but not all brands), and I was hoping baking would help, but the off putting flavors were still very noticeable. If you want a cheap, nostalgia supermarket brand of cookie dough, stick with Toll House.
