Say hello to summer in cookie form with toasted coconut sugar cookies! These sweet, buttery sugar cookies are full of tropical flavor with that soft, chewy texture everyone loves. Plus, they're incredibly simple to make for even the beginner baker. You won't find a more perfect summer cookie.
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Why You'll Love This Recipe
With summer here, you need a delicious but easy and portable dessert for all your backyard barbecuing needs -- something that can hold up to the hottest temperatures without refrigeration. No fussy preparation is required, and serving is as simple as grab and go for a casual evening.
Enter these toasted coconut sugar cookies! Not only do these little treats check all the aforementioned boxes, but they're also bakery-style sugar cookies as opposed to those puffier, more cake-like sugar cookies used for extra fancy decorating. And let's be honest. That's the best kind of sugar cookie.
Bakery-style sugar cookies have a tender, chewy bite with a crinkly top and buttery, moist base. Those more decorative sugar cookies tend to have a drier, almost crumbly texture. Plus, the toasted coconut adds even more chewiness. If you're all about a chewy texture, these cookies were made for you.
Bonus: If you love these tropical summer cookies, be sure to also check out my macadamia nut-coconut chocolate chip cookies and butterscotch-coconut-bourbon cookies!
Ingredients
And those are all the ingredients you need. As you can see, everything should be easy to find in the grocery store, which is yet another reason to love this recipe.
For the coconut, I used sweetened coconut. I just love flavor you get from the sweetened variety, and it's more commonly used in baking. That said, you could also substitute it with unsweetened coconut. While unsweetened coconut is a bit drier and chewier, it will work.
Step-by-Step Instructions
How to Toast Coconut
I like to toast coconut on the stove in a skillet, and the process couldn't be simpler.
Step 1: We toss a bunch of coconut into a nonstick skillet and cook over medium heat (photo 1). Every so often, we give the skillet a shake to keep the coconut from burning.
After several minutes, our coconut will brown like so (photo 2) and turn fragrant. Now we're ready to move on to the rest of our cookie recipe.
How to Prepare Cookie Dough
The rest of this recipe is similar to making your typical drop cookies. Unless you're a cookie rookie, this process should feel familiar.
Step 2: We start by stirring together our flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt and setting that aside (photo 3).
Step 3: In a large mixing bowl, we add softened butter and sugar and beat until it's light and fluffy like so (photo 4).
Step 4: From here, we add in vanilla extract and coconut extract for an extra dose of tropical flavor as well as freshly squeezed lemon juice. We then beat in our eggs one at a time (photo 5). We want to add in our eggs one at a time to prevent overbeating, so don't just throw them in all at once, thinking it doesn't matter.
Step 6: Now we stir in a little of our flour mixture at a time (photo 6) and repeat the process until we incorporate all of the dry ingredients (photo 7).
Step 7: Once the flour is all incorporated, we add our toasted coconut (photo 8 and 9), and we're ready to refrigerate our dough.
Step 8: After refrigerating, we shape our dough into golf ball-size dough balls by rolling them in our hands and then place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet.
Step 9: After baking, we place the cookies on a wire rack to cool, but do yourself a favor and treat yourself to a coconut sugar cookie while it's still warm.
Recipe FAQs
Before baking, we need to refrigerate this cookie dough for at least an hour. Yes, I realize this might be annoying, but if we don't refrigerate the dough, the cookies will overspread in the oven. The butter in the dough needs some time to firm back up before it hits that hot environment.
So go enjoy a little Netflix time, come back in an hour and the cookie dough will be ready for baking, which just takes nine minutes per batch.
When the toasted coconut sugar cookies come out of the oven, they may look slightly underbaked, but that just means you did it correctly. This ensures our cookies stay perfectly soft and chewy after cooling.
Yes. To prevent overspreading, you want to place the unbaked cookie dough on parchment paper with no cooking spray. If you have a silicone baking mat, you can use that as well.
This recipe is designed to be for drop sugar cookies, not cut-out sugar cookies. These are more of your chewy sugar cookies rather than the more cake-like type that you decorate with royal icing.
Expert Tips
- When measuring your flour and sugar, don't scoop the cup into bag. That packs in too much of our ingredient. Instead, spoon into the measuring cup and use a knife to level off any excess.
- Make sure your eggs are room temperature before beating. Room-temperature eggs incorporate much better than cold eggs. Simply allow them to sit for 30 minutes in room temperature. If you forget, place them in warm -- not hot -- water for 10 minutes.
- The lemon juice adds a nice brightness, but it also activates the baking soda, so don't skip this ingredient, thinking it's just for an extra flavor boost.
- For beating the cookie dough, I use my Kitchenaid mixer to handle this step. Three to four minutes of beating the sugar and butter on speed four works well for me. A hand mixer also works -- just make sure you give this step a few minutes of beating to incorporate enough air into the mixture.
Perfect Pairing
Beer and cookies are one of my favorite pairings, and I love an imperial stout with these toasted coconut sugar cookies. The inherent sweetness from the high alcohol content makes it perfect for all sorts of desserts, and coconut is a delicious match to that roasted malt.
For wine, an oaked chardonnay is a fun match. Oak barrels often impart a coconut flavor, and the buttery chardonnay fits perfectly with our cookie dough base. A riesling is another delicious option.
And, of course, if you want to really play up the coconut flavor, you can't go wrong with tropical cocktails. My coconut margarita and coconut-watermelon mojito are obvious choices.
When you need the perfect summer treat, I hope you try these toasted coconut sugar cookies. You'll love that tropical flavor packed into one delicious treat.
Cheers!
Can't Get Enough Cookies?
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Toasted Coconut Sugar Cookies
Equipment
- Stand or hand mixer
- Mixing bowl
- Large baking sheet
- Parchment paper
- Wire racks
Ingredients
- 1 ⅓ cups sweetened shredded coconut
- 2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- 1 cup salted butter softened
- 1 ½ cups granulated white sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon coconut extract
- Additional granulated sugar or turbinado sugar for dusting optional
Instructions
- In a small skillet over medium heat, toast the coconut until it begins to brown and turn fragrant. Stir every so often to prevent burning. Set aside.
- Stir together flour, baking soda, salt and baking powder in a small bowl. Set aside.
- Cream together the softened butter with sugar until light and fluffy.
- Scrape the creamed butter off the side of the bowl. Add one egg with the lemon juice and extracts. Beat just until combined. Repeat with the second egg. Once both eggs are combined, scrape the dough off the side of the bowl again.
- Add a spoonful or two of the flour mixture at a time and stir until incorporated. Repeat until all the flour mixture is combined into the dough. Stir in toasted coconut.
- Chill the cookie dough in the refrigerator for at least an hour.
- Heat oven to 375 degrees. On a parchment paper-lined baking sheet, form the dough into approximately golf ball-size dough balls.
- Bake for nine minutes. Allow to cool on the baking sheet for a couple minutes and then move to a wire rack to cool completely. If desired, dust with additional granulated sugar or turbinado sugar while still warm. Store in an airtight container. Enjoy!
Notes
- When measuring your flour and sugar, don't scoop the cup into bag. That packs in too much of our ingredient. Instead, spoon into the measuring cup and use a knife to level off any excess.
- Make sure your eggs are room temperature before beating. Room-temperature eggs incorporate much better than cold eggs. Simply allow them to sit for 30 minutes in room temperature. If you forget, place them in warm -- not hot -- water for 10 minutes.
- The lemon juice adds a nice brightness, but it also activates the baking soda, so don't skip this ingredient, thinking it's just for an extra flavor boost.
- For beating the cookie dough, I use my Kitchenaid mixer for this step. Three to four minutes of beating the sugar and butter on speed four works well for me. A hand mixer also works -- just make sure you give this step a few minutes of beating to incorporate enough air into the mixture.
- Nutritional information is only an estimate. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed.
Michelle Huston says
Tender AND chewy sugar cookies are my jam and these Toasted Coconut Sugar Cookies had me dancing all over the kitchen while "taste testing" them!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
Right?! Best texture for cookies!
Kayla DiMaggio says
Wow! These Toasted Coconut Sugar Cookies look amazing! It would be easy to adapt these to be vegan. I am sure the flavor is outstanding.
Jeri says
These cookies had amazing flavor with the toasted coconut! They turned out just perfect, and my whole family loved them! I'm going to make a double batch next time and freeze some!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
That's a brilliant idea! So glad they were a hit.
Kimberly says
My husband travels all year long and says he get these “coconut cookies” at a certain gas station. I found your recipe and it sounded close. I just made them and he walked in the door for his 1 hr home stay and was Amazed!!! It was perfect and I agree! These are simply Amazing cookies!
Easy to make and the house smells wonderful!
Thank you for helping me impress the love of my life. ❤️
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
Awww, Kimberly, I love this! I'm so happy you both loved them. Thanks for sharing such a sweet story. ?
Marwin Brown says
What an easy to make and tasty looking recipe! These cookies look like the perfect texture as well!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
They most definitely do!
Marisa F. Stewart says
This is definitely a win-win recipe. We love coconut and we can't get enough of sugar cookies. What a clever way to combine two types of cookies that we enjoy. I made the recipe and believe me, it won't be the last time we make it. So good.
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
Yay! Love hearing that, Marisa!
Elaine says
I've just been thinking that I need to do something about my cookie jar - it looks pretty empty to me 🙂 Can't wait to fill it up with these!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
This recipe will be the perfect solution!
Kushigalu says
One of the best and creative combination of flavor to try in cookie. I have all the ingredients and I will soon try this out.
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
I hope you love it!
Veronika says
I love anything with coconut! and these cookies look absolutely scrumptious! Great Summer flavor!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
They really are the perfect summer cookies!
Bernice Hill says
Beer and cookies? Yes please!! I just love the flavour of toasted coconut and I'm saving this recipe for future cookie craves.
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
They're just so good together!
Marta says
My husband LOVED these cookies paired with the stout! Great idea as I've never thought to combine beer and cookies!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
So glad to hear that! They're so good together!
Jacque Hastert says
I made these cookies last night and they were gone this morning! They were the perfect cookie for this coconut loving family. Thank you!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
Haha, so glad they were a hit!
Kathryn Donangelo says
I made a batch of these cookies over the weekend and they were a hit! Perfect hints of coconut makes this recipe so delicious!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
So glad to hear that, Kathryn! Makes me happy.
Andrea Howe says
Ooh a stout with my cookie? Yes please! I love coconut anything, so I know these will be devoured!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
These sound perfect for you then!
Milena says
I vote yes for the imperial stout pairing! Such a decadent idea. This is a great, easy recipe - the toasted coconut really stands out, loved the results!
Amanda McGrory-Dixon says
So happy to hear that, Milena! An imperial stout is totally the way to go!