Enjoy your afternoon tea with these crisp and buttery Matcha Cookies. The unique flavor combination of matcha and white chocolate is surprisingly delightful!
I have always had a sweet tooth starting at a young age. As I got older, my taste bud for sweets has evolved and I’ve come to appreciate baked goods and confectionaries that have different tones of flavor and are preferably not overly sweet. When comes to flavoring in the sweet department, my absolute favorite is matcha (green tea powder). The earthy, slightly bitter taste with a sweet hint of vanilla-like aroma of matcha is utterly dreamy and alluring, which makes it a delightful ingredient to work with. It is subtle but unmistakable.
And good news for matcha lovers! You can now find every imaginable snack and sweet available in matcha flavor. Specialty stores, mini markets, and even food courts at the departmental stores in Japan are offering matcha flavored goodies with an astonishing array of selections. Since I’ve been inspired to cook and bake with matcha, I’m excited to share one of my favorite butter cookies, Matcha Cookies (抹茶クッキー) with you today.
What is Matcha?
Before I begin talking about these cookies, let me share a bit of info on Matcha with you.
Matcha is a type of tea leaf powder that has a beautiful vivid green color. However, it’s different from the “green tea” that you drink with Japanese meals. That’s green tea too, but matcha leaves are grown and harvested differently. The leaves are grown under shade.
For those of you who want to try this recipe, I hope you can find 100% pure matcha powder in your local Asian grocery store. The good quality ones should have very beautiful green, not dull green. Japanese grocery stores around my area sell Maeda-En matcha and you can also get it on Amazon. It’s a bit pricey but matcha is expensive in Japan as well.
Adding White Chocolate Chips
These cookies are really delicious even without white chocolate chips (if you’re not a fan of white chocolate). However, I highly recommend it as matcha brings its characteristic bitter flavor to the cookies, and the sweetness from white chocolate chips actually balances out the cookies quite well.
If you add regular chocolate chips, the milk chocolate can be too strong and it ruins the unique matcha flavor and fragrance so I don’t recommend it.
Instead of white chocolate chips, I’ve also tried rolling the chilled cookie logs over white sparkling sugar (large sugar crystals) before slicing the dough. This is a great way to add more sweetness to the cookies. The large sugar crystals will keep their shape and give a nice sweetness and sparkles to the cookies.
I’ve also seen JOC readers adding macadamia nuts instead of white chocolate chips. Great idea!
Buttery and Crispy Texture
This type of cookie is known as butter cookies or icebox cookies. They also go by shortbread cookies or sable cookies. They are unleavened cookies, which means that leavening agents such as baking powder or baking soda are not used in the recipe.
The ingredients are simple: butter, sugar, and flour. They often include vanilla extract, but I omit it because it’s too strong for matcha flavor.
These cookies are crisp rather than chewy or soft. If you have tried and love shortbread cookies, you can expect a similar crispy texture.
Don’t Skip Chilling the Dough!
Chilling the dough intensifies the flavor of the dough and retains its shape in the oven (so the butter in the dough doesn’t melt fast). Hold tight for just 2 hours. You can clean up the kitchen and preheat the oven during this time.
If you like to cut out the cookie dough, roll the dough into a large disk, chill, then roll it out again before cutting it out into shapes.
I hope you enjoy making this Matcha Cookie recipe. They are perfect for a cozy afternoon snack or for your cookie swap during the holiday season!
More Cookie Recipes
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Matcha Cookies
Video
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (plain flour) (weigh your flour or use the “fluff and sprinkle“ method and level it off)
- 2½ Tbsp matcha green tea powder (1 Tbsp matcha is 6 g)
- ¾ cup unsalted butter (softened, at room temperature)
- 1 pinch Diamond Crystal kosher salt
- 130 g confectioners’ sugar (1 cup + 2 tsp)
- 2 large egg yolks (at room temperature)
- ¼ cup good-quality white chocolate baking chips
Instructions
Before You Start…
- Please note that this recipe requires a chilling time of 2 hours. Gather all the ingredients. I highly encourage you to weigh your ingredients using a kitchen scale for this recipe. Click on the “Metric“ button at the top of the recipe to convert the ingredient measurements to metric. If you‘re using a cup measurement, please follow the “fluff and sprinkle“ method: Fluff your flour with a spoon, sprinkle the flour into your measuring cup, and level it off. Otherwise, you may scoop more flour than you need.
To Make and Chill the Dough
- Combine 2 cups all-purpose flour (plain flour) and 2½ Tbsp matcha green tea powder in a large bowl.
- Sift the flour and the matcha powder.
- In a stand mixer with a paddle attachment or in a large bowl with a hand mixer, beat ¾ cup unsalted butter until smooth and creamy. Tip: It’s important to soften the butter ahead of time. Leave the butter out on the counter for 1 hour or microwave it in 5-second increments until it‘s softened.
- Add 1 pinch Diamond Crystal kosher salt and blend.
- Add 130 g confectioners’ sugar (1 cup + 2 tsp) and beat well until soft and light. As you blend, stop the mixer and scrape down the bowl occasionally.
- Add 2 large egg yolks and mix well until combined.
- Gradually add the flour and matcha mixture and mix until just combined.
- Add ¼ cup good-quality white chocolate baking chips and mix until just incorporated.
- Divide the dough into 2 equal pieces. Shape each piece into a cylinder about 1½ inches (4 cm) in diameter and 7 inches (18 cm) long.
- Wrap the logs in plastic wrap and chill in the refrigerator until firm, at least 2 hours. Tip: You can place the logs on a bed of uncooked rice while chilling. It’ll keep the dough in a nice cylindrical shape so your cookie slices won’t be flat on one side. To Freeze for Later: You can also freeze the unbaked logs of dough, wrapped in plastic wrap, for up to 2 months. To bake, let sit at room temperature for about 10 minutes before cutting and baking. Do not let the dough fully defrost.
To Bake
- Preheat the oven to 350ºF (175ºC). For a convection oven, reduce the cooking temperature by 25ºF (15ºC). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking liner. Remove the dough from the refrigerator and unwrap the plastic wrap. Use a sharp knife to slice the dough into rounds about ⅓ inch (7 mm) thick. If the dough is too hard to slice, wait 5 minutes or so before slicing. Place the sliced dough on the baking sheet, leaving about 1 inch (2.5 cm) of space between the rounds.
- Bake the cookies at 350ºF (175ºC) for about 15 minutes, or until the edges of the cookies start to get slightly golden brown.
- Remove from the oven and let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes; then carefully transfer the cookies to a wire cooling rack and let them cool completely before serving.
To Store
- You can keep the cooled cookies in an airtight container and store them at room temperature for at least 4 days.
Notes
Nutrition
Editor’s Note: The post was originally published on November 11, 2011. Since then the post has been updated with a new video, new pictures, and an updated recipe in July 2016.
What can I do to make the cookies less dry? During the mixing process and the result after being baked in the oven?
Hi Jo! I recently (maybe 1-2 week ago?) edited the recipe and it should be less crumbly. However, please note one thing. These cookies are not soft and chewy cookies. They are butter cookies/sable/shortbread, so maybe that’s why you think it’s “dry” after baked?
Hi Nami!
First, thank you for all these recipes.
I’ve just tried making the dough and it was extremely crumbly as well– I ended up adding two yolks as I feel mine were too small? The dough is sitting in the fridge for now, I’ll try actually cooking it tomorrow and see what happens o.o/
Hi Carol! Thank you so much for reading my blog and trying out my recipes!
Hope the cookies turned out well. I’ll be working on this recipe once again and try to film the video. Most of my readers who tried this recipe and showed me their result seem like they did okay, but I also hear some feedback on crumble dough. So I hope to improve the recipe. 🙂
Hello Namiko! First of all thanks very much for this Recipe!
I tried this recipe yesterday and the cookies turned out reaaaaally deliciouuuus…BUT..BUT..they were super crumbely 🙁
After they rested in the fridge, I tried to cut them into slices, but they just fell apart, so in the end I didn´t have nice and round circles like you did, I had some broken pieces of cookie, but they were still really yummy 🙂
so what did I do wrong? do I have to add more butter??
regards!
Hi Nadeshiko! Thank you for trying this recipe! This type of cookies is sable and hard cookies. And I understand about the crumbliness as some of my readers mentioned and I also experienced following this original recipe. You can reduce the amount of chocolate (which helped me) or increase the amount of butter a little bit. Depends on the moisture in the air, the dough gets drier or more moist, so we might have different outcome. Hope you give it a try again. I plan to make this again and hope to make this recipe a bit better…
Hi Nami,
I just tried making these today, but the dough was too crumbly for me to shape it into logs without breaking. Should I add more butter or is oil a better option?
HI Jjtaime! Thank you for trying this recipe! Some of my readers (above) commented that the dough was crumbly. I usually use metric (gram) to make so it’s exact recipe as this recipe, but once in a while when the weather is dry or humid, the outcome changes. Unlike soft chewy cookies, these are more like sable cookies so the dough is very different. You could add more butter/oil if you like, or reduce flour a little bit to begin.
I think I actually mixed both metric and cups, hence it turned out so crumbly. It taste great, so I will make it again and not be lazy. Thank you!
Hi Jjtaime! I’ll try to make video for this recipe and will try to make some variations to see what works best. 🙂
Made these today and they are delicious! Thanks so much for posting the wonderful recipe!
Hi Pam! So happy to hear that you liked this recipe! Thanks for trying and for your kind feedback. 🙂
Hi Nami,
Thank you very much! This is a wonderful recipe! the cookies tasted great and they were gone within a day =)
Hi Juliet! I’m so happy to hear that you enjoyed this recipe! Thank you for your kind feedback! 🙂
Hello Nami! I made these cookies today, and they turned out absolutely beautiful and delicious.
I did have some trouble with the dough being very crumbly, and it’s possible I overmixed it. I measured all the ingredients out in grams, and I used 1/3 c mini white chocolate chips. I also used the exact matcha you recommended. When I cut the dough into rounds, I found that it held together if I cut it a little larger than 1/4″.
I am planning on making the cookies again this week, and I will experiment with mixing the dough less and adding less flour. I’d love to hear your thoughts on any other changes I might make.
Hi Miche! Thank you for trying these cookies! I’m happy to hear you enjoyed them.
I apologize for my late response. I just found your comment in my (accumulated) inbox… so sorry!
I feel reducing the chocolate chips will prevent from breaking into pieces, as the dough will be held together better without chocolate chips… I hope your next batch went well. Again I’m sorry for my late response.
Hi!! I’m really interested in baking this! But can I use self-raising flour instead of all purpose flour? If so, what’s the exact measurement to that then? The same? THANKS((:
Hi Jazreel! I’m sorry but you can’t use it. Why?
Self-rising flour includes a leavening agent (such as baking soda) to rise. So if the recipe does not include baking soda along with flour, you are basically adding “unnecessary” leavening agent (baking soda) in the recipe.
I hope this makes sense. 🙂
Hi Nami,
Just wondering whether this cookies can be rolled and cut into shape using cookie cutter instead? I want to make this for christmas and would like them in shape.
Thank you 🙂
Hi Ica! Sure! 🙂 Sounds like you’re making Christmas tree or wreath? 🙂 Hope you enjoy these cookies!
Delicious recipe!! Made these for my friends last night and were a hit!! One friend was scared by the concept of the green tea being the core ingredient but with encouragement tried it and ended up taking home a “doggy bag” (as we like to call it in Australia) of biscuits at the end of the evening. Perhaps this is just in Australia but the green tea powder is very expensive here. Is this usually the case?
Thanks again for a tasty treat!! Now for the next recipe…
Hi Tamera! I’m so happy to hear your friends liked this recipe! Haha, I know new food can be very intimidating, especially when it’s green and you hear “bitter”. LOL.
Yes, green tea powder IS expensive even in Japan. Maybe just slightly cheaper but there are more high end green tea powder in Japan that price is pretty much the same. I spend $8 for 1 oz.
https://www.justonecookbook.com/pantry_items/green-tea-powder-matcha/
It’s cheaper than buying green tea baked goods or drinks though. It takes a long time to make green tea powder and labor intensive… so that’s why.
DO NOT buy cheap matcha. It’ll not taste good and awfully bitter and the color is not bright green (it’ll be yellow green). I had green tea latte at a cafe and it was so horrible… I’d dislike green tea if I tried that for the first time. 🙁
Hi Nami,
Just wondering if i can substitute matcha powder with cocoa powder? And would it be same amount?
Because i have to make a bery big batch (100+ cookies) so i won’t have enough matcha powder 🙁
Thanks alot!
Cecile
Hi Cecile! Sure you can do that. I think the same amount should work in this recipe (I haven’t tried, but my best judgement….). Wishing you good luck with making 100 + cookies!!!!
I made this today, and my whole family loved them! They ate them ALL today (in ONE day)! It’s a great recipe. I understand that these are meant to be crispy cookies, but is there any way to be able to make them a bit softer? I do like them crispy/crunchy but sometimes, I like making things a bit softer. Thanks!
Hi Megumi! Happy to hear you and your family enjoyed this recipe and thank you for your kidn feedback! These are sable cookies, so they are meant to be harder than those soft cookies. I’m not an expert in baking, but I think this recipe won’t work to achieve softer cookies… 🙂
That’s ok! I think these cookies are delicious anyway! Thanks, Nami-san!
Thank you Megumi! 🙂
Hey Nami! I’m a newbie to baking here. Do you mind answering my question? Do you really need the white chocolate chips or is it optional?
Hi Gizelle! You can definitely omit it, but matcha has a bit bitter flavor so white chocolate balances out. 🙂
Hi, thanks for the recipe! I followed your recipe to the dot but find that the mixture is really dry and crumbly, and I can’t roll it properly into logs. Is that normal or am I missing something?
Hi Stephanie! Thank you so much for trying this recipe! Once in a while I receive feedback from readers about the dough which is a bit crumbly just like you described. However, most of feedback (and final pictures I receive and share on FB fan page) are pretty successful. First, I highly recommend to measure by gram. Second, the size of eggs might matter in the texture of the dough. Not to mention the temperature of the room you make etc. I personally don’t have any problem as long as I don’t put too many white chocolate chips. I had problem with slicing the dough when I put too much chips. Hope this helps…
Thanks for your quick reply Nami! It might be because it’s a cold and dry day here 🙁 Any tips on what I can use to soften/moist the dough when this happens? I love the idea of your green tea white choc cookies and am not ready to give up this recipe yet..!
Only way is to add liquid in the dough but we don’t include milk or vanilla extract etc, we can increase either egg yolk or butter. I hate to add random amount of egg yolk (not a whole egg yolk that’s too much), and increasing butter isn’t too appealing so… Maybe reduce the amount of flour tiny bit? Remember, over mixing the dough also cause the dry crumbly texture so when it’s combined don’t mix too much. Hope this helps. They are really yummy cookies and this is one of readers’ favorite recipes.
hi nami,
i’m just wondering how long can the cookies keep?
Hi Sue! Probably about 2-3 days for the best taste/texture. 🙂