These Strawberry Cream Cheese Cookies are soft and chewy bites of delicious sweet flavor, bursting with seasonal fresh strawberries, cream cheese, and white chocolate chunks. Easy to make and quick to bake, they are truly the best of summer in cookie form.
Cake-like Cream Cheese Cookies
Strawberries mark the true beginning of summer which is why this recipe is a must-make, now that this produce is at its prime! These treats are similar to strawberry cheesecake but are constructed like a cookie. The tang of cream cheese combined with the sweet decadence of white chocolate and seasonal berries is a treat for the taste buds.
I especially love the flavor and texture combinations of smooth cream cheese, rich chunks of chocolate, hint of lemon, and sweet bursts of strawberry. Soft and creamy, these cookies are melt-in-your-mouth goodness, baked to perfection. It’s a fun twist on the traditional strawberry cheesecake but just bite-sized!
Simply delicious and kind of nutritious, this could possibly be my favorite strawberry cheesecake dessert stuffed inside a warm, buttery, white chocolate chip cookie.
Cream cheese strawberry cookies are so easy to make and have an impressive amount of vitamin C, antioxidants, and natural sweet flavors from chopped fresh strawberries that blend throughout the batter. The cream cheese filling in the middle stays gooey while providing a zestiness in every summery bite. With slightly crispy edges and silky centers, these resemble little soft pillows of cake-like cookies, not meant for your head but rather held in your hand.
Why We Love These Strawberry Cream Cheese Cookies
- Easy to make batter
- Quick bake time
- Perfect mix of cream cheese and strawberries combined in a cookie
- The cream cheese filling keeps these cookies soft for days
- Fresh strawberries baked in every bite
- Delicious and super fluffy
- You can make them with fresh strawberries in the summer and frozen ones throughout the year
- Strawberries are packed with vitamin C and acts as an antioxidant to keep your cells healthy
Ingredients / Shopping List
- All-purpose flour
- Baking powder
- Salt
- Granulated sugar: Adds extra sweetness.
- Unsalted butter: You can use regular butter or dairy free butter for a vegan option.
- Cream cheese: Keeps these cookies soft and provides a creamy tang.
- Eggs
- Pure vanilla extract: For a hint of vanilla essence.
- Fresh strawberries: I highly recommend using fresh strawberries if they are in season. Frozen strawberries can be used, but your dough will be more wet and sticky.
- Lemon juice: The flavor of the strawberries is enhanced by the lemon juice.
- White chocolate baking chips
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How To Make Strawberry Cream Cheese Cookies
It is so easy to make these simple summery cookies. Only 10 minutes to prep and under 15 to bake, these are fluffy and fresh mini cheesecakes, in cookie-form.
Combine the chopped strawberries and lemon juice in a small mixing bowl. In another bowl sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt.
Cream together butter, cream cheese, sugar, vanilla extract, and eggs. Slowly add the sifted flour mixture ½ cup at a time.
Add the white chocolate baking chips. Mix just until the ingredients are well incorporated.
Drain the lemon juice from the chopped strawberries and sprinkle 2 tablespoons of flour over them. Stir to coat the berries. Carefully fold the coated strawberries into the cookie dough.
Cover and chill the dough in the refrigerator for 10 minutes.
Using a 1- 1 ½ tablespoon cookie scoop, scoop out the dough, and space the dough balls 2 inches apart on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake for 13-15 minutes, just until the edges of the cookies are golden.
Pro-Tip: To prevent the cookie from spreading, place the cookie dough balls in the freezer for 10 minutes before baking.
Allow the cookies to rest on the cookie sheet for 5 minutes before moving them to a cooling rack. Allow the cookies to completely cool before plating them. Serve and enjoy!
Variations / Options / Add-In’s
- Berries: You can substitute blueberries, raspberries, or blackberries to create a delicious cream cheese berry cookie by following my same basic recipe.
- Make them Vegan: To make a vegan version, use vegan butter (to maintain the same fluffy texture) or vegetable oil (will have a slightly less fluffy texture). Swap the eggs with flax eggs (1T flax meal plus 2.5 T water equals one egg). Use a dairy-free/vegan cream cheese and dairy-free baking chips as well.
- Add extra sweetness: Sprinkle a little powdered sugar on top or drizzle with melted chocolate for an extra sweet touch!
Tips
- Use fresh strawberries when they are in season. While frozen strawberries are an option for cooler months, they tend to hold more water and may make the dough sticky.
- The cream cheese and the butter should be at room temperature, NOT melted. This will help preserve the shape of the cookies and prevent them from spreading too much during baking.
- Strawberries should be finely chopped into small pieces so that they can easily fit into the cookies.
- For easy clean-up, line your baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. This way there is no need to spray the baking sheet with non-stick spray.
Frequently Asked Questions
Because the strawberry cream cheese cookies are soft, they are best kept refrigerated in an airtight container for up to 3 days. Not only will this preserve them longer, it will also keep these soft cookies intact and keep the strawberries tasting fresh!
You can freeze your cookies in a ziplock bag to enjoy later and let them thaw in the fridge when you’re ready to eat!
Yes, but it’s not recommended. Frozen strawberries hold water that releases into the cookie dough as they thaw, making the cookie dough sticky and harder to work with. The color can sometimes bleed into the dough with frozen strawberries too. If you only have frozen strawberries, you can still use them but make sure you cut them up before making the dough, then just work really quickly to assemble the cookies.
Do not overmix the batter! You also want to make sure to avoid excess moisture as much as possible. Therefore, it is important to drain your strawberries right before you fold them into the cookie dough.
Coating the strawberries with flour before adding it to the cookie dough prevents them from sinking to the bottom of each cookie. Make sure you follow the recipe instructions for proper coating.
Yes! You can absolutely skip the cream cheese part of these cookies and still make the most delicious strawberry butter chip cookies ever!
Other Easy Cookie Recipes
S’mores Cookies | DoubleTree Chocolate Chip Cookies (Copycat Recipe)| Pop-Tarts Cookies | Peppermint Patty Cookies | Rainbow Sprinkle Cookies | Banana Bread Cookies | Lemon Meltaway Cookies | Strawberry Cake Mix Cookies | Funfetti Cake Mix Cookies | Sugar Cookie Icing | Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
Strawberry Cream Cheese Cookies
Ingredients
- 1¾ cup all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- ¼ tsp salt
- ¾ cup + 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
- ¼ cup unsalted butter softened
- 4 oz cream cheese softened
- 2 large eggs
- 2 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 2 cups rough chopped fresh strawberries
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 2 tbsp all-purpose flour
- 6 oz (½ bag) white chocolate baking chips
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 F
- In a small mixing bowl, combine the chopped strawberries and lemon juice, and set aside.
- Sift together the all-purpose flour, baking powder and salt. Set it aside.
- Using either a stand mixer, or a medium size mixing bowl and handheld mixer on medium-high speed, cream together the softened butter and the softened cream cheese for 1 ½ to 2 minutes. Using a silicone spatula, scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl.
- Add the granulated sugar, and continue to mix on medium-high for another 1 – 1 ½ minutes.
- Reduce the mixer speed to low. Add the vanilla extract, and add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each egg.
- Keep the mixer on low speed and slowly add the sifted flour mixture ½ cup at a time.
- Continue mixing on low, add the white chocolate baking chips. Mix just until the ingredients are well incorporated.
- Drain the lemon juice from the chopped strawberries, and sprinkle the 2 tablespoons of flour over the strawberries. Stir to coat the berries. Shake off and discard any excess flour.
- Carefully fold the coated strawberries into the cookie dough. Chill the dough covered in the refrigerator for 10 minutes
- Using a 1- 1 ½ tablespoon cookie scoop, scoop out the dough, and space the dough balls 2 inches apart. Bake for 13-15 minutes, just until the edges of the cookies are golden. Allow the cookies to rest on the cookie sheet for 5 minutes before moving them to a cooling rack. Allow the cookies to completely cool.
Jenn’s Notes
- Use fresh strawberries when they are in season. While frozen strawberries are an option for cooler months, they tend to hold more water and may make the dough sticky.
- The cream cheese and the butter should be at room temperature, NOT melted. This will help preserve the shape of the cookies and prevent them from spreading too much during baking.
- Strawberries should be finely chopped into small pieces so that they can easily fit into the cookies.
- For easy clean-up, line your baking sheet with parchment paper or aluminum foil. This way there is no need to spray the baking sheet with non-stick spray.
- To prevent the cookie from spreading, place the shaped cookie dough balls (on the cookie sheet) in the freezer for 10 minutes before baking.
these were horrible.
they were like eating playdoh
Hi, love the recipe 🙂 How long does the dough stay good for ?
I used a 1.2 ounce bag freeze dried strawberries increased the lemon juice to 1.5tablespoons skipped the 2 tablespoons flour and increased the refrigeration time to about an hour.
I really want this recipe to work out these looked so good. My cookies came out flat and disappointing. I followed all the instructions even chill the dough and freeze the balls before cooking and still FLAT! I even made sure to not overmix the dough but I don’t know what I did wrong.
I have noticed an error in your recipe. It says to add 2 tsp. Of flour to strawberries but in the recipe list it says sugar. Please update your recipe thank you 😊
No- it should be flour, not sugar. You will see that flour is listed twice in the ingredients.
Delicious and pretty. So easy to make-my four year old grandson helped make and eat these yummy treats.