Sourdough Discard Cowboy Cookies [full of rolled oats, pecans + coconut]

Sourdough Discard Cowboy Cookies are crispy on the outer edges, chewy in the middle and bursting with pecans, coconut flakes, rolled oats and chocolate chips.

Use 100g of sourdough starter discard to create these delicious cowboy cookies. The dough ferments in the fridge for a few hours to ensure you get a great flavor, texture and sourdough goodness!

If you love baking and eating sourdough cookies, you might also enjoy these soft sourdough chocolate chip cookies, sourdough jam drops, sourdough snickerdoodles, sourdough peanut butter cookies or these sourdough Anzac biscuits.

What are Cowboy Cookies?

Cowboy cookies are a type of cookie that is similar to chocolate chip cookies but with a twist. They are typically made with oatmeal or rolled oats, chocolate chips and pecans.

Cowboy cookies have a different texture to chocolate chip cookies because they have less flour. The added rolled oats and pecans give them crunch, but they're still a little chewy in the centre.

These cookies tend to be a little less uniform in shape than traditional chocolate chip cookies.

How To Make Sourdough Discard Cowboy Cookies

These sourdough discard cowboy cookies are really easy to mix and bake. You literally mix wet and dry ingredients together! How simple is that? I think the hardest part of this recipe is actually creating the balls of dough because after it's been the in the fridge, the cookie dough is very stiff.

I recommend using a good quality cookie scoop to form uniform balls of dough. I have used 30g balls of dough for the sourdough cowboy cookies in these photos. After testing a few different sizes, this size consistently baked up well and had a good texture compared to larger and smaller weights.

Here's how to make sourdough discard cowboy cookies:

1. Place all of the dry ingredients (all purpose flour, baking powder, corn starch, white and brown sugar, pecans, rolled oats, sweetened coconut, salt and chocolate chips) into a large mixing bowl and combine. Set this aside.
   
2. Now in a separate bowl, combine sourdough starter, melted butter, egg + egg yolk and vanilla extract. Stir together until they are well combined.
   
3. Now pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir to form the cookie dough. It will be quite stiff - that's ok!
   
4. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and place into the fridge for 12 to 24 hours.
   
5. The next day, when you are ready to bake the cookies, preheat the oven to 165C (330F) and line two cookie sheet with parchment paper.
   
6. Use a cookie scoop or large spoon to scoop out balls of dough. I have used 30g dough balls for this recipe. Place the dough balls onto the prepared baking sheets. You can flatten them a little if you want to, but it's not necessary.
   
7. Place the cookies into the oven for 13 to 16 minutes at 165C (330F) or until they are golden brown on top but still molten in the centre (see notes on this).
   
8. Remove from the oven and carefully transfer to a wire rack to cool. The cookies will continue to bake for a few minutes after they are removed from the oven and will firm up as they cool.

Ingredient Notes

• Sourdough Discard - you can use sourdough discard or active sourdough starter. It's better not to use older sourdough discard as it will give the cookies an unpleasant sour flavor.
  
• Baking Powder - use Baking Powder NOT Baking Soda or Bicarb Soda.
  
• Corn Starch is a fine, white processed corn flour used for thickening sauces and gravies. Do NOT use corn meal! The corn starch is added to give you a softer cookie. Corn starch is called corn flour in Ausralia.
  
• Sweetened Coconut Flakes - I've used sweetened coconut flakes - you can use shredded coconut or unsweetened flakes if you prefer.
  
• Butter - Make sure you melt the butter for this recipe before you start. Letting it cool just slightly before you add it to the other ingredients will give you the best result. You don't want it to have cooled too much - it should still be slightly warm. I use salted butter in this recipe, but you can use unsalted butter if you prefer.
  
• Nuts - You can use any type of nuts you like - pecans, walnuts, peanuts, hazelnuts all work really well.

Tips for Baking Sourdough Cowboy Cookies

• Refrigerating the dough will give you the best sourdough cowboy cookies. You'll get a chewier texture to the cooled cookies. I also love that refrigerating them overnight means that the dough ferments and the sourdough bacteria get to work their magic on your cookie dough! While you won't reap the same health benefits as eating sourdough bread, they're still doing lots of good!
  
• For thicker cowboy cookies, don't flatten the balls of dough before putting them in the oven. For thinner, crispier cookies, flatten the little balls down a little first.
  
• Don't over cook these cookies. Remove them from the oven when the centre still looks wet or they will be too dry when they cool. The temperature of 165C (330F) might seem low, but it will give you a chewy centred cookie with crispy edges.

Storage + Freezing

I find these sourdough discard cowboy cookies are better stored in a glass cookie jar or cookie tin. Storing them in plastic makes them go soft (and we love the crispy edges!).

They freeze really well. I have frozen them once they're baked and they defrost really well.

The best way to freeze them is to scoop out the cookie dough balls and then snap freeze those on a baking tray. Once frozen, transfer them to a ziploc bag. Then you can grab out a handful whenever you want fresh baked sourdough cowboy cookies.

You can bake these cookies from frozen - just add 5 minutes to the baking time.

Frequently Asked Questions