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Substitute or Add Ingredients – Sometimes, depending on your recipe, you can add or sub out ingredients with good results. Who says baking cookies has to follow some rulebook anyway? Um, except the rules of science. But you can make subtle as well as some not-so-subtle variations in your recipe and achieve a desired result without sacrificing flavor or texture.
- You can add a large chocolate chunk at the center of the dough ball or add more melted butter,
- It’s entirely up to you.
- Use Brown Sugar In most cookie recipes, some type of sweetener is required.
- Usually, it’s sugar, and often it is white sugar.
- However, you can use brown sugar as well, since brown sugar contains more moisture.
Try substituting brown sugar for white sugar on a one-to-one basis, or you can try subbing out most of your white granulated sugar for brown, but still leave a small percentage white. For instance, if you need 2 cups of sugar, you could use 1 1/2 cups of brown sugar and 1/2 cup of white sugar instead.
- It’s all about experimentation, so try it and see what happens.
- Eep in mind that brown sugar will also give your cookies a more caramelized color and deeper flavor, which is excellent.
- Add Molasses or Honey Another way to add more moisture to your cookies is incorporate a tablespoon of molasses into a standard-sized cookie recipe.
Don’t use any more than a tablespoon, because it will make your cookies very sweet and runny. One tablespoon is just enough. If you do not like the strong flavor of molasses, try honey instead. Replace Butter with Vegetable Shortening Because butter contains milk solids, fat, and water, using butter can cause steaming while baking, which can dry out your cookies.
However, vegetable shortening is made up entirely of fat, so it doesn’t have this problem. It also melts at higher temperatures, which gives your cookie batter more time to rise. This helps retain moisture and makes your cookies chewier. If you can’t stand not having that butter flavor, you can try butter-flavored shortening, or you can try splitting the required amounts between butter and shortening.
Always use a one-to-one ratio when replacing butter with shortening, Double Your Yolks Most cookie recipes call for at least one egg. You can try omitting the white of each egg, which tends to dry out when baked, and replacing it with an additional yolk.
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How to make crunchy chocolate chip cookies. – 1. Substitute 2/3 cup granulated sugar for the brown sugar.2. Substitute 1/2 cup vegetable shortening for the butter.3. Bake the cookies for 23 minutes in a preheated 325°F oven. Cookie chemistry: Crunchiness in a cookie depends on a good balance of fat and dryness. That said, using a combination of butter and vegetable shortening (as in the original recipe), or even using all butter, will make an acceptably crunchy chocolate chip cookie. It won’t be AS crunchy as an all-shortening cookie; but for those who eschew vegetable shortening, it’s an option.
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Why Are My Cookies Flat? How to Prevent Spreading By Heath Goldman for Food Network Kitchen There’s nothing worse than baking off fresh cookies, anticipating perfectly fluffy results, only to have them turn out flat-as-pancakes. Yep, you can still eat them, but they’re not what you were expecting.
- What went wrong? Below, we’ve rounded up some of the most common reasons why cookies spread too much.
- SouthernLightStudios/Getty Images Many cookie recipes call for “softened” butter, which sounds like a pretty vague term that’s open to interpretation.
- In actuality, softened butter is a very specific baking descriptor: the butter should be left out at room temperature for thirty minutes to one hour until it’s pliable but still cool to the touch.
You should be able to indent it with a finger and your fingerprint should look like a clean divot. Room temperature butter is just the right consistency to incorporate air when it’s creamed with sugar. These trapped air pockets result in risen, fluffy cookies.
- If the butter is any warmer, it won’t incorporate enough air and your cookies will have less rise.
- Moreover, butter that’s warmer than room temperature melts in an instant in the oven, encouraging the dough to spread quickly with it.
- Refrigerate the remaining dough until it feels firm to the touch, one to two hours.
This chills the butter, so it won’t spread rapidly in the oven. Although your cookies won’t be as fluffy as they might have been, they won’t turn into pancakes. Tetra Images/Getty Images You’re in a groove making cookies, and after the first batch comes out, you transfer a new batch of dough to the baking sheet.
While the first batch came out perfectly, the second batch spread a lot, perhaps so much that the cookies fused together. What happened? It all comes back to that butter, people. Hot baking sheets cause the butter to melt really quickly, bringing the dough with it. We get that you might have a limited number of baking sheets and amount of time.
But you really want to make sure your baking sheets are completely cool between batches. Luckily, there’s a trick for that. Let your baking sheets cool a few minutes so they’re warm, not screaming hot. Then rinse them off under room temperature water until they’re no longer hot to the touch.
- Dry them off and place your cookies on the magically cool sheets.
- If your cookies repeatedly turn out flat, no matter the recipe, chances are your oven is too hot.
- Here’s what’s happening.
- The butter melts super quickly in a too-hot oven before the other ingredients have firmed up into a cookie structure.
Therefore, as the butter spreads so does the whole liquidy cookie. An immediate fix is to lower your oven by a few degrees and extend the baking time. In the long-term, consider buying an oven thermometer and leaving it in your oven so you know your oven’s exact temperature.
- Then you can adjust the heat accordingly, or, better yet, consult the manual on how to calibrate the oven.
- Debby Lewis-Harrison/Getty Images If your ratios of flour, butter and sugar off, the cookie might spread too quickly.
- This can occur if you aren’t precise with your measurements.
- If your recipe calls for 1 cup of sugar, for example, and you add a slightly heaping cup instead of leveling off the cup precisely, you’ll end up with too much.
Sugar sucks up liquid, and when those cookies bake, it’ll release the liquid and cause the cookies to spread out. If you use too much butter, the cookies will end up flat and greasy. And if you use too little flour, the amount of butter and sugar will be proportionally too high, meaning the cookies will spread for the aforementioned reasons.
- If you realize that you used too little flour, simply stir a couple more tablespoons into the batter.
- Otherwise, shape your cookies and freeze them on the baking sheet until they’re solid.
- Although the cookies might still spread some, the frozen butter will counteract the action.
- If all else fails, consider repurposing your flattened cookies: crumble them up as ice cream toppings or mix-ins, or stir them into cake batter or nut butter for a decadent treat.
Related Links: : Why Are My Cookies Flat? How to Prevent Spreading
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Is it OK to use melted butter instead of softened?
Since it is not being creamed and aerated nor kept in cold pieces that create steam in the oven, melted butter does not serve the same roll in leavening pastries as softened and cold butter do. However, it does still play a roll in the texture. For instance, using melted butter in a cookie recipe will make them chewy.
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First, What Makes Cookies Soft? – If someone ever told you that “baking is a science,” they weren’t wrong. Cookies are soft or snappy or cake-y or crunchy based on the ingredients they’re made with. It’s all about moisture. To keep it simple, cookie recipes that contain a lot of butter, brown sugar or egg yolks are going to yield soft and chewy cookies, because those ingredients add moisture and retain it for a longer amount of time.
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Martha Stewart’s Best Baking Tips – “My golden rule for baking is make it cold and bake it hot,” she said. Use Grated Butter for Flakey Crust The food and lifestyle maven said that using frozen butter over a box grater creates perfect size pieces. “You’ll have no problem with it making the most beautiful flakiness – in biscuits, scones, pie crusts and other laminated doughs.” Simple Substitute for Buttermilk “I rarely buy buttermilk any longer,” she said adding that instead she has found a way to “make it at home out of whole milk and the addition of vinegar.” If a recipe calls for a cup of buttermilk, Stewart suggests using three-quarters of a cup of milk and a quarter of a cup of vinegar. 
ABC News Martha Stewart appears on “Good Morning America,” May 20, 2020. Baking Powder Freshness Test Baking powder is activated by a combination of heat and moisture. Test baking powder by mixing 1 teaspoon of baking powder with 1/3 cup hot water. If the baking powder is fresh, the mixture should produce lots of bubbles.
- Be sure to use warm or hot water; cold water will not work for this test.
- Use baking powder when making biscuits, muffins, etc.
- Rock Hard Brown Sugar Brown sugar can get hard when the molasses coated sugar crystals are exposed to the air and the moisture evaporates.
- To combat the small granules that form into a hardened mass, Stewart suggests the following.
To soften, start by always using an air-tight container to store brown sugar. Use a terra cotta shard that has been soaked in water and seal it in with the brown sugar to help soften it up. Similarly, you can use a slice of bread or a slice of apple in the container can also lock in the moisture.
- Microwave the brown sugar rock wrapped in a wet paper towel.
- How to Make Brown Butter It feels like a magic trick every time.
- Brown butter is a simple one-ingredient sauce that can transform all kinds of recipes.
- In mere minutes, a stick of unsalted butter melts, then simmers and sputters, transformed into a fragrant and impossibly silky brown sauce.
As soon as the foam subsides, the milk solids darken and fall to the bottom of the pan, an unmistakable nutty aroma fills the air, and you’re well on your way to better, bolder-flavored food. You’ve probably had it spooned over pasta or seafood, but it also adds dynamic depth to hollandaise sauce, chicken pot pie, humble glazed radishes, even lemony crinkle cookies.
- So roll up your sleeves and get cooking! You’ll be browning butter for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert.
- Melt butter in a saucepan over medium-high.
- When it boils, reduce heat to medium; simmer until foamy.
- Continue cooking, stirring occasionally and scraping bottom of pan, until foam subsides, butter turns golden brown with a nutty aroma, and milk solids separate into brown specks that sink to bottom, 2 to 7 minutes (depending on amount).
Remove from heat; immediately transfer to a heatproof bowl unless otherwise noted in recipe (butter may burn if left in hot pan). Unexpected items that come in handy when baking Dental floss can be used to even off the dome of a cake. Rasp, a wood working tool, can be used for grating zest.
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It might be old hat by now, but it’s still true: Salt makes cookies taste better. There’s salt in the dough, of course, but for an extra hit and a nice crackly texture, sprinkle your dough balls with flaky salt (we love Maldon) before baking.
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Cookies Made with Butter vs Shortening – Cookies are a good example of where you see a difference in baking results using butter versus shortening in a recipe. Cookies made with only butter may not rise as much and may spread a bit more, but the edges will be crispier and will have a rich buttery taste.
- Cookies made with only shortening will result in a cookie that bakes higher and holds its shape better during baking.
- The reason a cookie made with butter is slightly flatter and spreads more is that butter has a lower melting point than shortening, causing them to spread more quickly in the short time it takes to bake.
(Top cookies in both photos are made with butter, bottom cookies in both photos are made with shortening.) 
The photo shows the cookies made with shortening rise a little higher and hold their shape better. The butter cookie provides better flavor and a crispier exterior with some good browning around edges and a chewy interior.
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Why Do Cookies Get Hard? – Like all baked treats, cookies are subject to getting stale. Over time, the moisture in the cookies evaporates, leaving them stiff and crumbly. It’s the same thing that happens to breads, muffins, and other baked goods. The longer they sit, the more stale they become.
- Thus, the best, most foolproof way to prevent cookies from going stale is to eat them the day they were baked.
- Seriously! You can make a batch of cookie dough and refrigerate or freeze it, then just bake however many you plan to serve that day.
- Stale cookie problem solved.
- But suppose you have more cookies than you and your household can eat in one day.
Or maybe you’re sending some cookies through the mail and they won’t arrive for a few days. What can you do? The Spruce
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Chilling and Baking Times – Other factors that can impact the texture of cookies are chilling (or not chilling) and baking times. Cookie dough that is unchilled will spread more readily, resulting in a crisper cookie. To keep cookies from spreading as much, resulting in a thicker, chewier cookie, chill the dough before baking.
- This is a good technique to use on butter cookie dough recipes when you’re looking for a thicker, gooier, but not necessarily cakey cookie.
- Baking a cookie for longer will also result in a crispier cookie.
- Let the cookies bake until the edges start to brown and the cookie is baked all the way through, but don’t allow them to burn.
Bake less for a chewier cookie. Note that raw cookie dough carries the same health risks as eating raw eggs, so don’t underbake your cookies too much.
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What Is Cornstarch? – First things first: let’s discuss what cornstarch is and where it comes from. Cornstarch is one of the most versatile starches there is. Extracted from the starchy endosperm of corn kernel, it’s a white powdery substance that is virtually flavorless.
- Contrary to what some people think, corn starch and corn flour are not the same thing.
- It is a terrific ingredient for thickening sauces, puddings, soups and pie fillings, and is also used in many baked good recipes.
- It is often mixed with a small amount of cold liquid to create a slurry to thicken sauces,
When added to cake, cookie, pie filling and shortbread recipes, cornstarch helps create a crumbly and tender dessert-like texture. Commercially, cornstarch is often used as an anti-caking agent. When added to packaged goods like shredded cheese, cornstarch coats the cheese and helps to absorb moisture that would otherwise cause spoiling.
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Why are my cookies dry? – The most common reason cookies are dry is too much flour. Over-measuring flour is a very common reason for most any baking recipe to fail. If you scoop your measuring cup down into the flour container to measure, then odds are you’re using too much. The best way to measure flour is by weight or the spoon and sweep method. It can make such a big difference. For my tips on how to measure flour properly, be sure to see How to Measure Flour,
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If your cookies are still spreading, add an extra 2 Tablespoons of flour to the cookie dough. Don’t overmix the cookie dough ingredients. Cream the butter and sugar for only as long as you need to, usually about 1-2 minutes. Don’t begin beating then leave the room with the mixer running.
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You’re not using enough flour – Without sufficient flour, there is nothing to absorb or hold onto all the fat and liquid from your eggs and butter, causing the dough to spread as soon as it hits the oven. Think back: were you counting your cups carefully? Sometimes it’s easy to miss a scoop.
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There’s a lot of ingredients you can mix into box cookie mixes. – Since they’re all dry ingredients, you can really experiment with liquid ingredients. Sydney Kramer/INSIDER Box mix cookie dough is just a box of the dry ingredients. You typically only add eggs and butter to a box mix recipe, but A Good Tired blog says you shouldn’t stop there.
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Chill the Cookie Dough Chilling cookie dough in the refrigerator firms it up, which decreases the possibility of over-spreading. It not only ensures a thicker, more solid cookie but an enhanced flavor as well. In these soft chocolate chip cookies, for example, it helps develop a heightened buttery, caramel-y flavor.
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Add more complex proteins, like malted milk powder and brown butter – Caramelizing the sugar beforehand brings bright notes to your cookies, but you can further expand your dessert’s flavor profile by playing with proteins. The Maillard reaction, which we explored in “How to cook the perfect Thanksgiving turkey, according to science,” happens when the amino acids in proteins and sugars react with heat and time to break down and recombine into thousands of new flavor compounds. Chocolate chip cookies brown in the oven because of the Maillard reaction. Image by Jamie Leventhal Parks recommends throwing a little malted milk powder into your cookie batter to capitalize on the Maillard reaction. Malted milk powder adds a butterscotchy note, and its milk solids fuel the reaction to make cookies browner and more flavorful than before.
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