The key is to always use top-quality ingredients as they’ll result in a better cookie; it really is that simple.
- Always use butter.
- Choose the right sugar.
- Choose the right flour.
- Check your flour is in date.
- Choose the right kind of chocolate.
- Cream the butter and sugar.
- Beat in the eggs.
- Fold in the flour.
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2. Prevent Excess Spreading
- Chill your cookie dough. See tip #1 above.
- Use a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.
- Never place cookie dough balls onto a hot baking sheet.
- Butter may have been too warm.
- Under-measuring the flour.
- Don’t over-mix the cookie dough.
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. Add in milk, vanilla, oatmeal, and a little bit of coconut oil to increase the flavor profile of the box mix dough.
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 Plus, egg yolks have more fat than egg whites, which helps to keep your cookies moist and chewy.
Butter contributes milk solids and water to a cookie, both of which soften it. Brown sugar contributes molasses – again, a softener. Using lower-moisture sugar (granulated) and fat (vegetable shortening), plus a longer, slower bake than normal, produces light, crunchy cookies.
Using melted butter in cookies helps you achieve a similar fudgy-yet-cooked texture and prevents any unwanted cakiness. Instead of the rise coming from both chemical and physical leavening agents (baking soda/powder + creamed butter), it now comes almost exclusively from chemical agents alone.
Chilling cookie dough controls spread.
Chilling cookie dough before baking solidifies the fat in the cookies. As the cookies bake, the fat in the chilled cookie dough takes longer to melt than room-temperature fat. And the longer the fat remains solid, the less cookies spread.
Is it OK to use melted butter instead of softened?
You can absolutely use melted butter. Softened butter can also be used. Even chilled butter has its place in some baking recipes.
More eggs mean that there will be more binding between starch and flour proteins. This means that there will be more texture to the cookie, with that texture often being chewy. If you enjoy chewy, almost cake-like cookies, then you will want to increase the number of eggs you include in your recipe.
How do you make Betty Crocker Cookie Mix better?
Simple Tips and Tricks to Show You How to Make Betty Crocker Chocolate Chip Cookie Mix Better
- Always use butter.
- And make sure it’s room temperature.
- Allow for chill time.
- Add vanilla extract and brown sugar.
- Add an extra egg.
- Go for powdered milk.
- Use coconut oil.
- Play with the baking time.
Adding more moisture to your dough in the form of extra butter, egg yolks, or brown sugar will make your cookies even softer. We go into even more detail on how to achieve chewy perfection here.
Vinegar is a surprisingly common ingredient in baked goods, considering that it has such a sharp flavor. But as an acid, vinegar is often included in cake and cookie batters to react with baking soda and start the chemical reaction needed to produce carbon dioxide and give those batters a lift as they bake.
9 Tips to Remember
- Use Real Butter and Keep It Cool. The low melting point of butter may be what makes your cookies flat.
- Use Shortening.
- Chill Dough Twice.
- Use Parchment Paper or a Silicone Liner.
- Measure Precisely.
- Use Fresh Baking Soda.
- Use Optional Add-Ins.
- Buy an Oven Thermometer.
Brown sugar retains more moisture than white sugar, making it a great option for cookies that are moister and not as crisp. What is this? That’s because brown sugar is a mixture of sugar and molasses, and the molasses is really the key here to help keep those cookies moist.
For softer, chewier cookies, you will want to add much less granulated sugar, slightly more brown sugar, and a fair bit less butter. For cakey cookies, you will often be including even less butter and sugar.
They go from soft to hard because they start to dry out, and it begins as soon as you pull them from the oven. (Yikes.) Whatever moisture is left in the cookies is always in a state of evaporation. At the same time, the sugars and starches are solidifying.
Your Butter Came Straight From the Fridge
This relates to the issue of creaming, because cold butter is more difficult to cream. Thus, if your butter is too cold, your cookies will be denser, and they will likely not spread enough in the pan when you bake them. In general, you want your butter to be cool, but not cold.
Cold eggs won’t make your batch of cookies taste or look horrible, but taking a little extra time to bring them to room temperature will get you fluffier cookies. If you have some time to kill before baking, simply let the eggs sit on the counter for no more than two hours.
Too much butter causes cookies to spread a lot and ultimately crisp out on the outside being able to completely cook. Extremely chewy cookies (when the recipe isn’t meant to make chewy cookies). This is because of the liquid content in the butter. Moisture helps develop gluten and gluten helps make chewy cookies.
Water vapor escaping from the dough in combination with the carbon dioxide released by our baking soda is ultimately what makes our cookies light and airy.
Let it sit for long enough—the famous Jacques Torres chocolate chip cookie, published in the New York Times, mandates a rest of at least 24 hours and up to 72—and the starches and proteins in the flour begin to break down, leading to more browning and caramelization.
Popping your dough in the fridge allows the fats to cool. As a result, the cookies will expand more slowly, holding onto their texture. If you skip the chilling step, you’re more likely to wind up with flat, sad disks instead of lovely, chewy cookies.
“Most people think the butter should be so soft that it’s broken down, but the most important thing is that you want a little bit of give to the butter.” If you want to get technical, she says the precise temperature should be between 63 and 68 degrees — where it’s cool to touch, but your finger can leave an indent.
O’Brady is specific that the butter be melted slowly, over low heat to prevent any evaporation. In its liquid state, butter mixes readily with both the sugar and flour, making for a softer dough that actually develops more gluten (thanks to the butter’s moisture hydrating the flour).
How to Soften Butter
- Setting out chilled butter at room temperature for 30 to 45 minutes prior to use gives it time to soften.
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- Place the butter stick in a resealable plastic bag or between two sheets of waxed or parchment paper, then pound and roll with a rolling pin to flatten and soften.
Liquid milk, she says, “allows leavened dough to retain more gas,” therefore making it lighter. But liquid milk also adds water to batters and doughs, too much of which can ruin the texture of the finished baked good.
Adding eggs, one at a time
They should be added one at a time, each one thoroughly beaten in before the next is added, to allow the creamed butter/sugar mixture to most effectively retain its trapped air. Be sure to scrape the sides of the bowl so all of the butter/sugar mixture is incorporated.
Brown sugar, meanwhile, is dense and compacts easily, creating fewer air pockets during creaming—that means that there’s less opportunity to entrap gas, creating cookies that rise less and spread more. With less moisture escaping via steam, they also stay moist and chewy.
Here’s how you can improve premade cookie dough or dough from a mix.
- Add spice to your dough.
- Punch up the flavor of your cookies by adding extracts.
- Before baking, roll the dough in a garnish of your choice.
- Stir nuts right into the dough for an added crunch.
- Add in your favorite savory snacks, like chips or pretzels.
Can I use oil instead of butter in Betty Crocker Cookie Mix?
Butter Substitutions
On the other hand, if your cookie recipe calls for melted butter, vegetable oil can be subbed, because it has a similar consistency.
The role of vanilla in sweet baked goods is like the role of salt on the savory side: it enhances all the other flavors in the recipe. Without it, cookies and cakes tend to taste flat and bland. Forget to add the vanilla once, and you’ll probably never do it again!
Sugars, like fats liquefy in the oven. White sugar will make your cookies crispier while brown sugar contains more moisture and will result in a softer and more chewy cookie. Most chocolate chip cookie recipes call for both sugars.
Milk performs many functions in your baked goods. It serves as a source of liquid to hydrate the dry ingredients, adds flavor, supports browning and softens texture.
When added to cake, cookie and shortbread recipes, cornstarch helps create a crumbly and tender dessert-like texture. Commercially, cornstarch is often used as an anti-caking agent.
What does apple cider do for baking?
Apple cider vinegar is a popular flavor and texture enhancer in baking, especially when making vegan treats that can’t include eggs. It can also add extra flavor to homemade candy and caramels, like in this recipe.
The apple cider vinegar is used to activate the baking soda, helping the dough to rise a bit.
Baking soda encourages spreading while baking powder puffs the cookies up. If your recipe calls for 1 teaspoon of baking soda, you would use 3 to 4 teaspoons of baking powder.
Carbon dioxide gas and water vapor form the bubbles which make cookies rise. Rising doesn’t just make cookies taller. It also opens up space to keep the cookie from becoming too dense. Salt slows down the decomposition of baking soda, so the bubbles don’t get too big.
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.
Basically, cookies made with butter spread more and are flatter and crisper if baked long enough. However, they are more flavorful than cookies made with shortening. Cookies made with shortening bake up taller and are more tender, but aren’t as flavorful.
If you are trying to make your own chewy cookie recipe, replace the white sugar with about 75% the quantity of brown sugar. So, if your cookie recipe asked for 1 cup white sugar, only use ¾ cup packed brown sugar. The cookies will be plenty sweet, spread less and be chewier thanks to the moisture in the brown sugar.
The most common cause is using a different flour than usual, such as cake flour, and measuring flour with too heavy a hand. Using larger eggs than called for can make cookies cakey, as will the addition of milk or more milk or other liquids than specified.
Egg yolks are high in fat in relation to the egg white which is high in protein so often acts as a binder. Adding egg yolks to the cookies yields a super tender, chewy cookie.
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. Add in milk, vanilla, oatmeal, and a little bit of coconut oil to increase the flavor profile of the box mix dough.
Reheat them in the microwave on medium setting for 15 to 20 seconds. This should be enough time for the cookies to soak in the moisture from the paper towel. If you take them out and they haven’t softened enough yet, wrap them in another damp paper towel and microwave again for 10 more seconds.
The best way to soften cookie dough is by leaving it in a warm place such as near a hot stove or under a lamp. Other methods for softening cookie dough include using a hot water bath, microwaving it on very low power, hitting it with a rolling pin, and cutting it into smaller pieces.
Melted butter is best suited for drop doughs such as chocolate chip, peanut butter, and sugar cookies, as well as most cookie bars. You can usually adapt recipes that don’t originally call for melted butter to use this technique if you’re looking for an even fudgier texture.
While butter contains air pockets that help it retain its shape, oil is more compact. You can’t really alter it from its original state. Not to mention, using a flavorful oil such as olive oil in a cookie might give you a baked product that’s just a little on the funkier side. Naturally, you can expect a softer dough.
So long as they end up evenly flat, that is; squashing cookies haphazardly under your palm means they may bake and brown unevenly. Still, if you care deeply (or even casually) about the look of your cookies, you can take the flattening step as an opportunity for enhancement. The bottom of a glass works fine, it’s true.
It’s a rather simple solution, and one that can save your cookie dough from turning into a melting pot before you’re ready. Not only will your cookie dough stay cool in the heat, you may not even need to chill your dough before scooping and rolling into a ball.
Do Cold eggs make a difference in baking?
Room temperature eggs are good for baking because they blend more evenly in batters and help the dough rise more easily than cold eggs straight out of the fridge. Cold eggs, on the other hand, can result in lumpy batter, a stodgy texture, and require longer baking times — and no one wants that!
What happens if you bake with cold eggs?
In general, room temperature eggs are most critical in formal or classical baking—what we might call “fine baking”— where an ingredient that’s too cold (or warm) can break an emulsion and destroy the texture of a cake, like mayonnaise curdles if you use cold egg yolks, or where a cold ingredient can cause a batter to …
Normally the cookie should not be too flat – should be rounded in the middle, should snap if it’s crispy or bend and break if it’s chewy. If it has nuts, there should be enough of them to have a piece in every bite. The cookies should be big enough to get a good taste of the cookie but not so big that it’s a full meal.
What happens if you melt the butter instead of softening it?
When butter is properly softened to 65 or 70 degrees, the tiny crystals can effectively surround and stabilize the air bubbles that are generated during creaming. When heated to the melting point, however, these crystals are destroyed.
Granulated sugar
Using granulated white sugar will result in a flatter, crispier and lighter-colored cookie. Granulated sugar is hygroscopic, so it attracts and absorbs the liquid in the dough. This slows down the development of the gluten (flour), which makes the cookies crispier.
Baking soda is typically used for chewy cookies, while baking powder is generally used for light and airy cookies. Since baking powder is comprised of a number of ingredients (baking soda, cream of tartar, cornstarch, etc.), using it instead of pure baking soda will affect the taste of your cookies.
Generally for 1 or 2-inch-deep pans, you will fill them 1/2 full of batter. For pans that are 3 or 4-inch-deep, the batter needs to be about 2/3 full.
Cream of tartar helps stabilize whipped egg whites, prevents sugar from crystallizing and acts as a leavening agent for baked goods.
Scoop and Drop Dough
Any recipe for scoop and drop cookies like oatmeal raisin cookies or chocolate chip cookies are better if you chill them overnight. It makes a better-textured cookie and the cookies with bake up thicker and chewier.
Water vapor escaping from the dough in combination with the carbon dioxide released by our baking soda is ultimately what makes our cookies light and airy.
Chilling cookie dough
- Chilling cookie dough for just 30 minutes makes a big difference. The cookies pictured above are the same size, weight-wise.
- The longer you chill cookie dough, the smaller the changes become.
- Over time, chilling cookie dough produces cookies with darker color and more pronounced flavor.
Let it sit for long enough—the famous Jacques Torres chocolate chip cookie, published in the New York Times, mandates a rest of at least 24 hours and up to 72—and the starches and proteins in the flour begin to break down, leading to more browning and caramelization.