These cookies are a variation based on the pumpkin butter cookies published in my ebook, All About Pumpkin. Using fruit butters like pumpkin butter, apple butter, or pear butter allows us to infuse these fall cookies with flavour without the water of apple sauce, pear compote or pumpkin purée which would compromise the texture.

Ingredients To Make Fall Cookies

These apple butter cookies are a variation of my best chocolate chip cookies. Here's what you need to make these fall cookies:

• apple butter—do not confuse this with a compound butter! Apple butter is 100 % pure apple (maybe with a little sugar or spices) whereas apple compound butter is a cow's butter flavoured with apple. The two are not interchangeable!
• sugar—use mostly brown sugar with a little white granulated sugar for the most flavour and best texture
• white chocolate—I prefer to use chopped high-quality white chocolate
• pumpkin seeds—use shelled pumpkin seeds. Make sure they aren't old or rancid!
• salt—I bake with Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using table salt, add half the amount to avoid making the cookies too salty
• leavening—we are using baking soda, not baking powder. Read about the difference between baking powder and baking soda if you aren't sure the difference
• flavour agents—you will need ground cinnamon and pure vanilla extract
• butter—use unsalted butter or add less salt to the recipe to make sure the cookies aren't too salty
• flour—I tested this recipe with bleached all-purpose flour, but unbleached should work too
• egg—I always use large eggs for all my recipes. If you use a different size of eggs, this may alter the texture and spread of the cookies.

Please see the recipe card for the exact ingredients and amounts.

Substitutions and Variations

These fall cookies have a simple list of ingredients, and just a few variations or substitutions are possible:

• Apple butter - you can use any fruit butter to make these cookies, like apple, pumpkin, or pear.
• Nuts - these cookies are nut-free, made with pumpkin seeds, but you can replace them with sunflower seeds or even toasted walnuts or pecans.
• Cranberries - I love dried cranberries in this fall cookie because cranberry season is late fall and early winter, but you can also use dried currants, raisins, or even chopped crystallized ginger.
• Chocolate - I think white chocolate is the best choice for these cookies, but this recipe will work with milk or dark chocolate too. You can use chips or chopped chocolate bars.

Instructions For Apple Butter Cookies

Just like most cookie recipes, these autumn cookies are made using the creaming method with a stand mixer (or a hand mixer if you prefer), though by hand with a wooden spoon is also possible if you have the energy!

Step 1—Whisk the dry ingredients in a medium bowl (image 1) to evenly incorporate the salt, spices, and leavening. Meanwhile, combine the butter and sugars in the stand mixer fitted with a paddle attached (image 2) until creamy and fluffy, then add the egg and vanilla (image 3).

Step 2—Add the apple butter to the light mixture (image 4) before stirring in the whisked dry ingredients (image 5), followed by the add-ins (chopped white chocolate, dried cranberries, and pumpkin seeds (image 6).

Step 3—The cookie dough will be thick and sticky once mixed (image 7). Use a 1-⅓-ounce disher to portion out the dough into 50-gram scoops (image 8). Chill the scoops of dough for 15 minutes before baking.

Step 3—I like to roll the chilled cookie dough scoops between the palms of my hands to smooth the surface and even them out before placing them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper (image 9). Bake until set (image 10).

Storage

Store the baked cookies in an airtight container for up to a week or freeze them for longer storage.

Other Drop Cookie Recipes

Looking for other recipes like these fall drop cookies? Try these:

If you tried this recipe for fall cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

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Fall Cookies

These fall cookies are made with apple butter, white chocolate, dried cranberries and pumpkin seeds with a little cinnamon to round it out!

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time 14 minutes minutes

Chill time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 18

Calories 229kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• 5-quart KitchenAid Artisan mixer
• 1-⅓oz scoop
• Sheet pan

Ingredients

• 190 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 5 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
• 2.5 mL baking soda
• 2.5 mL ground cinnamon
• 115 grams unsalted butter
• 150 grams light brown sugar
• 50 grams granulated sugar
• 1 large egg(s)
• 10 mL pure vanilla extract
• 75 grams apple butter
• 130 grams white chocolate chopped
• 115 grams pumpkin seeds
• 90 grams dried cranberries

Metric - US

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C). Line two or three large half sheet pans (13” x 18” x 1” | 33 cm x 45.5 cm x 2.5 cm) with parchment paper.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon. Set aside.
• In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or in a big mixing bowl using an electric hand mixer), cream together the butter, the brown sugar, and the granulated sugar until it’s very light and fluffy.
• Add the egg and the vanilla, and mix well until the mixture is light and fluffy again. Then stir in the apple butter. Make sure to clean down the sides of the bowl as needed with a big spatula.
• Dump in the whisked dry ingredients, and incorporate them on low.
• Mix in the white chocolate, pumpkin seeds, and dried cranberries.
• Scoop approximately 50-gram portions of the sticky dough onto one of your parchment-lined sheet pans. I like to do all the scooping at once and place them all on one of the prepared sheet pans.
• Chill the portioned out scoops of dough in the refrigerator for 15 minutes to firm them up, then roll them into smooth balls with the palms of your hand.
• Place 6–8 scoops per cookie sheet, spacing them apart and staggering them.
• Bake the cookies one sheet pan at a time until the edges are set and begin to brown slightly (about 14 minutes). You might want to rotate the pan partway through the baking to ensure the cookies brown evenly.
• Let the cookies cool completely on the sheet pan while you bake the second pan. Store the cookies in an airtight container once they've cooled completely.

Notes

• This recipe calls for Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount or the recipe may be too salty!
• This recipe works with any fruit butter, such as pumpkin, pear, or apple butter.
• Remember, fruit butters are made from fruit purée (compote or sauce) that is cooked down into a thick, concentrated spread. This is not to be confused with a compound butter made with cow's butter.
• Want to change this up?
  • Replace the dried cranberries with chopped crystallized ginger, raisins, currants, or chopped dried pear or apple
  • Replace the pumpkin seeds with toasted walnuts or pecans
  • Replace the white chocolate with milk or dark chocolate.

Nutrition

Calories: 229kcal | Carbohydrates: 30g | Protein: 4g | Fat: 11g | Saturated Fat: 5g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 2g | Monounsaturated Fat: 3g | Trans Fat: 0.2g | Cholesterol: 24mg | Sodium: 167mg | Potassium: 107mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 20g | Vitamin A: 177IU | Vitamin C: 0.2mg | Calcium: 31mg | Iron: 1mg

The post Fall Cookies With Cranberries, White Chocolate And Apple Butter appeared first on The Bake School.

When I came up with the recipe for my version of the best chocolate chip cookies, my goal was to have a recipe that can easily be tweaked to modify it. This blueberry oatmeal cookies recipe is just one of many creative ways you can adapt that recipe with chunks of white chocolate and fresh or frozen blueberries.

Baking cookies in ring moulds or a muffin pan is a great way to stop cookie dough from spreading without making any other changes to your recipe, like in this thick oatmeal cookie recipe. For these cookies, I wanted a recipe that didn't require a ring mould to stay thick when the dough bakes in the oven.

If you want to bake cookies that are thicker, without having to use a muffin pan or ring moulds, the simplest solution is to add more flour to the cookie dough, which yields a thicker dough that doesn't spread.

The higher the proportion of flour you have in your recipe, relative to the butter, sugar, and eggs, the less the cookies will spread.

These cookies are a variation on the classic chocolate chip cookie recipe, adding oats and replacing the dark chocolate with white chocolate, while also incorporating blueberries into the cookie dough. Make sure to take the time to properly measure your ingredients before mixing the dough: a little extra butter or a little more oats may drastically change the texture, resulting in thinner or dryer cookies if you aren't careful. The French baking term for this is called mise-en-place.

What You Need To Make Oatmeal Blueberry Cookies

• butter—I bake with unsalted butter. If using salted butter, you may want to adjust the amount of salt you add to the cookie dough
• sugar—I baked these cookies with a combination of white and brown sugar. Both work, and you can replace one with the other. Brown sugar adds more flavour than white sugar
• eggs—I bake with large eggs. If you use smaller or larger eggs, the texture of the cookies may end up different
• flour—I bake with bleached all-purpose flour, but unbleached flours should work here
• oats—use large flake oats, also called rolled oats or old-fashioned oats. These are not to be confused with minute oats or instant oats, which have a finer texture, or with steel cut oats, which are more coarse and crunchy
• blueberries—use wild blueberries, which are smaller in size. You can use fresh or frozen. If using fresh, you will freeze them before incorporating them into the cookie dough to avoid smushing the berries as you stir them in
• white chocolate—you can use white chocolate chips or chopped white chocolate. Personally, I prefer chopped white chocolate because the flavour is better. I also enjoy cream cheese chips, which have a really nice flavour that pairs well with blueberries
• salt—I bake with Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount to avoid making the cookies too salty
• leavening—this oatmeal cookie recipe calls for baking soda, not baking powder. Read about the difference between baking powder and baking soda if you aren't sure.

Please see the recipe card for the exact ingredients and quantities.

How To Make Oatmeal Cookies With Blueberries

Step 1—Start by combining the butter and sugars in your stand mixer bowl fitted with the paddle attachment (image 1), mixing them together until creamy and light. Then, add the egg, maple syrup, and vanilla (image 2), whipping these ingredients together really well until light and creamy. Meanwhile, whisk the dry ingredients separately in a small bowl (image 3) before adding them to the mixer bowl (image 4).

Step 2—Add the chopped white chocolate or white chocolate chips first (image 5) and stir them in with the mixer before folding in the frozen blueberries by hand using a big spatula (image 6)

Step 3—Portion out the cookie dough using a ¾-ounce scoop before baking them (image 8), eight cookies at a time on a parchment paper-lined half sheet pan (image 9). Bake the cookies until the edges are set and golden brown (image 10).

Tip: Let the cookies cool completely before moving them as the berries make them especially delicate. Use a mini offset spatula to lift them off the parchment paper.

I like to store these blueberry oatmeal cookies in an open container in a cool, dry place. This way, they don't become overly soft or moist from the fresh berries. A closed container will lead to soft cookies that will perish more quickly!

Top Tip

When you want to add berries to cake batters and doughs, especially when they are very thick, it can be helpful to freeze the berries so that, when you mix them in, they don't burst open, adding too much water to your mixture. This is a trick I learned for the honey blueberry muffins, and it works well, even in the dough for these blueberry white chocolate cookies!

Other Amazing Oatmeal Cookies

If blueberries aren't your thing, you can always try these other oatmeal cookie recipes:

• thick chewy oatmeal cookies with chunks of milk chocolate and peanuts. Other options if you are big on oatmeal
• plain thick oatmeal cookies baked in a muffin pan so that they all have a round, uniform shape and to limit the spread of the cookie dough as they bake
• the best crunchy oatmeal raisin cookies, which are made with Sultana raisins and cinnamon—there's also soft and chewy oatmeal raisin cookies if you prefer!
• apple oatmeal cookies—the perfect cookie for fall that you can make with dried apple or chopped fresh apple!

If you tried this recipe for the best blueberry oatmeal cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

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Blueberry Oatmeal Cookies with White Chocolate and Rosemary

These blueberry oatmeal cookies with white chocolate and rosemary are as easy to make as a regular chocolate chip cookie. They are the perfect summer cookie made with frozen blueberries (or fresh local berries that were frozen prior to mixing).

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time 12 minutes minutes

Total Time 32 minutes minutes

Servings 30 cookies

Calories 114kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• 5-quart KitchenAid Artisan mixer
• OXO balloon whisk
• GIR spatula
• Sheet pan

Ingredients

• 150 grams fresh blueberries preferably wild blueberries which are smaller and sweeter
• 188 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 95 grams rolled oats (or large flake oats) also called old fashioned oats
• 2.5 mL baking soda
• 2.5 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
• 10 mL finely chopped fresh rosemary
• 115 grams unsalted butter softened
• 100 grams granulated sugar
• 100 grams light brown sugar
• 1 large egg(s)
• 5 mL pure vanilla extract
• 45 mL pure maple syrup
• 90 grams white chocolate or white chocolate chips

Metric - US

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C). Line a couple of sheet pans with parchment paper.
• Place the blueberries on a parchment-lined rimmed baking sheet and freeze while you make the cookie dough.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, oats, baking soda, salt, and fresh rosemary. Set aside.
• In a large bowl, cream together the butter with the two sugars until they are well mixed with a wooden spoon (or in the mixer if you prefer).
• In a small cup, whisk together the egg, vanilla, and maple syrup.
• Drop this mixture into the bowl with the creamed butter, a little at a time, stirring well with each addition.
• When the egg mixture has been incorporated, pour the dry ingredients into the bowl. Stir to combine.
• Dump in the white chocolate chunks and the frozen blueberries, folding them in carefully.
• Scoop heaped tablespoons of the cookie dough onto a big parchment-lined sheet. Chill the cookies for 15 minutes.
• Bake the cookies for 12 to 16 minutes in the oven or until the edges are beginning to brown. Note the baking time is entirely dependent on your oven and how cold the cookie dough is.
• Let cool before transferring to a rack. I stored these on the wire rack, uncovered, overnight, so that the cookies dried out a little. The next day you will have perfectly chewy blueberry cookies, whereas fresh from the oven, they were a little moist and cakey.

Notes

• This recipe calls for Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount or the recipe may be too salty!
• Please note that I bake with uncoated aluminum sheet pans that are light in colour. If you are baking this recipe with darker bakeware, you may have to drop the oven temperature to 325 °F (165 °C) to prevent your baked goods from browning too quickly.
• For the chocolate, I prefer to use chopped white chocolate because it tastes better than white chocolate chips. You can also use cream cheese chips, which I find pair really well with berries.
• For the berries, use wild blueberries, fresh or frozen. If using fresh, freeze them on a parchment paper-lined sheet pan.

Nutrition

Calories: 114kcal | Carbohydrates: 17g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 5g | Saturated Fat: 3g | Cholesterol: 14mg | Sodium: 62mg | Potassium: 43mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 10g | Vitamin A: 116IU | Vitamin C: 1mg | Calcium: 16mg | Iron: 1mg

The post Blueberry Oatmeal Cookies with White Chocolate appeared first on The Bake School.

Everybody has a different description of the best chocolate chip cookie that is their absolute favourite. That's normal. My best chocolate chip cookie won't necessarily be your favourite, and vice versa. Describing any food as "best" is highly subjective and up for interpretation. It can depend on your age, your history and what you grew up eating, where you live, your friends....

Your favourite chocolate chip cookie will evolve with time. Some days, all you may want is raw cookie dough straight from the mixer bowl, or a super gooey, under-baked cookie that is soft and melty. Other days, you might crave a thin, crispy, dry, even sandy textured chocolate chip cookie. Lately, I've fallen in love with chewy chocolate chip cookies. But actually, when they are freshly baked, they have a crispy edge and raw middle. When you store them they mature, and they develop a chewier texture that I find highly addictive.

I'm not here to tell you that this is the best chocolate chip cookie, but I would like to discuss how to take your favourite recipe and adapt it to suit your needs, or your dietary restrictions, or a national shortage of all-purpose flour. How do you swap one flour for another? What do you do if you are stuck with a gluten-free flour to work with that isn't a pre-mixed blend to replace all-purpose, cup-for-cup. What if you want a cookie that spreads thinner as it bakes, or a cookie that is more gooey?

Tools and Equipment

These are tools, equipment, and bakeware that I use when I make chocolate chip cookies. If you plan to make cookies often or bake more regularly, these are some of the essential baking tools you might want to consider investing in. These items make baking sessions easier and more successful!

• Kitchen scale: I cannot stress enough how much easier it is to measure out ingredients by weight. If you are interested in making the switch to a digital scale, I like this OXO Good Grips kitchen scale available on Amazon. I use it all the time and it takes standard AAA batteries which you probably have on hand most of the time. Make sure to do your mise-en-place, the French baking term for measuring out all your ingredients before proceeding to make the recipe.
• Electric hand mixer: most of us used to make cookies with a good old wooden spoon, but now I don't have the stamina, the arm strength, or the motivation, honestly. I have used an electric hand mixer from Braun (Multimix HM5100 available on Amazon) to make these cookies and it works well. I've also used the KitchenAid Artisan mixer. Both work!
• Large bowl with a rubber or silicone grip on the bottom: if you are going to make cookie dough with a hand mixer, invest in a GIANT 8 quart stainless bowl with a rubberized bottom so it is stable on the counter and this way, the bowl won't dance around as the mixer runs. This set from Amazon will do the trick. Or buy a stainless bowl without a rubberized grip and nest it in a damp towel to stabilize it while mixing. 
• Cookie scoop: this style of cookie scoop comes in a variety of sizes. Some call it a "disher" and it's the most reliable scoop I've found (available on Amazon). They can handle firm doughs without breaking because the release mechanism is separate from the handle! This gives you a better, firm grip on the handle, without the risk of breaking the leaver.
• Baking sheets: invest in large baking sheets, also known as half sheet pans, with the following dimensions: 13"x18". The larger the better, but make sure they fit in your oven before investing in bigger sheet pans. I like the Nordic Ware sheets (available on Amazon) and they come in a variety of sizes (quarter sheet, half sheet, big sheet). You can also find cheaper pans. Just make sure you opt for light Aluminum pans, not the pans with a darker finish because cookies on darker pans will brown/burn more quickly on the bottom!
• Parchment paper to prevent sticking: I prefer to bake cookies on Aluminum pans lined with parchment paper. I have baked with Silpat and silicone baking mats in the past, but I much prefer baking with parchment. Silicone is insulating and this will have an impact on how long it takes to properly bake the cookies and this will reduce browning as well. If you like gooey, underbaked cookies, silicone mats like the Silpat are your best bet (available on Amazon). If you prefer chewy cookies, opt for parchment paper—I use the Kirkland brand roll available on Amazon.

Basic Ingredients

Most will use the Nestlé Tollhouse chocolate chip cookie as the reference for the quintessential chocolate chip cookie, and they use the recipe on the back of that yellow bag we have all seen at the grocery store. Others now refer to Jacques Torres' chocolate chip cookie recipe published in the New York Times years ago. But all chocolate chip cookies combine the same basic ingredients: butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla extract, flour, chemical leaveners, salt and, of course, chocolate. With these base ingredients, there are a seemingly infinite number of ratios to explore, but also ingredient variations.

Butter

Most recipes call for unsalted butter, but some may recommend salted butter, in which case the recipe may omit any other salt from the ingredients. The butter can be softened (room temperature), melted and cooled, but some may even ask you to brown the butter to bring out those toasted nut flavours by browning the milk solids in the butter. This will add a ton of flavour, but at the expense of water, which evaporates as you heat the butter.

Softened butter allows you to cream the butter with the sugar(s) in the recipe, allowing you to incorporate air at this stage, which is a method to lighten the cookie dough so that it's not so dense. The creaming method is important to achieve the right texture. 

Melted butter can't trap air the way softened butter can. So making chocolate chip cookies with melted butter will result in a denser cookie. The same goes for brown butter. If you like a denser cookie, opt to work with melted butter or brown butter. 

Regardless of the butter you use, remember that more butter will lead to more spread, and less butter will lead to thicker chocolate chip cookies.

Sugar

Classic chocolate chip cookies call for a combination of white and brown sugar (light or dark). The sugar is essential for preserving the cookies after they are baked, for locking in moisture so that they don't dry out as fast, and also the sugar is key if you are using the creaming method to incorporate some air.

Granulated sugar (regular white sugar or caster sugar) gives a more crispy texture to cookies, while brown sugar gives both flavour and more softness along with some chewiness too. Another thing to note is that sugar promotes cookie spread as they bake, especially granulated sugar: cookies made with 100 % granulated sugar and no brown sugar spread more than the same recipe made with brown sugar exclusively. That's because brown sugar is a little more acidic than plain white sugar, and so that brown sugar will react with the baking soda in most recipes, helping the cookies to rise up rather than spread out. If you like thicker cookies, use more brown sugar than white sugar. 

Another thing to note when choosing what type of sugar to bake with: brown sugar lends a ton of flavour to chocolate chip cookies. Chocolate chip cookies made with only granulated sugar tend to have a more eggy flavour, which some might not like. I prefer to bake with a mixture of white and brown sugar, if not with only brown sugar. In fact, lately I've been baking with dark brown sugar to add as much molasses flavour as possible to cookies.

Eggs

The classic recipes for basic chocolate chip cookies will call for whole eggs, usually 1 large egg for every 125 to 190 grams (1 to 1.5 cups) of flour. There are some recipe writers that may recommend to add extra egg yolks to cookie dough to provide more richness, and a more chewy or gooey texture to the baked cookies. More egg whites will contribute to a more crisp texture. Personally, I don't want to separate an egg when I'm making chocolate chip cookies. I can't be bothered. 

Too much egg can cause your chocolate chip cookies to taste eggy, especially if there's not enough brown sugar, butter, flour, and vanilla to mask the eggy flavour. Too much egg will also cause the cookies to spread more, so if you want thicker cookies, use less egg (relative to the other ingredients).

Flour

The classic Tollhouse recipe is made with all-purpose flour, the bleached plain flour you find at most grocery stores. On the other hand, the Jacques Torres chocolate chip cookies call for a combination of bread flour and cake flour. The bread flour brings a lot more protein to the cookie dough, which means more gluten and more chewiness in the baked cookie. Cake flour is lower in protein and higher in starch, so it's finer and will give a lighter texture. None will provide much flavour and the role of these flours is mostly structural.

The amount of flour affects the texture and shape

Too much flour will make very thick cookies that hardly spread at all as they bake. The more flour you add, the dryer and harder your cookies will be, especially if you don't compensate with more butter, sugar, and eggs. Conversely, less flour will make cookies spread more as the butter melts and the cookies heat up in the oven. If you want to bake thick chocolate chip cookies, add more flour, but not too much (as compared to the other ingredients in the recipe)!

The type of flour affects the flavour, texture, and shape

All-purpose flour has that name for a reason: it's a pretty easy flour to work with, it's readily available, you can use it to make most recipes, and it's not overly flavourful. Whole wheat all-purpose flour has more flavour than bleached white all-purpose flour, and cookies made with whole wheat spread a little more than with all-purpose, but not so much so that you have to fiddle with the quantities.

On the other hand, rye flour has a ton of flavour (grassy is how some would describe it) and it's lower in gluten and can lead to denser baked goods (rye flour is commonly used in bread making). Bake a chocolate chip cookie with rye flour and it will be thicker and more chewy.

Spelt flour is very fine and soft, with a texture similar to cake flour. For this reason, it leads to a softer cookie with a lighter texture. Oat flour is also very fine and soft, adding a sweeter flavour to cookies. Corn flour behaves much like spelt and oat flour, and it is the sweetest of them all. The flavour of corn flour is very interesting in a chocolate chip cookie. Give it a try! With spelt, oat, and corn flour, you have to add slightly more than you would all-purpose to achieve similar results.

Buckwheat is another flour with a ton of flavour that is very polarizing: some love it, others hate it. Buckwheat is described as nutty, vegetal, and earthy, and it has a very fine texture. To make chocolate chip cookies with only buckwheat flour, you have to use much more than the other flours, especially if you want a thicker cookie. 

Chemical leaveners—Baking soda vs baking powder

Baking powder, made up of baking soda plus an acid (or two) is a complete chemical leavener that requires water and heat to react and nothing more. Baking powder added to cookie doughs will open the crumb, leading to a lighter middle but also to crispier edges.

Baking soda added to cookie doughs will still react because the sugars added to cookie doughs provide a little acidity. But still, the baking soda won't all react and its presence actually contributes to the faster browning of the cookie (Maillard browning, specifically). Baking soda helps the edges of the cookie to brown in such a short baking time. Without it, your cookies may end up looking pale, and not as appealing.

Salt

In the cookie dough itself, most recipes will call for either table salt or fine kosher salt. Remember that table salt is twice as salty as fine kosher salt (like Diamond Crystal) so make sure you use the salt the recipe recommends, or adjust the amount according to the type of salt you are using.

Some recipes, those made with salted butter, may not have any other salt added to the dough and the butter provides all the salt. The problem with this is the salt content of salted butters can vary from brand to brand, so it's hard to judge if there will be enough salt in the recipe if you bake with salted butter.

Many will add flaky sea salt, Fleur de sel, or Maldon salt to garnish the balls of cookie dough before baking. The salt will stay intact as the cookies bake, and give a little salty crunch, which helps balance the sweetness.

Vanilla extract

Most recipes call for pure vanilla extract, but you can substitute imitation vanilla for vanilla extract and your cookies will still taste like the real thing. In fact, using imitation vanilla (also known as vanilla essence) in a recipe like this is actually what might lead to a more pronounced, striking vanilla flavour. 

Chocolate chip cookies are not a place for precious, expensive vanilla beans. Save those for a vanilla bean pastry cream, vanilla bean panna cotta, or your favourite ice cream. The beans would be wasted in cookies because there's no step that involves extracting the flavour to infuse your dough. Stick with extract or essence, here. If you really want to bake with the beans, I'd suggest using vanilla bean paste, teaspoon for teaspoon, in place of the vanilla extract.

If you are out of vanilla and need a substitute: add some whiskey or bourbon instead of the vanilla!

Chocolate Type and Chips Versus Chunks

Obviously the Nestlé Tollhouse chocolate chip cookies call for Nestlé Tollhouse chocolate chips, which are a semi-sweet chocolate chip. There's nothing wrong with chocolate chips, but sometimes, especially if you add a lot of chocolate chips to your cookies, you may notice the chocolate chips are too sweet for your cookies. You might actually want to use a different chocolate type for making chocolate chip cookies.

These days, I prefer to bake my chocolate chip cookies with dark chocolate, preferably with a 70–80% cocoa content that is bittersweet, not sweet. A chocolate like Cacao Barry Ocoa, which is a 70 % dark chocolate would be perfect. Cacao Barry's Saint Domingue would also be great here. You could also opt for Lindt Excellence 70 % dark chocolate which is sold in 100 gram bars in most grocery stores these days and also isn't sweet. It's the perfect balance for the sweet-salty cookie dough.

The idea is to provide contrast in flavours and a bittersweet chocolate that is at least 70 % cocoa will provide a good amount of bitterness to balance out all the sugar in your recipe.

If you aren't working with chocolate chips, you will have to chop the chocolate to incorporate it in your cookie dough. How you chop it will have an impact on your cookies. For example, you can use a food processor to make finer shards of chocolate for your cookies, as I did when I adapted the Jacques Torres recipe in these chocolate chip cookies: you can see that the dough is darker because the finer shards of chocolate melted into the cookie dough. I loved that effect and the flavour was great!

Another thing to note when baking with dark chocolate as opposed to chocolate chips: chocolate chips are formulated to keep their shape as they bake, without melting, even in a hot oven. On the other hand, most quality dark chocolate is not formulated for this and will melt as the cookies bake, creating puddles or pools of chocolate on top and throughout the cookie. Make sure to give ample time for the cookies to cool and for the chocolate to set again before packing them, otherwise, they may stick to each other. 

To Chill or Not to Chill

Chilling dough is really important for cutout cookies and pie dough. There have been countless blog posts and newspaper articles about how chilling improves flavour and texture, but honestly, most of the time, I can't be bothered.

When I'm making chocolate chip cookies, I want them now, not in 24 to 48 hours, or worse, 72 hours! Still, you can absolutely take cookie dough and chill it overnight (or for longer). You can even freeze scoops of cookie dough and future-you will be ever so grateful! 

Gluten-free flours often take longer to hydrate and absorb surrounding oil and humidity. When you don't give them enough time to do so, the cookies will inevitably spread fast as soon as they hit the oven. For this reason, chilling is important, though still not essential. I found with oat flour especially, the flavour was much improved by chilling the balls of cookie dough overnight in the refrigerator before baking. But that being said, it's optional and you can absolutely bake the freshly made cookie dough right away. No stress! 

With many of the alternative flours (buckwheat flour, oat flour, corn flour, and spelt flour), you have to add more flour to the cookie dough in order to be able to bake the freshly made cookie dough right away without compromising the thickness and the chewiness of these cookies.

Baking Temperature

The temperature you preheat your oven to is entirely dependent on the type of baking sheets you are using, but also the type of chocolate chip cookie you want to make.

I bake with light-coloured, standard restaurant-style sheet pans from Nordic Ware. These half-sheet pans are made with aluminum and because they are lighter in colour, they don't absorb as much heat as darker sheet pans and so browning/burning doesn't happen too quickly. This is a good thing.

If you are using darker sheet pans, you will have to drop your oven temperature by 25 ºF compared to what the recipe recommends. Darker sheet pans absorb more heat and cause cookies to burn on the bottom if you don't adjust the temperature of your oven to compensate.

If you bake your cookies on a sheet pan lined with a silicone baking mat, your cookies will take longer to bake and they will be softer. The silicone mat is insulating, which means the cookies won't brown as much on the bottom. This leads to a softer cookie than on a parchment-lined sheet pan.

Bakeware aside, if you are baking with standard sheet pans, if you want your cookies to spread more and bake thinner, and crisper, bake them at a lower temperature (try 325 ºF or oven 300 ºF) and let them bake for longer. The lower oven temperature allows the butter to melt and the sugar too, which will cause the cookies to spread, and because the oven temperature is lower, the exterior of the cookie takes longer to set, allowing the cookie to spread out more.

If you want a gooey chocolate chip cookie that is soft on the outside, try baking at a lower temperature, like 325 ºF and don't over-bake your cookies. They should still be quite raw in the middle and very delicate when you take them out. 

I like thicker cookies that are really "meaty" and to achieve this, besides adding more flour to my recipe, I also like to bake the cookies at a higher temperature, 375 ºF or even 400 ºF. This way the exterior of the cookie heats up faster, setting and creating a crust before the butter has time to melt. The cookies will end up thicker for this reason, held together by the crispy set exterior. This is the way to achieve thick cookies that have a crispy exterior and a gooey interior.

In the case of very thick cookies, the outer crust of the cookie may crack or crackle as the interior melts and expands under the crunchy exterior. For thicker chocolate chip cookies, bake them at 375 or 400 ºF.

Regardless of the temperature you bake them at, remember that your chocolate chip cookies will continue to bake on the sheet pan as they cool. Given this, you can now understand why the time the cookies spend in the oven is so brief!

Storing Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough

If you decide to chill your cookie dough to let the dough "cure" and for the flavours to develop, I prefer to roll the raw cookie dough out into 50-gram balls. You can place them in a zip-top bag or even in a closed plastic container. 

Freezing raw cookie dough and how to bake them later

If you decide to freeze your portioned out cookie dough unbaked, I like to place it in an air-tight zip-top freezer bag, being careful to remove all the air before zipping the bag closed. Then you can store them in the freezer for several months. 

When you are ready to bake the frozen cookie dough, simply place them on a parchment-lined cookie sheet to bake from frozen. Let the cookies defrost for 10 minutes at room temperature, while you preheat your oven. The cookies will inevitably take longer to bake, look for the tell-tale signs that they are done: the edges should begin to brown and the surface should look like it's beginning to set, without being baked through.

Storing Freshly-Baked Chocolate Chip Cookies

Once the baked cookies have cooled completely (emphasis on the completely!), I store my freshly baked chocolate chip cookies in a sealed container. As you store them, in the first few days, you will notice they will dry out just a little and become even chewier. I find they hit peak chewy on day 2. After that, the cookies will really start to dry out more.

Also, there isn't much hope for conserving the gooey freshly-baked texture when you store chocolate chip cookies, unfortunately. If that's the texture you look for in a chocolate chip cookie, you are better off storing the raw cookie dough than the baked cookies. This way you can bake them when the craving strikes.

To keep them moist, you can try the same tricks you would use to keep brown sugar fresh and moist:

1. put a marshmallow in the container with the cookies
2. put a slice of bread in the container with the cookies
3. put a slice of apple in the container with the cookies 
4. put a hydrated terracotta brown sugar keeper in the container with the cookies

Freezing freshly baked cookies and how to defrost them later

Most people aren't aware that chocolate chip cookies freeze beautifully. You can do so in a zip-top freezer bag, being mindful to suck all the air out of the bag before placing in the freezer. Then when you want a cookie, take one out and gently reheat it in a low oven (250 ºF) for around 10 to 15 minutes to achieve a warm chocolate cookie that's as good as freshly baked. Future you will be very thankful for that stash of frozen baked chocolate chip cookies on those late nights when you have a craving for freshly-baked chocolate chip cookies that you can't ignore! Trust me.

By the way, you can also chop up extra cookies into small pieces and freeze them to churn into a batch of homemade cookie ice cream!

Flour Substitutions

Things can get quite tricky if you want to use a different flour instead of all-purpose in your favourite chocolate chip cookie recipe. All-purpose has roughly 10 % protein, which gives cookies structure, preventing the cookies from spreading too much in the oven. The ratios used in the classic recipes were developed for all-purpose flour. For this reason, you can't just replace all-purpose flour with another and expect the same results. Even worse, if you want to work with gluten-free flours, most of which have significantly lower protein content and no gluten for structure. You will inevitably have to make adjustments to your recipe. Here's how:

The chocolate chip cookie recipe below can be adapted in the following ways with a variety of flours:

• replace the all-purpose flour with:
  • whole wheat flour: 190 grams (1.5 cups) whole wheat flour to make whole wheat chocolate chip cookies—note that at 190 grams (1.5 cups) of whole wheat flour, the cookies spread out more than they would with the same weight of all-purpose, but they are still on the thicker side so I don't think you should add more flour than this.
  • rye flour: 190 grams (1.5 cups) rye flour to make rye chocolate chip cookies (basically replace with the same amount)—any more rye flour makes the cookies too thick and way too chewy, and less rye flour results in a much thinner cookie that spreads out. Also note that chocolate chip cookies made with 100 % rye flour will be quite chewy, even freshly baked.
  • spelt flour: 220 grams–250 grams (1.75 cups to 2 cups) spelt flour to make spelt chocolate chip cookies— at 250 grams of spelt flour, the freshly baked cookies are quite thick, with a crispy light exterior and a gooey interior. Use just slightly less if you prefer you cookies a little more spread out (so 30 grams or ¼ cup less)
  • oat flour: 220 grams–250 grams (1.75 cups to 2 cups) oat flour depending on how thick a cookie you want (note you can also replace the chopped chocolate with raisins to make them gluten-free oat flour raisin cookies )
  • corn flour: 220 grams–250 grams (1.75 cups to 2 cups) corn flour, depending on how thick a cookie you want
  • buckwheat flour: 310 grams (2.5 cups) buckwheat flour to make gluten-free buckwheat chocolate chip cookies—less works, but the cookies spread quite a bit!
• add oats:
  • add 95 grams (1 cup) of rolled oats, along with peanuts and swapping milk chocolate for dark chocolate to make these thick chewy oatmeal cookies with milk chocolate and peanuts

Other Variations and Substitutions

Feel free to modify this recipe to make your version of the best chocolate cookies. Here are some ways to adapt this recipe:

• Add nuts: when you add in the chocolate, also mix in 110 grams (1 cup) chopped nuts like pecans, walnuts, or even peanuts or pistachios.
• Add seeds: when you add in the chocolate, also mix in 110 grams (1 cup) sunflower seeds or pumpkin seeds.
• Add sprinkles: if you want a funfetti chocolate chip cookie or a "birthday cake" style cookie, mix sprinkles in with the cookie dough. I like adding rainbow jimmies to cookie dough.
• Add peanut butter: when you cream the butter with the sugars, you can add 125 grams (½ cup) of all-natural peanut butter because the recipe below is VERY similar to this recipe for classic peanut butter cookies.
• Add cocoa powder: replace 60 grams (½ cup) of flour with 45 grams (½ cup) of cocoa powder to create the best chocolate chocolate chip cookies
• Change the chocolate: I love to make chocolate chip cookies with chopped dark chocolate that is preferably 70 % cocoa and not too sweet, but you can also use milk chocolate, white chocolate, or a combination of the three. Make sure you stick to the same total quantity of chocolate though. Try adding toffee bits, butterscotch chips, or even peanut butter chips for a completely different flavour.
• Replace the chocolate with chopped dried fruit: you can replace the chocolate with raisins, dried cranberries, dried blueberries, dried sour cherries, chopped crystallized ginger, chopped dates, etc. Substitute cup-for-cup, or do a mixture of chocolate and dried fruit. Up to you!
• Add in something crazy: take inspiration from Christina Tosi's Milk Bar compost cookie recipe and her compost pound cake and throw in some salty potato chips, chopped pretzels, coffee grinds! I've added oats, white chocolate, and blueberries to the same cookie dough base to make these gorgeous blueberry white chocolate cookies
• Garnish: you can't go wrong with a sprinkle of flaky sea salt which will help balance out the sweetness of the cookie dough.

Troubleshooting

If you tried this recipe for the best chewy chocolate chip cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

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Thick Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Here's a recipe for classic chocolate chip cookies that are super chewy and salty-sweet, including tips for adapting this recipe with different flours (whole wheat, rye, spelt, and even gluten-free flours like oat, corn, and buckwheat).

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 14 minutes minutes

Servings 14

Calories 258kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• OXO balloon whisk
• Sheet pan
• GIR spatula
• 1-⅓oz scoop

Ingredients

• 190 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 5 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt or 2.5 mL (½ tsp) table salt
• 2.5 mL baking soda
• 115 grams unsalted butter
• 150 grams dark brown sugar
• 100 grams granulated sugar
• 1 large egg(s)
• 10 mL pure vanilla extract
• 175 grams dark chocolate (70 % cocoa content) chopped (approximately 250 mL or 1 cup), or 250 mL (1 cup) dark chocolate chips

Metric - US

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 400 ºF (200 °C). Line two large sheet pans with parchment paper.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking soda. Set aside.
• In a large bowl, using an electric hand mixer, cream together the butter, the granulated sugar, and the brown sugar until it's very light and fluffy.
• Add the egg and the vanilla, and mix well until the mixture is light and fluffy again. Make sure to clean down the sides of the bowl as needed with a big spatula.
• Dump in the whisked dry ingredients, and incorporate them either with the hand mixer on low, or by hand with a big wooden spoon.
• Mix in the chocolate. The dough should be quite thick.
• Scoop approximately 50 gram portions of the dough, rolling them into balls.
• Place 7 cookies per cookie sheet, being sure to space them apart and stagger them.
• Bake the cookies one sheet pan at a time until the edges just begin to brown (this takes about 12 to 14 minutes). You might want to rotate the pan partway through the baking to make sure the cookies brown evenly.
• Let the cookies cool completely on the sheet pan while you bake the second pan.
• Store in an airtight container.

Notes

• This recipe calls for Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount or the recipe may be too salty!
• replace the all-purpose flour with:
  • whole wheat flour: 190 grams (1.5 cups) whole wheat flour to make whole wheat chocolate chip cookies—note that at 190 grams (1.5 cups) of whole wheat flour, the cookies spread out more than they would with the same weight of all-purpose, but they are still on the thicker side so I don't think you should add more flour than this.
  • rye flour: 190 grams (1.5 cups) rye flour to make rye chocolate chip cookies (basically replace with the same amount)—any more rye flour makes the cookies too thick and way too chewy, and less rye flour results in a much thinner cookie that spreads out. Also note that chocolate chip cookies made with 100 % rye flour will be quite chewy, even freshly baked.
  • spelt flour: 220 grams–250 grams (1.75 cups to 2 cups) spelt flour to make spelt chocolate chip cookies— at 250 grams of spelt flour, the freshly baked cookies are quite thick, with a crispy light exterior and a gooey interior. Use just slightly less if you prefer you cookies a little more spread out (so 30 grams or ¼ cup less)
  • oat flour: 220 grams–250 grams (1.75 cups to 2 cups) oat flour depending on how thick a cookie you want (note you can also replace the chopped chocolate with raisins to make them gluten-free oat flour raisin cookies )
  • corn flour: 220 grams–250 grams (1.75 cups to 2 cups) corn flour, depending on how thick a cookie you want
  • buckwheat flour: 310 grams (2.5 cups) buckwheat flour to make gluten-free buckwheat chocolate chip cookies—less works, but the cookies spread quite a bit!
• add oats:
  • add 95 grams (1 cup) of rolled oats, along with peanuts and swapping milk chocolate for dark chocolate to make these thick chewy oatmeal cookies with milk chocolate and peanuts
• If you want to add nuts: when you add in the chocolate, also mix in 110 grams (1 cup) chopped nuts like pecans, walnuts, or even peanuts or pistachios.
• If you want to add seeds: when you add in the chocolate, also mix in 110 grams (1 cup) sunflower seeds or pumpkin seeds.
• If you want to add sprinkles: if you want a funfetti chocolate chip cookie or a "birthday cake" style cookie, mix sprinkles in with the cookie dough. I like adding rainbow jimmies to cookie dough.
• If you want to add peanut butter: when you cream the butter with the sugars, you can add 125 grams (½ cup) of all-natural peanut butter because the recipe below is VERY similar to this recipe for classic peanut butter cookies.
• If you want to change the chocolate: I love to make chocolate chip cookies with chopped dark chocolate that is preferably 70 % cocoa and not too sweet, but you can also use milk chocolate, white chocolate, or a combination of the three. Make sure you stick to the same total quantity of chocolate though. Try adding toffee bits, butterscotch chips, or even peanut butter chips for a completely different flavour.
• If you want to replace the chocolate with chopped dried fruit: you can replace the chocolate with raisins, dried cranberries, dried blueberries, dried sour cherries, chopped crystallized ginger, chopped dates, etc. Substitute cup-for-cup, or do a mixture of chocolate and dried fruit. Up to you!
• If you want to add in something crazy: take inspiration from Christina Tosi's Milk Bar compost cookie recipe and her compost pound cake and throw in some salty potato chips, chopped pretzels, coffee grinds!
• If you want to garnish: you can't go wrong with a sprinkle of flaky sea salt which will help balance out the sweetness of the cookie dough.
• Please note that I bake with uncoated aluminum sheet pans that are light in colour. If you are baking this recipe with darker bakeware, you may have to drop the oven temperature to 325 °F (165 °C) to prevent your baked goods from browning too quickly.

Nutrition

Calories: 258kcal | Carbohydrates: 34g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 12g | Saturated Fat: 7g | Cholesterol: 30mg | Sodium: 199mg | Potassium: 122mg | Fiber: 2g | Sugar: 21g | Vitamin A: 227IU | Calcium: 24mg | Iron: 2mg

The post The Science of Chocolate Chip Cookies appeared first on The Bake School.

I've always been interested in making graham crackers at home and they are actually quite easy to make. You can whip them together just like any other cut-out cookie recipe (like gingerbread and sugar cookies).

What is in graham crackers?

Graham crackers are made with whole wheat flour and wheat germ that many recipes called for. Apparently, graham crackers got their name, not from some dude named Graham who created them, but from the "graham flour" that is used to make them. Graham flour was actually named after a dude named Graham (it figures at some point, there was a Graham involved, somehow!).

What is graham flour?

Graham flour can be replicated with a mix of white flour, whole wheat, and wheat germ. The whole wheat and wheat germ, besides being extra healthy, give the crackers a more granular texture, and definitely add to the "chew" of the cookies. That's a win–win, if you ask me. I'm definitely going to keep a batch on hand at all times, just so that I am ready to make last-minute graham cracker crusts and microwave s'mores whenever I want to. I can't wait to play with them in the kitchen.

How to Make

Graham crackers are made like any cookie cut-out recipe because that's what they are. All you have to do is make a sweet, but not too sweet cookie dough, roll it out, cut out the cookies, chill, and bake!

What to do with graham crackers

Once you've mastered making graham crackers, you can use them as a building block for so many great recipes!

Use them in a graham cracker crust

Graham crackers can be ground into crumbs, then mixed with a little melted butter and sugar to make a very easy graham cracker crust for desserts like:

• tarts, like in this Earl Grey chocolate tart
• bars, like these s'more bars

Use them as a garnish or topping

Crumbled or ground graham crackers make a great garnish for desserts:

• Serve them on top of milk chocolate pots de crème with toasted vanilla marshmallows
• Garnish a lemon mousse with graham cracker crumbs
• Make a crumb topping out of them and then top a cinnamon apple crumb cake with them before baking

Incorporate them into doughs and batters

• Christina Tosi's compost pound cake
• Milk Bar's compost cookies
• These Canadian Nanaimo bars and white chocolate Nanaimo bars are made with lots of graham cracker crumbs and coconut incorporated in the crust mixture

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Homemade Graham Crackers

Learn how to make homemade graham crackers from scratch with this easy recipe. This baking staple is made with all-purpose and whole wheat flour and wheat germ, giving them a delightfully nutty flavour. Perfect for s'mores and ice cream sandwiches!

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes minutes

Total Time 25 minutes minutes

Servings 30 cookies

Calories 124kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Ingredients

• 205 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 125 grams whole wheat all-purpose flour
• 43 grams wheat germ
• 2.5 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
• 5 mL baking soda
• 5 mL ground cinnamon
• 234 grams unsalted butter room temperature
• 144 grams light brown sugar
• 30 mL honey

Metric - US

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C).
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flours, wheat germ, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon. Set aside.
• In the bowl of an electric mixture fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter, brown sugar, and honey until it is smooth.
• With the mixer on low, slowly add the dry ingredients, and continue mixing until the dough comes together. The dough will squeeze together nicely between your fingers when it is ready, though it may still appear slightly crumbly.
• Take half the dough and form it into a rectangle. Roll it on a generously floured surface until it is about ⅛-inch thick. Cut into squares with cookie cutters and place on a parchment- (or Silpat-) lined baking sheet. The cookies do not expand much in the oven, so you can pack them pretty close on each cookie sheet. Continue to roll and cut out cookies with the other half of the dough and the scraps.
• Freeze the cookies for 20 minutes until they are frozen solid, then prick decorative holes through each (I used my metal cake tester for this) and bake for about 10–12 minutes until the edges just begin to turn golden.
• Remove them from the oven and let them cool completely on a cooling rack.

Notes

• This recipe calls for Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount or the recipe may be too salty!
• The original recipe is from Martha Stewart. I didn’t make too many changes, though I converted the recipe to grams (my preferred measurement for dry ingredients) and baked them for longer. The amounts listed are from my weighing, measuring, and converting.
• For the honey, I used my lavender infused honey

Nutrition

Calories: 124kcal

The post Homemade Graham Crackers appeared first on The Bake School.

This retro snickerdoodle cookie recipe was adapted from my mom's recipe for "Best-ever cookies," but make no mistake, these are classic snickerdoodle cookies. If you love these, but want a chocolate version, try these chocolate snickerdoodle cookies made with cocoa powder.

Ingredients

The beauty of these cinnamon sugar cookies is that you likely have everything you need in your pantry!

• butter—this recipe calls for unsalted butter. If using salted butter, add less salt to the cookie dough.
• sugar—you can use white granulated sugar or light brown sugar in the cookie dough. I prefer brown sugar to add a little flavour and also soften the texture a bit.
• eggs—I always bake with large eggs. If you use a different size, this may have an impact on the texture, spread, and appearance of these cookies
• flour—I bake with bleached all-purpose flour. Unbleached should also work too.
• leavening—we are using baking soda, not baking powder here. Read about the difference between baking soda and baking powder if you aren't sure.
• acid—cream of tartar gives these cookies a tangy taste but also reacts with the baking soda to cause the cookies to puff up as they bake
• cinnamon sugar—you can use store-bought or homemade cinnamon sugar

Please see the recipe card for the exact ingredients and quantities.

Substitutions and Variations

A simple recipe like this has only a few substitutions and variations possible. Here are some changes to consider:

• Chocolate - check out this chocolate snickerdoodle recipe for a version with cocoa powder
• Cardamom - I love to replace the cinnamon sugar with homemade cardamom sugar, also adding cardamom to the cookie dough
• Ginger - my mom put ground ginger in the cookie dough, but it is optional. For more flavour, you could also add ginger to the sugar coating before baking!
• Salt—my mom didn't add salt to this recipe, but if you would like to, add up to ¼ teaspoon (1.25 mL) of Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount to avoid making the cookies too salty.
• Snickerdoodles without cream of tartar—if you prefer to use baking powder instead of the cream of tartar plus baking soda, omit the two ingredients and replace them with 1.5 teaspoons (7.5 mL) baking powder.

With any change to a recipe, you may have to do some testing to achieve the desired results.

How To Make Snickerdoodles

This recipe is so easy and doesn't require any chilling time, so you can make the sugar cookie dough and bake it right away!

Step 1—Start by combining the butter and sugar (image 1) and mixing until creamy and well mixed before adding the egg and vanilla (image 2). Then add the flour mixed with the leavening and cream of tartar (image 3) and stir until the mixture clumps together to form a cookie dough (image 4).

Step 2—I use a ¾ ounce scoop to portion out the dough, rolling it between the palms of my hands to smooth it before rolling it in cinnamon sugar (image 4). Place the cinnamon sugar cookies on a sheet pan, spacing them out. I can fit 8 per half sheet pan (image 5), then bake until the edges are set and the cookies have puffed. They will sink a little as they cool if you don't overbake them (image 6).

Hint: I prefer to bake these cookies just enough that the edges are set, but slightly underbaked so that the centres collapse as they cool. If you prefer a puffy more baked cookie, bake them an extra minute to preserve their puffy shape.

Storage

Store homemade snickerdoodle cookies in an airtight container for up to a week in a cool, dry place.

Snickerdoodle Cookie Baking FAQs

More Drop Cookie Recipes

Drop cookies are quick to make. It's always a good idea to have a container of them in the cupboard. Here are a few more drop cookie recipes to try:

If you tried this recipe for snickerdoodle cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

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Snickerdoodle Cookies

Bake classic snickerdoodle cookies, a retro cinnamon sugar cookie that has a slight tang from cream of tartar, creating soft, chewy cookies that everybody loves!

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time 10 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 22

Calories 145kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• 5-quart KitchenAid Artisan mixer
• ¾ oz scoop
• GIR spatula
• Sheet pan

Ingredients

• 250 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 5 mL cream of tartar
• 5 mL ground ginger
• 2.5 mL baking soda
• 170 grams unsalted butter softened
• 200 grams light brown sugar
• 1 large egg(s)
• 5 mL pure vanilla extract
• 50 grams cinnamon sugar have extra on hand in case you need more than this!

Metric - US

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C). Line three half sheet pans with parchment paper and set aside for later.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, cream of tartar, ginger, and baking soda.
• In the bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the butter and brown sugar, mixing until light, fluffy, and evenly mixed.
• Add the egg and vanilla and mix them in really well.
• Add the dry ingredients and stir them in on low until you form a cookie dough.
• Portion out the dough into 30 gram scoops, rolling them between the palms of your hands to smooth them out.
• Roll each scoop of dough in cinnamon sugar to completely coat it, then place them on a prepared sheet pan (8 per pan maximum).
• Bake each sheet pan for about 10–12 minutes until puffed and the edges are set. Let cool before serving.

Notes

• For a chocolate version - check out this chocolate snickerdoodle recipe for a version with cocoa powder
• Want to use cardamom? I love to replace the cinnamon sugar with homemade cardamom sugar, also adding cardamom to the cookie dough
• More ginger flavour - my mom put ground ginger in the cookie dough, but it is optional. For more flavour, you could also add ginger to the sugar coating before baking!
• Salt—my mom didn't add salt to this recipe, but if you would like to, add up to ¼ teaspoon (1.25 mL) of Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount to avoid making the cookies too salty.
• Snickerdoodles without cream of tartar—if you prefer to use baking powder instead of the cream of tartar plus baking soda, omit the two ingredients and replace them with 1.5 teaspoons (7.5 mL).
• Please note that I bake with uncoated aluminum sheet pans that are light in colour. If you are baking this recipe with darker bakeware, you may have to drop the oven temperature to 325 °F (165 °C) to prevent your baked goods from browning too quickly.
•  

Nutrition

Calories: 145kcal | Carbohydrates: 20g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 7g | Saturated Fat: 4g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 0.3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 2g | Trans Fat: 0.3g | Cholesterol: 24mg | Sodium: 22mg | Potassium: 70mg | Fiber: 0.3g | Sugar: 11g | Vitamin A: 204IU | Vitamin C: 0.002mg | Calcium: 13mg | Iron: 1mg

The post Snickerdoodle Cookies appeared first on The Bake School.

Some people love crispy oatmeal raisin cookies, and others prefer soft and chewy oatmeal raisin cookies. These banana oatmeal cookies are for those who prefer a cakey oatmeal cookie that is somewhere in between. They are kind of like a hearty version of these banana oat muffins but in cookie form!

Ingredients

These banana chocolate chip cookies are easy to make and call for a simple list of ingredients that you probably have in your pantry already!

• butter—this recipe was tested with unsalted butter. If using salted, you may want to reduce the salt added to the cookie dough
• sugar—I like to use a combination of brown sugar and granulated sugar. For the brown sugar, dark brown sugar will give you the most flavour, but light will also work
• eggs—use large eggs. The cracked egg should weigh 50 grams
• banana—use a very ripe banana and weigh it after mashing. This recipe calls for 110 grams of mashed banana, which is usually equivalent to 1 large banana. Make sure to have extra bananas in case your bananas are smaller. Make sure the total weight of banana added to the cookie dough matches the recipe card, or else your cookies may be too dry or too wet
• vanilla—use pure vanilla extract if possible, or add less if baking with artificial
• oats—this recipe was tested with large flake oats, which are sometimes called rolled oats or old fashioned oats. Don't use steel-cut or minute/quick oats as these will greatly affect the texture
• flour—I used bleached all-purpose flour, but unbleached flour should work fine here
• leavening agent—these banana oatmeal cookies are made with baking soda, not baking powder. Read about them if you are unsure of the difference between baking soda and baking powder.
• salt—I bake with Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If you are using table salt, add half the amount
• chocolate chips—any of your favourite chocolate chips will work here
• nuts—any chopped nuts will work here, but I prefer walnuts or pecans

Please see the recipe card for the exact ingredients and quantities.

Substitutions and Variations

Instructions

Like any drop cookie recipe, these banana oatmeal cookies come together quickly. The cookie dough doesn't require any chilling or resting!

Step 1—Toast the nuts on a small sheet pan (image 1) before you begin making the cookie dough. Meanwhile, whisk the dry ingredients (flour, oats, baking soda, salt) with a Danish dough whisk (image 2).

Step 2—Combine the butter and sugars in the bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (image 3) and beat until fluffy and well-mixed before adding the egg (image 4). Add the mashed banana and vanilla after (image 5) and beat it in. At this point, the mixture may look a little curdled.

Step 3—Stir in the whisked dry ingredients (image 6), followed by the chocolate chips and chopped toasted nuts (image 7) to form a thick, sticky cookie dough that you will portion out using a medium cookie scoop (image 8).

Step 4—Place the scoops of cookie dough on a half-sheet pan lined with parchment paper. I like to bake 6 cookies per pan. Use the back of a spoon to press down and flatten out the scoops slightly (image 9), then bake until golden brown and set (image 10).

Hint: Oatmeal cookies don't spread very much in the oven when baked. This is why you need to press the scoops of dough with a spoon or your palm to flatten them out slightly before baking to help them spread, like in this recipe for apple oatmeal cookies.

Other Drop Cookies to Try

Other Banana Recipes to Bake

If you tried this recipe for banana oatmeal cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

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Banana Oatmeal Cookies

These banana oatmeal cookies are thick and cakey, flavoured with dark brown sugar, chocolate chips, and toasted nuts.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time 12 minutes minutes

Total Time 32 minutes minutes

Servings 20 cookies

Calories 222kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• Danish dough whisk
• 6-quart KitchenAid Pro mixer
• GIR spatula
• Sheet pan
• 1-⅓oz scoop

Ingredients

• 90 grams walnuts chopped
• 200 grams rolled oats (or large flake oats) also called old fashioned oats
• 125 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 3.75 mL baking soda
• 2.5 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
• 155 grams unsalted butter softened
• 100 grams dark brown sugar
• 50 grams granulated sugar
• 1 large egg(s)
• 110 grams mashed banana approximately 1 very ripe large banana
• 10 mL pure vanilla extract
• 160 grams dark chocolate chips

Metric - US

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C) and line a couple of baking sheets with parchment.
• Place the walnuts on a sheet pan and toast them until golden brown (about 10–15 minutes). Set aside to cool completely then breka them into smaller chunks.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the oats, flour, baking soda, and salt.
• In the bowl of an electric mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and the sugars for about a minute or until properly blended and smooth, then add the egg, scraping down the bowl as needed with a spatula.
• Add the mashed banana and vanilla and stir them into the dough. The dough will likely look curdled at this stage.
• Add the whisked dry ingredients to the mixer, on low, until the cookie dough is just starting to come together, then add in the chocolate chips and toasted nuts.
• Portion out the cookie dough using a 40 mL (1-⅓ oz)and place 6 per prepared baking sheet. Flatten the scoops down with the back of a spoon or your palm. You can moisten your palm with water so the dough doesn't stick.
• Bake the cookies until set, about 12 minutes, depending on how well done you like them. Personally, I leave them until the edges turn golden brown.
• Let the cookies sit on the sheet pan to firm up before transferring the cookies to a wire rack to cool.

Notes

• Store these cookies in an airtight container.
• If the cookies dry out after a few days, you can soften them with a soaked terracotta brown sugar keeper. Blot it dry after soaking, and then place the brown sugar saver in the cookie container and close the lid. After a day, the cookies will have softened. They will remain pleasantly chewy but won't be as hard and brittle!
• If you'd like to add spices to your banana cookies, consider adding 5 mL (1 teaspoon) of cinnamon along with the dry ingredients.
• This recipe calls for Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount or the recipe may be too salty!
• Please note that I bake with uncoated aluminum sheet pans that are light in colour. If you are baking this recipe with darker bakeware, you may have to drop the oven temperature to 325 °F (165 °C) in order to prevent your baked goods from browning too quickly.

Nutrition

Calories: 222kcal | Carbohydrates: 24g | Protein: 4g | Fat: 13g | Saturated Fat: 7g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 2g | Trans Fat: 0.3g | Cholesterol: 25mg | Sodium: 101mg | Potassium: 126mg | Fiber: 2g | Sugar: 10g | Vitamin A: 207IU | Vitamin C: 0.1mg | Calcium: 42mg | Iron: 1mg

The post Banana Oatmeal Cookies appeared first on The Bake School.

Amaretti cookies are one of my favourite easy recipes to use those leftover egg whites after making a batch of lemon curd or lemon bars. These Italian almond cookies store well in an airtight container and they are gluten-free!

Ingredients

Besides egg whites, you only need a few pantry staples to make these gluten-free cookies. Here's what you need:

• sugar—you will need both granulated sugar and icing sugar (powdered sugar) for this recipe. The granulated sugar is used in the dough, mixed with the egg whites to make a meringue and the dry ingredients, and also as a coating before the icing sugar
• egg whites—please weigh your egg whites to make sure you have the right amount. This recipe requires approximately 4 egg whites but going by weight is more accurate and will lead to more consistent results
• salt—I use Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt. If using table salt, add half the amount to avoid making the cookies too salty
• almond extract—use pure almond extract, not artificial. It's usually available in grocery stores with the other extracts. While not essential, the almond extract really brings out that strong almond flavour and aroma that we expect from amaretti cookies
• orange zest—I used the zest of one Navel orange, which yields roughly 2 teaspoons (10 mL) of zest. Feel free to use more or less.

Please see the recipe card for the exact ingredients and quantities.

Substitutions and Variations

Instructions

Italian almond cookies are very easy to make, but it's best to whip the egg whites in a stand mixer to get the best texture.

Step 1—Combine the ground almonds with 100 grams (½ cup) of sugar and the zest of 1 orange with a Danish dough whisk (image 1). Whisk until evenly mixed (image 2).

Step 2—In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, combine the egg whites and salt (image 3). Whisk until frothy, then gradually add 50 grams (¼ cup) of sugar and whip until firm peaks form (image 4). Fold in the ground almond mixture, one-third at a time (image 5) being sure to fully incorporate it before folding in another portion of the dry ingredients (image 6).

Tip: adding salt to the egg whites helps to break up the globular proteins, allowing you to whip them up faster and create more volume more easily.

Step 3—The almond cookie dough will be thick like almond paste (image 7). Use a ¾ ounce scoop to portion out the dough in 24 equal scoops of approximately 22 grams (image 8). I like to portion out all the dough, rolling each scoop into smooth ball (image 9).

Step 3—Place the granulated sugar and icing sugar in separate shallow bowls and start by coating all the balls of dough in granulated sugar to coat (image 10) before coating them in icing sugar (image 11). Coat all the dough in icing sugar (image 12).

Step 3—Place 12 icing sugar-coated portions of dough on each parchment paper-lined sheet pan, staggering them and pressing down each mound slightly to flatten them out (if desired) (image 13). Bake until cracked and set (image 14).

Amaretti Cookie Baking Tips

I tested the recipe without any sugar coating, comparing it to cookies rolled in just granulated sugar, just icing sugar, or rolling first in granulated then icing sugar to show the difference.

Rolling the portioned-out amaretti cookie dough in granulated sugar, followed by icing sugar, is non-negotiable because it creates the most perfect cracked finish and the longest-lasting coating. If you don't roll in any sugar, the cookies don't crack and the surface looks a little more rough. Icing sugar alone is prone to becoming greasy as it absorbs the oils from the almonds. For best results, roll the dough first in granulated sugar, then icing sugar for perfectly cracked amaretti cookies and crinkle cookies.

Whether or not you decide to press the cookies before baking to flatten them out slightly is entirely up to you and the results are very similar, though the shape is different (round versus thick/flat).

Storage

When amaretti cookies are fresh, the day they are baked, they have a crispy exterior and a soft interior. As they sit in an airtight container, the texture will become more soft and chewy, and even throughout, like amaretti morbidi. These can be stored for weeks in a container and improve with age.

Other Crinkle Cookies

I am obsessed with crinkle cookies and the deep cracks that form on the surface. They have such a unique texture! Here are a few more crinkle cookie recipes to try:

If you tried this recipe for orange almond amaretti cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

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Orange Almond Amaretti Cookies

Learn how to make the best orange amaretti cookies with this easy recipe. These gluten-free Italian almond cookies are made with egg whites and ground almonds, and flavoured with lots of orange zest and almond extract for a soft and chewy texture that everybody loves!

Course Dessert

Cuisine Italian

Prep Time 30 minutes minutes

Cook Time 17 minutes minutes

Total Time 47 minutes minutes

Servings 24

Calories 109kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• Danish dough whisk
• 6-quart KitchenAid Pro mixer
• ¾ oz scoop
• Sheet pan

Ingredients

• 300 grams ground almonds
• 100 grams granulated sugar
• 10 mL finely grated orange zest equivalent to the zest of one Navel orange
• 105 grams large egg white(s) room temperature
• 0.625 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
• 50 grams granulated sugar
• 10 mL pure almond extract

For coating

• 40 grams granulated sugar
• 30 grams icing sugar

Metric - US

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C). Line two half sheet pans with parchment paper. Set aside.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the ground almonds, sugar, and orange zest until they are well mixed. Set aside.
• Place the egg whites and the salt in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Whisk until very frothy, then gradually sprinkle in the sugar, a little at a time. Continue whipping until you form a meringue with fairly firm peaks.
• Sprinkle one-third of the ground almond mixture on the meringue and fold it in with a spatula. Repeat with half of the remaining almond mixture, folding it in, then folding in the remainder. You will have a thick almond paste dough that is a little sticky.
• Place the granulated sugar for coating in a shallow bowl, and the icing sugar in a separate shallow bowl.
• Portion out the dough into 24 scoops of approximately 22 grams each (0.77 oz). Roll each into a smooth. ball.
• Roll each ball of almond cookie dough in the granulated sugar to lightly coat it all around, then roll in icing sugar to coat.
• Place 12 cookies per sheet pan.
• Bake the cookies, one sheet pan at a time, until the surface is cracked and set and the bottom begins to brown. This takes approximately 17 minutes in my oven.
• Let cool. Store in an airtight container.

Notes

• Use room-temperature egg whites so that they whip up more easily.
• You can make this recipe with any finely ground nuts, like almonds, pistachios or hazelnuts, or a combination of them.
• You can flavour this cookie with orange zest or lemon zest.
• I like to use a ¾ ounce scoop to portion out the dough.
• Please note that I bake with uncoated aluminum sheet pans that are light in colour. If you are baking this recipe with darker bakeware, you may have to drop the oven temperature to 325 °F (165 °C) to prevent your baked goods from browning too quickly.
• Freshly baked amaretti will have a crunchy exterior and softer interior initially. Then after storage, the textures will become more soft and chewy throughout.
• This recipe calls for Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount or the recipe may be too salty!
•  

Nutrition

Calories: 109kcal | Carbohydrates: 12g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 6g | Saturated Fat: 0.4g | Sodium: 20mg | Potassium: 8mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 10g | Calcium: 27mg | Iron: 0.5mg

The post Orange Almond Amaretti Cookies appeared first on The Bake School.

Ingredients To Make Peanut Butter White Chocolate Chip Cookies

You likely have most of the ingredients for these white chocolate peanut butter cookies in your pantry and fridge! Here's what you need:

• butter, specifically unsalted butter, but if you only have salted, you can use it and omit the fine kosher salt in the dough
• peanut butter—all-natural, unsweetened smooth peanut butter, specifically the kind you have to stir before using. Make sure to stir the peanut butter well before measuring it out to make sure the peanut oil is evenly mixed into the spread
• sugar—you will need both granulated sugar and light brown sugar. You could use one or the other, but I prefer to use both to achieve the right cookie texture.
• eggs—use large eggs (which weigh about 56 grams with the shell or 50 grams per egg after removing the shell) otherwise, if using a different size of egg, you will have to weigh the cracked eggs and make sure you add 100 grams of egg
• milk—use whole milk (3.25% or 2 % fat)
• flour—specifically bleached all-purpose flour
• leavening agents—you will need both chemical leavers, baking soda and baking powder, to make these cookies
• salt is really important in this recipe to balance out the sweetness of the cookies but also provide a nice contrast of flavours. I use Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt in the cookie dough and flaky sea salt on top (like Maldon sea salt or Jacobsen). If you are using regular table salt to make the dough, use half the amount so the cookies aren't overly salty
• white chocolate— both white chocolate chips and chopped white chocolate are used to make these cookies
• peanuts—chopped toasted peanuts you can also use chopped toasted almonds or walnuts

Please see the recipe card for full information on ingredients and quantities.

How To Make This Recipe

To make these cookies, you will use the creaming mixing method. Remember that butter temperature is key to making a smooth, aerated, thick batter.

• Step 1: Whisk the dry ingredients in a medium bowl to make sure they are evenly mixed (image 1).
• Step 2: Combine the peanut butter, butter, and sugars in the mixer bowl (image 2), then beat them together for several minutes until light and fluffy (image 3).
• Step 3: Add the eggs, milk, and vanilla to the mixer bowl (image 4).

• Step 4: Beat the mixture until light and fluffy (image 5), scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula as needed, then add the dry ingredients (image 6).
• Step 5: Stir the cookie dough until the flour disappears (image 7), then add the white chocolate chips and chopped peanuts (image 8).

Pro Tip: Ingredients get stuck in mixing bowls! To make sure you are mixing everything evenly together, use a big spatula to scrape at the sides of the bowl and to lift up any trapped ingredients so everything is properly mixed together.

• Step 6: Make sure the white chocolate chips and peanuts are evenly incorporated in the dough (image 9), then cover the dough with plastic wrap (image 10) to chill it for 30 minutes in the refrigerator.
• Step 7: While the dough chills, you can preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C)
• Step 8: Using a disher and a kitchen scale, portion out the dough into 60-gram scoops (image 11). You can roll them between the palms of your hand then place them all on a small sheet pan (image 12).

• Step 9: Once the oven is preheated and you've finished portioning out the dough, transfer 5 to a parchment-lined half-sheet pan. Flatten the mounds of cookie dough with the palm of your hand, then press in a few chunks of white chocolate and sprinkle with flaky sea salt (if using) (image 13). Make sure the cookies are spaced roughly 3 inches apart to allow for spreading (image 14).
• Step 10: Bake until the edges are set and begin to brown (image 15). This takes 12–16 minutes, depending on how "well done" you like your cookies.
• Step 11: Let the cookies cool on the sheet pan to firm up for about 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely (image 16). You can use a mini offset spatula to transfer the cookies neatly.

Hint: Give your cookies enough room on a sheet pan to spread out a little but also more room translates to better air circulation, which means they will bake more evenly!

If you tried this recipe for peanut butter white chocolate chip cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

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Peanut Butter White Chocolate Chip Cookies

This easy recipe for chewy peanut butter white chocolate chip cookies recipe makes giant bakery-style peanut butter cookies with white chocolate chips and chunks!

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 16 minutes minutes

Chill time 30 minutes minutes

Total Time 1 hour hour 1 minute minute

Servings 30 cookies

Calories 316kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• 5-quart KitchenAid Artisan mixer
• OXO balloon whisk
• 1-⅓oz scoop
• Sheet pan
• Mini offset

Ingredients

• 230 grams unsalted butter softened
• 520 grams all natural, unsweetened smooth peanut butter room temperature
• 300 grams granulated sugar
• 200 grams light brown sugar
• 2 large egg(s)
• 30 mL whole milk (3.25 % fat)
• 10 mL pure vanilla extract
• 313 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 7.5 mL baking soda
• 5 mL baking powder
• 2.5 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
• 115 grams white chocolate chips
• 60 grams chopped toasted peanuts you can also use chopped toasted almonds or walnuts
• 100 grams white chocolate chopped

Metric - US

Instructions

• In a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream together the butter, peanut butter, and sugars. Beat for 2 minutes on medium–high, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed with a spatula.
• Add the eggs, vanilla, and milk, and beat again on medium–high for another 2 minutes until the mixture is light and fluffy. Scrape down the sides as needed.
• In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and the salt.
• Dump this dry mixture into the mixer bowl and mix everything together on low until combined. Stir in the white chocolate chips and the chopped peanuts. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Chill 30 minutes in the refrigerator.
• Preheat the oven to 350 ºF (175 °C). Line 3 baking sheets with parchment.
• Using a medium disher or cookie scoop, portion out the chilled dough into 60 gram scoops onto a cutting board (or a parchment-lined sheet pan). You can roll the scoops between the palms of your hands to smooth them into round balls of cookie dough.
• When the oven is preheated, transfer 5 scoops of dough to a prepared sheet pan, spacing them about 3 inches apart. You can only fit 5 cookies on a half sheet pan at a time.
• Flatten the cookies with the palm of your hand so they are ½ inch high
• Bake 1 sheet at a time for about 12–16 minutes. I prefer to bake them for the longer time until the edges are set and very lightly browned.
• Remove pan from the oven and let the cookies cool for 10 minutes on the baking sheet before transferring to a wire rack

Notes

• This recipe calls for Diamond Crystal fine Kosher salt. If using regular table salt, add half the amount or the recipe may be too salty!
• For the white chocolate chunks, I used a bar of Lindt White Chocolate, like this Lindt Excellence on Amazon or this Lindt Classic Recipe on Amazon.
• "Natural" nut butters tend to separate as they sit, with the solids sticking to the bottom of the container and the oil floating to the top. Make sure to scrape, stir, and shake well before measuring to ensure a good mix of both components.
• Make sure to chill the cookie dough for 30 minutes before scooping and then press the mounds of dough to flatten them slightly before baking so that they spread perfectly to make thick bakery-style peanut butter cookies.
• Let the cookies cool on the sheet pan for 10 minutes to firm up before transferring to a cooling rack as they are fragile when hot.
• Please note that I bake with uncoated aluminum sheet pans that are light in colour. If you are baking this recipe with darker bakeware, you may have to drop the oven temperature to 325 °F (165 °C) to prevent your baked goods from browning too quickly.
• Store cookies in an airtight container for up to one week.
• This recipe was adapted with permission from Touchwood editions. The original recipe is called "Double peanut butter and white chocolate chunk cookies" and can be found in All The Sweet Things by Renée Kohlman on Amazon.

Nutrition

Calories: 316kcal | Carbohydrates: 33g | Protein: 6g | Fat: 19g | Saturated Fat: 7g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 7g | Trans Fat: 0.3g | Cholesterol: 29mg | Sodium: 119mg | Potassium: 174mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 23g | Vitamin A: 211IU | Vitamin C: 0.04mg | Calcium: 42mg | Iron: 1mg

The post Peanut Butter White Chocolate Chip Cookies appeared first on The Bake School.

I have been searching for the perfect molasses cookie for a long time. I was looking for a cookie that was chewy and not too soft. Most importantly, I wanted it to have that crackled finish. I think this is pretty darn close to what I had in mind.

Molasses cookies are quite different than ginger cookies. They get most of their sweetness and depth of flavour from molasses, instead of granulated or brown sugar. Molasses cookies, in the most classic sense, are not flavoured with warm spices, like ginger or cinnamon, though some recipes do feature it.

Molasses cookies tend to have a cracked or crinkled appearance on the surface of the cookies, so they may be called molasses crinkles or molasses crackle cookies.

What Molasses Cookies Are Made Of

If you want to make thick and chewy molasses sugar cookies, you will need the following ingredients:

• butter, preferably unsalted butter because you will add salt to the dough, but if you have salted it, it will work. Just adjust the salt in the recipe accordingly, otherwise, your cookies may be too salty
• light brown sugar, which adds to the molasses flavour and also helps make a slightly thicker cookie that has a chewy texture
• molasses, specifically Fancy molasses or baking molasses. Do not use blackstrap molasses, which may be too bitter for this recipe
• large eggs—don't use smaller eggs because your cookie dough may be too dry, leading to cookies that don't spread at all in the oven, and don't use extra large eggs which might make the dough too wet and loose causing the cookies to puff and spread too much
• all-purpose flour is needed to bind all the ingredients together and give the cookies structure, contributing to the chewiness of the cookies as well. If you don't use enough flour, your cookies may spread too much as they bake
• baking soda is a base (alkaline) and contributes to that signature cracked finish that we expect of the best ginger cookies. You need baking soda for the cookies to spread properly and to crack. Do not use baking powder. Read up on baking soda vs baking powder if you are unsure
• salt is really important to balance out the sweet molasses flavour. Please don't skip it. I like to use Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt, but table salt will work, though the cookies will be saltier and you may want to halve the salt in that case.

Please see the recipe card for the exact ingredients and quantities.

Note that we are not baking with ground ginger or cinnamon, or adding any warm spices to the dough. This cookie is all about the flavour of molasses and by eliminating the typical spices that we use in gingerbread cookie cut-outs and crystallized ginger cookies, we are giving the chance for the molasses to shine through.

Substitutions and Variations

• Molasses—use fancy molasses (which you can find on Amazon), which is sometimes called baking molasses or original molasses in the US (available on Amazon) or black treacle, which I used in these soft gingerbread cookies. You can also order black treacle on Amazon. Both are by-products from the sugar refinement process in the transformation of sugar cane). Mild molasses also works.
• Brown sugar—I used light brown sugar, but dark brown sugar also works
• Sugar coating—I love to roll the scoops of cookie dough in turbinado sugar, a coarse crunchy non-melting sugar, but you can also roll the cookie dough in granulated sugar or even icing sugar or both (like for chocolate crinkle cookies and lemon ricotta cookies)

Note: Do not use blackstrap molasses. Blackstrap molasses is very dark and has a more bitter taste, whereas Fancy molasses has a milder taste that is more suited for regular homemade cookies and Christmas cookies.

How To Make Molasses Sugar Cookies

Remember to scrape down the sides of the bowl of your stand mixer after each step to ensure all the ingredients are properly mixed. Otherwise, you will end up with textural defects in your cookies that may show up on the surface of them (like crystallized or shiny patches).

Step 1—Combine the butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (image 1) and mix them until creamy and smooth before adding the molasses (image 2) followed by the egg (image 3).

Step 2—Whisk the dry ingredients in a separate bowl (image 4) and then add them to the mixer (image 5). Stir until you form a thick, sticky dough (image 6). I like to transfer the dough to a smaller bowl or container to chill until firm (image 7)

Step 3—Scoop the dough using a medium cookie scoop (image 8) and then roll each scoop in turbinado sugar to coat it all around (image 9). I like to do all the scooping at once and then all the rolling in sugar at once so that my scoops are ready to bake (image 10).

Step 4—Stagger the cookies on a baking sheet, six per half-sheet pan (image 11) and bake until set and cracked (image 12).

Baking Tips For Thick Chewy Molasses Cookies

To achieve the perfect thick and chewy molasses cookie with a cracked surface:

• chill the cookie dough properly so that the edges will set before the baking soda reacts, which will lead to cracking when the leavening kicks in. Insufficient chilling may lead to thinner cookies
• use the correct type and amount of chemical leavener: in this recipe, we use baking soda, not baking powder, and we use a lot of it to achieve the right flavour, browning, and cracked finish
• roll the cookies in turbinado sugar, which adds a coarse crunch to the outside of the cookie and a little sparkle.

You could also opt to roll in granulated sugar, like for the classic ginger cookies, or icing sugar. You need to make sure to really coat the scoops of cookie dough thickly with sugar to achieve an even crackle finish.

If you want a thicker powdery white crinkle on the outside, you can roll the balls of dough into granulated sugar first before coating them in icing sugar (powdered sugar). The granulated sugar will help absorb the moisture on the surface of the cookies, drying them out and helping the cookies crack in the oven when they are baked. Really coat the cookies generously in a lot of powdered sugar so that they are well covered in a thick layer of icing sugar.

Other Baking Recipes With Molasses

If you love the taste of molasses, here are a few other recipes to try:

• ginger cookies with white chocolate
• moist gingerbread cake topped with white chocolate cream cheese frosting and lemon curd
• gingerbread muffins with cranberries

If you tried this recipe for the best molasses sugar cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

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Molasses Sugar Cookies

These sparkly molasses sugar cookies have a bold molasses flavour and a great chewy texture. These cookies are thick with a crunchy exterior because the scoops of cookie dough are coated in turbinado sugar before baking.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 11 minutes minutes

Chill time 1 hour hour

Total Time 26 minutes minutes

Servings 20 cookies

Calories 189kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• 1-⅓oz scoop
• Sheet pan

Ingredients

• 115 grams unsalted butter softened
• 100 grams light brown sugar
• 225 grams Fancy molasses
• 1 large egg(s)
• 345 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 5 mL baking soda
• 1.25 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
• 150 grams turbinado sugar

Metric - US

Instructions

• In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and the brown sugar until light and fluffy. Mix in the molasses, then beat in the egg, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.
• In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Add half this dry mixture to the mixer bowl and stir it in on low, then mix in the rest.
• The dough is soft so cover the bowl with plastic wrap and chill it in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour.
• Preheat the oven to 350 ºF (175 °C). Line a baking sheet with parchment.
• Roll 40 grams of dough into round balls, then roll them in the turbinado to coat them on all sides. Place the cookies on the prepared baking sheet, spacing them about 2 inches apart. Bake the cookies for about 11 minutes or so, the edges will be firm. Let cool 5 minutes on the pan before transferring to a cooling rack.

Notes

• Variations:
  • Molasses—use fancy molasses (which you can find on Amazon), which is sometimes called baking molasses or original molasses in the US (available on Amazon) or black treacle, which I used in these soft gingerbread cookies. You can also order black treacle on Amazon. Both are by-products from the sugar refinement process in the transformation of sugar cane). Mild molasses also works.
  • Brown sugar—I used light brown sugar, but dark brown sugar also works
  • Sugar coating—I love to roll the scoops of cookie dough in turbinado sugar, a coarse crunchy non-melting sugar, but you can also roll the cookie dough in granulated sugar or even icing sugar or both (like for chocolate crinkle cookies and lemon ricotta cookies) 
  • Salt—I bake with Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt. If using table salt, add half the amount or the cookies may be too salty.
• Please note that I bake with uncoated aluminum sheet pans that are light in colour. If you are baking this recipe with darker bakeware, you may have to drop the oven temperature to 325 °F (165 °C) to prevent your baked goods from browning too quickly.

Nutrition

Calories: 189kcal | Carbohydrates: 34g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 5g | Saturated Fat: 3g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 0.3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 1g | Trans Fat: 0.2g | Cholesterol: 21mg | Sodium: 74mg | Potassium: 196mg | Fiber: 0.5g | Sugar: 21g | Vitamin A: 156IU | Calcium: 33mg | Iron: 1mg

The post Molasses Sugar Cookies appeared first on The Bake School.

There are two types of sugar cookies: cutout sugar cookies that require chilling, rolling and cutting with cookie cutters and sugar cookies that are drop cookies where the dough is scooped and baked. These lemon sugar cookies fall in the drop cookie category, which means less work and a faster reward!

While both these lemon poppy seed cookies and these chocolate sugar cookies don't require chilling, that's not true for every drop sugar cookie recipe. These maple sugar cookies are a little more complex (in both the ingredients and the method) and take a little more time (chilling in the fridge overnight), but they are still well worth the effort!

What You Need to Make Cream Cheese Sugar Cookies

These lemon poppy seed cookies are based on a cream cheese sugar cookie recipe. Adding cream cheese to sugar cookie dough creates a thick and chewy cookie with a really nice flavour. Here's what you need to make these:

• butter—this recipe was developed with unsalted butter. If using salted butter, you may want to adjust the salt in the recipe to avoid the cookies being too salty
• cream cheese—use full-fat cream cheese sold in bricks (blocks). I prefer to bake with Philadelphia brand cream cheese. Don't use whipped cream cheese or spreadable cream cheese because the composition is different and it will affect the texture and spread of the cookies.
• lemon zest—fresh lemon zest adds a ton of flavour. I zested 2 lemons to get enough zest for these cookies. The zest of 1 lemon wasn't sufficient in my tests
• sugar—you will need white granulated sugar for this recipe. Don't use brown sugar which will impart too much colour and molasses flavour that doesn't work here
• egg—all the recipes on this site are tested with large eggs. If using smaller or larger eggs, this will affect the texture of the cookies and how they spread
• flour—I bake with regular bleached all-purpose flour. These cookies will likely work with unbleached flour, though the texture may be a little different
• poppy seeds—if your poppy seeds are old, toss them out and buy more because the oils in them can go rancid and the flavour will be off
• leavening agent—you will need baking soda, not baking powder for these cookies. Read about baking soda versus baking powder if you aren't sure the difference
• salt—I bake with Diamond Crystal Fine Kosher salt. If you are using regular table salt, you may want to add half the amount to avoid the cookies being too salty
• citric acid—this ingredient is available in most scoop shops and bulk stores (often used for making pickles). It's the secret ingredient to bring a tart flavour to these lemon cookies without having to add lemon juice (which may ruin the texture of the cookies).

Please see the recipe card for the exact ingredients and quantities.

Substitutions and Variations

This is a simple recipe with just a few variations and substitutions possible. Here are some ideas:

• Lemon variation—you can skip the poppy seeds and keep these plain
• Poppy seed substitutes—chia seeds could work in this recipe because there's not much moisture for them to absorb, but the flavour wouldn't be great. I would prefer to replace the poppy seeds with sesame seeds
• Orange poppy seed variation - replace the lemon zest with the same amount of orange zest (inspo: this orange poppy seed loaf cake)

How to Make Lemon Poppy Seed Cookies

I prefer to make cookie dough in the stand mixer. Here's how to make them:

Step 1—Combine the butter, cream cheese, sugar and lemon zest in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (image 1). Cream them together until light and fluffy before adding the egg (image 2).

Step 2—Whisk the dry ingredients together in a separate along with the poppy seeds (image 3) and add them to the mixer bowl (image 4). Stir until the dough comes together (image 5).

Step 3—Use a medium cookie scoop to divide the dough into 50 gram portions (image 6). I like to smooth out the scoops between the palms of my hands, then roll them in sugar to coat them (image 7).

Step 4—Bake the sugar cookies six at a time on a half-sheet pan (image 8) and bake until the edges begin to brown and the tops have set and cracked (image 9).

Storage

Store these sugar cookies in an airtight container. They can last a week, and if anything, the texture and flavour are even better after a day of storage.

Other Recipes To Bake With Citrus

If you love lemon and citrus as much as I do, here are a few more baking recipes with citrus to try:

If you tried this recipe for lemon poppy seed cookies (or any other recipe on my website), please leave a ⭐ star rating and let me know how it went in the comments below. I love hearing from you!

📖 Recipe

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Lemon Poppy Seed Cookies

Learn how to make the best lemon poppy seed cookies with this easy recipe. This cream cheese sugar cookie recipe is flavoured with lots of lemon zest and poppy seeds, along with a tiny amount of citric acid to give them the bright lemony flavour we all expect from lemon cookies.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time 14 minutes minutes

Total Time 34 minutes minutes

Servings 16

Calories 213kcal

Author Janice Lawandi

Equipment

• Danish dough whisk
• GIR spatula
• 1-⅓oz scoop
• Sheet pan

Ingredients

• 280 grams bleached all-purpose flour
• 14 grams poppy seeds
• 3.75 mL baking soda
• 1.25 mL citric acid optional but gives the cookies more zing
• 2.5 mL Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt or 1.25 mL (¼ tsp) table salt
• 300 grams granulated sugar plus extra for rolling the scoops of cookie dough before baking
• 115 grams unsalted butter softened
• 75 grams Philadelphia cream cheese (full fat, regular) softened
• 30 mL finely grated lemon zest
• 1 large egg(s)

Metric - US

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C). Line three large half-sheet pans with parchment paper and set them aside.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, poppy seeds, baking soda, salt, and citric acid. If there are lumps, use a sifter. The salt and poppy seeds will not pass through, so dump them into the bowl with the rest of the ingredients.
• In a large bowl, using an electric hand mixer or stand mixer, cream together the sugar, butter, cream cheese, and lemon zest until it's very light and fluffy.
• Add the egg and mix well until the mixture is light and fluffy again. Clean down the sides of the bowl as needed with a big spatula.
• Pour the whisked dry ingredients into the mixer bowl, and incorporate them either on low or by hand with a big wooden spoon.
• Scoop approximately 50-gram portions of the dough, rolling them into balls between the palms of your hands to smooth them out, then rolling them in granulated sugar to completely coat them.
• Place 4–6 cookies per cookie sheet, being sure to space them apart and stagger them.
• Bake the cookies one sheet pan at a time until the edges are set and the surface cracks (this takes about 14 minutes).
• Let the cookies cool completely on the sheet pan while you bake the second pan.
• Store in an airtight container.

Notes

• For the salt, use 2.5 mL (½ tsp) of Diamond Crystal Fine Kosher salt or 1.25 mL (¼ tsp) of table salt
• I had to zest 2 lemons to get enough zest to flavour these cookies. One was insufficient and didn't impart nearly enough flavour
• Citric acid is available in scoop or bulk stores. It's used for making pickles, though I've also incorporated it in cream cheese frosting for the Milk Bar birthday cake to give it a more tart bright flavour.
• Use a cookie scoop to portion out the cookie dough easily. Then roll each scoop into a smooth ball so that it bakes perfectly. Evenly scooped cookies will bake at the same time, whereas if you portion out dough unevenly, they will not.
• If sealed properly, these cookies will last 4 or 5 days in an airtight container. 
  
• Please note that I bake with light-coloured uncoated aluminum sheet pans. If you are baking this recipe with darker bakeware, you may have to drop the oven temperature to 325 °F (165 °C) in order to prevent your baked goods from browning too quickly.

Nutrition

Calories: 213kcal | Carbohydrates: 33g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 8g | Saturated Fat: 5g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 1g | Monounsaturated Fat: 2g | Trans Fat: 0.2g | Cholesterol: 30mg | Sodium: 127mg | Potassium: 38mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 19g | Vitamin A: 258IU | Vitamin C: 1mg | Calcium: 24mg | Iron: 1mg

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