Drop Sugar Cookies Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What makes drop cookies different? ›

“Drop cookie” is a term applied to cookie recipes where bakers “drop” cookie dough from a spoon or cookie scoop onto a baking sheet, rather than roll it out or cut it into specific shapes. Conversely, most Christmas cookies and shortbread-style cookies are “cut” cookies.

Cream of tartar makes cookies chewy, as it precludes the sugar in the dough from crystalizing, which would lead to crispiness (ie: the opposite of chewiness).

Certain cookies — Sugar Cookies, Snickerdoodles, Classic Peanut Butter Cookies — need to be flattened a bit before they bake, lest they end up emerging from the oven looking like ping-pong balls rather than typical flat, round cookies.

If you enjoy your cookies soft and chewy, chances are likely the recipe contains a common ingredient that serves a very specific purpose. No, it's not granulated sugar, nor the butter. It's not the egg, all-purpose flour, or even the vanilla extract. The simple, yet oh-so-necessary component is cornstarch.

Cookies fall into a few different categories. The most common is a drop cookie, where dough is simply scooped onto cookie sheets. Fans of chocolate desserts will easily recognize chocolate chip cookies as classic examples.

If your cookies repeatedly turn out flat, no matter the recipe, chances are your oven is too hot. Here's what's happening. The butter melts super quickly in a too-hot oven before the other ingredients have firmed up into a cookie structure. Therefore, as the butter spreads so does the whole liquidy cookie.

The powdered sugar in the recipe helps absorb moisture from other ingredients, giving the cookies a unique bumpy looking appearance and an extra tender and chewy texture.

Baking soda also serves another important purpose when it comes to cookies: It encourages spreading by raising the mixture's pH, which slows protein coagulation. This gives the dough more time to set before the eggs set, which results in a more evenly baked cookie.

The Best Substitute for Cream of Tartar

For every 1/2 teaspoon of cream of tartar in the recipe, use 1 teaspoon lemon juice or white vinegar. As an example, if your cookie recipe calls for 1 teaspoon baking soda, add 2 teaspoons lemon juice instead of the cream of tartar.

Baking powder or flour in excess will cause cookies to rise more, making them more fluffy and cakey. Increased sugar will make them caramelize more and increased fat will make the dough heavier and richer, all increasing retention of water in the dough- these all add up to chewier cookies.

What does cornstarch do in sugar cookies? ›

Cookies. Cornstarch does kind of incredible things to cookies. I mean not only does it give them soft centers, prevents them from spreading, and makes them somewhat thick (in a good way), but it also contributes to the chewiness factor, which, in my opinion, is the most important cookie attribute.

Cornstarch helps product soft and thick cookies. Using more brown sugar than white sugar results in a moister, softer cookie. An extra egg yolk increases chewiness. Rolling the cookie dough balls to be tall and lumpy instead of wide and smooth gives the cookies a bakery-style textured thickness.

Double Your Yolks Most cookie recipes call for at least one egg. You can try omitting the white of each egg, which tends to dry out when baked, and replacing it with an additional yolk. Plus, egg yolks have more fat than egg whites, which helps to keep your cookies moist and chewy.

Molded - dough is molded by hand into a ball. Peanut butter and molasses cookies are good examples. Peanut butter cookies are usually pressed with a damp fork in a criss cross pattern, where molasses cookies are rolled in sugar before baking. Drop - dough is dropped on the sheet pan by the spoonful.

Rolled and cut cookies take much more time and preparation than drop or bar cookies as the dough usually has to be chilled before it can be rolled and cut. Once the dough has been rolled out it can be cut with cookie cutters, a knife or a pastry wheel.

Make a batch of your favorite drop cookie dough.

What's a drop cookie, you ask? Simply one you shape by dropping balls of dough onto a baking sheet – as opposed to rolling out and cutting with a cutter, or baking in an iron (e.g., pizzelle).

Slice and bake cookies are a type of cookie that is formed into a log that you can cut into individual rounds and place on the baking sheet, as opposed to “drop cookies” that are hand shaped and dropped into small mounds on the baking sheet before baking.