the dough wasn’t cool enough before baking. Warm cookie dough or excess butter will cause the cookies to spread too much, baking quickly on the outside but remaining raw in the middle. Next time, chill your cookies in the fridge for 10 minutes before you bake them. If the problem persists, use less butter.
One of the most common reasons why cookies didn’t spread out in the oven is because you added too much flour. Cookies rely on the perfect ratio of butter to flour in order to spread just the right amount when baked. It’s very easy to over measure flour when using cup measurements.
Oven Temperature
Generally, cookies are baked in a moderate oven — 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) — for 8 to 12 minutes, depending on the size of the cookie. For chewy cookies, allow them to cool on the baking sheet for 3 to 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
Better to be on the safe side and remove them when they’re slightly underdone than burn them. You can always return cookies to the oven if they need a few more minutes. You can even rebake cookies long after they’re cool to restore crispness or freshness.
Keeping them on the sheet too long after baking can cause them to get hard or stick to the sheet. Cookies are done when they are firmly set and lightly browned. When you touch them lightly with your finger, almost no imprint will remain.
That, or the dough wasn’t cool enough before baking. Warm cookie dough or excess butter will cause the cookies to spread too much, baking quickly on the outside but remaining raw in the middle. Next time, chill your cookies in the fridge for 10 minutes before you bake them. If the problem persists, use less butter.
Place one baking sheet at a time onto center rack of preheated 350 degree F oven. Bake until cookies are golden around the edges, still have pale tops, and are soft in the center, about 8 to 10 minutes. (Do not overbake! They will firm up more during cooling.)
For those ooey, gooey chocolate chip cookies, 375 degrees Fahrenheit is your sweet spot. It’s the perfect temperature to ensure super crispy exterior edges, while leaving the center slightly underdone and, thus, doughy and fudgey.
Turn the oven off, let the trapped heat cook the cookies. My cookies were underdone after a bake of 7 minutes. To save these cookies, I let them completely cool first. Then continue baking them at 180 degrees C for 5 minutes.
Chilling cookie dough controls spread.
Chilling cookie dough before baking solidifies the fat in the cookies. As the cookies bake, the fat in the chilled cookie dough takes longer to melt than room-temperature fat. And the longer the fat remains solid, the less cookies spread.
(No one knows how hard it is to wait before tasting more than I do.) Once it’s clear that you do have limp cookies or less-than-crispy crackers, put them back into a preheated 300° F or 325° F oven, regardless of the original (presumably higher) baking temperature.
Most cookies are still soft when done (they harden as they cool) and will continue to bake on the cookie sheet once removed from the oven. Remove cookies from the cookie sheet as soon as they are firm enough to transfer, using a spatula, to a cooling rack or paper towels to finish cooling.
When cookie dough is sticky, it’s generally because there’s too much moisture. You need to get a good balance of the dry and wet ingredients so that the dough isn’t too wet or too dry. Having cookie dough that’s too wet results in cookies that spread out far too much during baking.
Too much butter causes cookies to spread a lot and ultimately crisp out on the outside being able to completely cook. Extremely chewy cookies (when the recipe isn’t meant to make chewy cookies). This is because of the liquid content in the butter. Moisture helps develop gluten and gluten helps make chewy cookies.
Chocolate chip cookies are done when they have a firm golden edge or bottom and appear slightly set on top. If the edges become dark brown, they are overbaked. If edges aren’t golden and tops are soft and shiny, bake a little longer.
Cookies should (almost) always be baked on the middle rack of the oven. The middle rack offers the most even heat and air circulation which helps cookies bake consistently.
Use a small amount of an acidic condiment such as lemon juice or vinegar to neutralise the soda. If the recipe has chocolate, simply add half a teaspoon of cocoa powder to it. Buttermilk can also be used to counter the pungent taste of baking soda.
To keep the edges from crisping, try chilling the dough in the fridge (Cook’s Illustrated recommends 10–15 minutes) before scooping it onto a baking sheet. This will keep the butter from melting and making the dough too soft before going into the oven.
If you are able to touch the top of them and they are right between soft and firm (or how you would prefer them), they would be good. if you are able to touch them and they still feel to dough-like, leave them in the oven for another 2 or 3 minutes.
Bake at 375 degrees F until golden and crunchy on the outside, and chewy on the inside, 10 to 12 minutes. For super-chewy cookies: Substitute cake flour for all-purpose flour.
Lining a baking sheet when making cookies: Not only will the parchment help cookies bake more evenly, the non-stick quality also helps prevent them from cracking or breaking when lifting them off the sheet. Decorating home-baked goods: Parchment paper makes the perfect wrapper for baked goods.
Because the higher temperature causes the cookies to firm faster (aka set faster) and this prevents spreading. Cookies baked at 375 degrees F will have a thicker, chewier bottom.
Even heat created by the air circulating in convection yields the irresistible combination of crunchy and gooey – and some say it’s the secret to the perfect cookie. But, if you prefer a softer, chewy cookie, use Bake mode without convection.
Preheat oven 10 to 15 minutes before baking the first sheet or pan of cookies. Check oven temperature with an oven thermometer.
Popping your dough in the fridge allows the fats to cool. As a result, the cookies will expand more slowly, holding onto their texture. If you skip the chilling step, you’re more likely to wind up with flat, sad disks instead of lovely, chewy cookies. Cookies made from chilled dough are also much more flavorful.
Let it sit for long enough—the famous Jacques Torres chocolate chip cookie, published in the New York Times, mandates a rest of at least 24 hours and up to 72—and the starches and proteins in the flour begin to break down, leading to more browning and caramelization.
Anywhere from 24 to 72 hours. The longer you chill the dough, the more flavor will develop. The flour will also absorb more of the moisture so the thicker and chewier the final texture will be.
This is because when cookies are left to cool on a hot-from-the-oven baking sheet, they continue to bake and can become overdone in a flash. A cookie cooling rack ($16, Target) allows air to circulate under the cookies, cooling them quickly and completely.
If you mix (or roll out) cookie dough too much, you’ll add excess air to the dough, causing it to rise and then fall flat in the oven. Overmixing the dough can also lead to excess gluten development, resulting in dense cookies.
Having too much flour in your cookies will make them tender, and even crumbly. This is apparent in shortbread cookies, which are well known for being dry and soft. What is this? This will often happen when you use a high amount of flour in cookies that have very few wet ingredients, such as eggs and butter.
Thus, if your butter is too cold, your cookies will be denser, and they will likely not spread enough in the pan when you bake them. In general, you want your butter to be cool, but not cold. The right way: Let your butter sit out for 15 minutes (but not longer — see below) before creaming.
9 Tips to Remember
- Use Real Butter and Keep It Cool. The low melting point of butter may be what makes your cookies flat.
- Use Shortening.
- Chill Dough Twice.
- Use Parchment Paper or a Silicone Liner.
- Measure Precisely.
- Use Fresh Baking Soda.
- Use Optional Add-Ins.
- Buy an Oven Thermometer.
It can also affect the texture of a cookie. Butter has a lower melting point than shortening or margarine, causing it to spread more during baking, so a cookie made with butter will be thinner and crisper than the same cookie made with shortening or margarine. Changing the type of butter can also make a difference.
At that temperature, the butter will be melted and greasy, so your cookies will spread all over the pan. If it’s winter, meanwhile, and the air temperature is 60 degrees Fahrenheit, the butter will be too firm, so your cookie dough will not get enough air while creaming, she says, and they won’t rise properly.
Normally the cookie should not be too flat – should be rounded in the middle, should snap if it’s crispy or bend and break if it’s chewy. If it has nuts, there should be enough of them to have a piece in every bite. The cookies should be big enough to get a good taste of the cookie but not so big that it’s a full meal.
Does oven heat from top or bottom?
Most (if not all) ovens are hotter at the top than at the bottom. Thus, if you have two baking sheets in your oven, one on a higher rack and one on a lower rack, the one on the higher rack will cook faster. Therefore, it is important not only to rotate your pans from front to back, but also from top to bottom.
Baking soda is generally about three times stronger than baking powder, so adjust your recipe accordingly. Baking soda and baking powder can produce cookies with different textures. Baking soda is typically used for chewy cookies, while baking powder is generally used for light and airy cookies.
1. Unless you want cakey cookies, avoid using baking powder: The cookies made with both the single- and double-acting baking powders were just too darn cakey. 2. Baking soda helps cookies spread more than baking powder.
In addition, baking powder produces a slightly different texture in cookies than baking soda does. While baking soda will create a coarse, chewy cookie texture, baking powder will produce a light, fine cookie texture. To achieve the best cookie results, use a double-acting baking powder as a substitute.
One option is to use parchment paper, also called baking paper, which is both moisture and heat resistant and used by plenty of bakers to help you protect the bottoms of the cookies (this also helps with clean up).
Eating uncooked dough or batter can make you severely sick. The primary risk comes from flour. That’s right… flour. That fluffy powder may look innocent, but it should be viewed as a potentially dangerous “raw” food.
If you absolutely need to bake more than one batch at a time for an event, holiday baking, etc– rotate the baking sheets from the top rack to bottom rack once halfway through the baking process.
Oven Temperature
Generally, cookies are baked in a moderate oven — 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) — for 8 to 12 minutes, depending on the size of the cookie. For chewy cookies, allow them to cool on the baking sheet for 3 to 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
Bake until the cookies are lightly browned and no longer wet in the center, 6 to 8 minutes; if baking more than one pan at a time, switch pan positions halfway through baking. (Take the cookies out of the oven 1 or 2 minutes before the cookies are cooked, as they will continue to cook on the baking pans.)
Doughy cookies may be the result of under baking, which prevents enough moisture from evaporating off. If you find the edges of your cookies are fully cooked but the center is still too doughy, reduce the baking temperature and increase the baking time.
For those ooey, gooey chocolate chip cookies, 375 degrees Fahrenheit is your sweet spot. It’s the perfect temperature to ensure super crispy exterior edges, while leaving the center slightly underdone and, thus, doughy and fudgey.
Keeping them on the sheet too long after baking can cause them to get hard or stick to the sheet. Cookies are done when they are firmly set and lightly browned. When you touch them lightly with your finger, almost no imprint will remain.
Place one baking sheet at a time onto center rack of preheated 350 degree F oven. Bake until cookies are golden around the edges, still have pale tops, and are soft in the center, about 8 to 10 minutes. (Do not overbake! They will firm up more during cooling.)
Which side of parchment paper goes up?
There is no right or wrong side to parchment paper, so either side can be used. For the best baking results, use a fresh sheet of parchment paper for each pan of cookies.
Does parchment paper change baking time?
It changes cooking times and scratches off when you clean it – unless you are unbelievably careful – which I am not.) One day I realized that baking recipes sometimes mention parchment paper.
When should you not use parchment paper?
When Not to Use Parchment Paper. Parchment paper is not designed for high heat cooking. Avoid using it in your oven or on the grill if temperature will exceed 400 degrees, says Michelle Weaver, chef at Charleston Grill in South Carolina, as there’s a chance it could catch fire.
If you’re baking your cookies at 325 degrees, you’ll need to bake them longer than you would at 350 degrees. This is because, as previously noted, the lower temperature of the oven will result in the cookies baking at a slower pace. Some sources say to bake cookies at 325 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes.
LOWER THE TEMPERATURE
“Bake low and slow,” says Matheus. Turn your oven down 50 degrees from what your recipe recommends. “When you bake at a lower temperature, you will get that perfect cookie with a soft center and crisp exterior,” she adds.
Conclusion. The baking time of your cookies will be the same whether you bake one tray or four trays — assuming your oven is large enough to handle them. Oven racks should be evenly spaced and at least several inches away from the heating element.