Making changes to a cookie recipe

Cafe Society
1

A friend gave me a recipe for cranberry flavored cookies that taste good, but they aren’t of a ‘texture’ I like. As in, the cookies are softish little lumps after they’re cooked, tender and crumbly, somewhat like you’ve taken a bite of cake.

Me, I prefer my cookies to be either hard and crispy (e.g. ginger snaps) or thin but chewy (e.g., well, some sugar cookies or chocolate chip cookies.)

I’m thinking the main difference is in how much a cookie ‘spreads’ as it bakes, and likely the fats to solids ratio, and maybe whether the fat is oil or butter or margarine or crisco. (My favorite sugar cookie uses nothing but crisco.)

To cut down on how many failures I experience as I tinker, any rules of thumb? Like butter = crispier, margarine = chewier?

The current cookies swell up as they bake and hardly spread out at all – would just reducing the baking soda/powder lessen that? They also have two eggs, would cutting that to one make then less cakey? But increase some liquid amount to offset the loss in terms of how stiff the dough is?

Also … I really think I’d like them more if they were cranberry-ORANGE flavored cookies. I’m betting adding orange zest would be good for that, but maybe I should add orange juice instead, to replace the loss of liquid from the egg?

2

My sister does a lot of cooking baking, especially this time of year. She uses 3 basic recipes then add the fillers, chocolate chips, M&Ms, dried fruits. Her basic recipes are for a sugar cookie, oatmeal cookie or brown sugar cookie. I would just find a recipe for a basic cookie and add some chopped up dried cranberries. If you want orange flavor, stick with zest. The orange juice will react with the baking soda and produce carbon dioxide. Thinks science project volcano.

3

Best thing to do for cookies is to let the dough sit in the refrigerator for 24-36 hours before making the cookies. This allows moisture to be fully absorbed by the flour (or oatmeal) and will usually result in cookies with a soft, chewy center and crisp edge.

4

Orange zest will add a lot more flavor than orange juice.

If you give us the recipe ingredient amounts, we can see what looks wrong.

5

For a real treat, incorporate orange zest into French toast. I sauté it in melted butter just before putting the dipped bread in the pan.

6

Heh. “Cranberry Orange Volcano cookies!” Sounds fun.

Never heard that tip before! Though a lot of time my doughs got ‘aged’ anyway, due to how time worked out.

Okay, here’s what I wrote down from her reading the recipe to me, plus a few sort of parenthetical comments she’d made during the reading and in another conversation.

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Chocolate Cranberry Cookies

Preheat oven to 350F, grease cookie sheets or line with parchment paper.

Sift and set aside:
3 C flour
1/2 C cocoa
1 T. baking soda
2 t. baking powder

In separate bowl, cream together
1 C butter
1 C white sugar

Beat in:
2 eggs
1 t. vanilla

Stir in (be a little gentle, don’t want to smash up all the cranberry bits)
~1 1/2 C Whole Berry cranberry sauce (she says she just uses 1 ‘standard’ can)

Add the dry ingredients and stir to combine.

Sometimes she adds chopped nuts and/or chocolate chips, “as many as looks right”

They’re drop cookies, says she uses a ‘standard’ size cookie scoop (Maybe 2 T. size?) and puts the lumps on the sheet in a 4X6 ‘staggered’ pattern since they don’t really spread that much.

Bake for about 10 minutes, until they look “done.” (Sort of dry to the touch but not firm, since you can’t go by color.)

Cool on the sheet for a few minutes, then move to wire racks to finish cooling. Store in air tight container. No idea how long they can be kept, or if they can be frozen: She has five children at home!

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Just remembered: she said the woman she got the recipe from said she would flatten them a bit (glass dipped in sugar) before baking, but she never does. That make them spread out more, obviously, and maybe crispier? Maybe all I need to do is that? Plus add the zest.

7

The cranberry sauce is what it making the cookies soft. I would suggest using dried cranberries instead, although letting the dough sit in the fridge for a day might help.

8

And maybe soak the dried cranberries in a small amount (maybe 1/2 cup?) of orange liqueur plus about a tablespoon of orange zest to replace a bit of the moisture. The alcohol will bake off.

9

A good idea flavor-wise, but then you’re back to adding liquid, which will make the cookies soft.

10

Here’s my recipe for oatmeal/raisin cookies (which includes walnuts and other dried fruit).

This recipe makes large (4”) cookies that are moist and chewy with a crisp edge, but the secret to the texture is in the refrigeration time. I prefer adding ingredients by weight, rather than by volume.

Dry ingredients (whisk together in a large mixing bowl):

2 cups all-purpose or baking flour (240 grams)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp kosher salt
1 heaping tsp of Baking Spice (Penzeys: www.penzeys.com)
½ tsp Vietnamese cinnamon (same source)
1 tsp cocoa (optional)

Wet ingredients:

1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar (198 g)
1 cup brown sugar (dark or light) 200g
2 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla (not imitation)

Cream the wet ingredients with a hand mixer until light. By hand or stand mixeer, stir the wet and dry ingredients until just well combined. It’s important not to overwork it.

Add the following:

3 cups oats (not instant) 270g
1 cup golden raisins, or ½ cup raisins and ½ cup diced dried apricots (or substitute other dried fruit, if desired)
1 cup walnut pieces

When all have been combined, you may cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate it, making sure the plastic is touching the surface of the dough. The dough can be refrigerated overnight or up to 36 hours. Or just bake right away. Refrigeration helps the moisture to be absorbed by the flour and oats, and can improve texture.

Heat oven to 350F. Using a spoon or a cookie/ice cream scoop, form the dough into 2” diameter balls, taking care not to compress the dough too much. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet or on parchment paper on a sheet, allowing enough room for expansion (about nine cookies per sheet). Press down with a fork. Bake for 10-13 minutes, or until golden. It’s important not to overcook these.

After the cooking cycle, you will see moisture in the cookie cracks or even puddled ingredients in the middle. This is good. Remove from the oven and let sit on the sheet for about two minutes, then remove to a wire rack to cool. Store as you normally would.

Sprinkle lightly with a bit of kosher salt, if desired.

11

Um, how about some changes to refrigerated cookie dough, like the Nestle break-apart chocolate chip cookies. I think McDonald’s cc cookies are baked just about right, but the Nestle directions gives underbaked rounded cookies, not crispy edges with a soft center. My solution is to increase the oven temperature to 375 (from 350) and to slightly flatten the unbaked dough. My goal is to get almost burnt bottoms, like my mother used to bake (perhaps unintentionally).

If I’m making dough from scratch I prefer using margarine instead of butter for cc cookies. However, make sure it’s labeled at 90% fat for baking, not a more typical 50 to 60%.

12

Not if you’re just adding the plumped-up cranberries without the excess liquid.

13

Ah, I misread your post.

14

Thanks! I’ll bet subbing in dried cranberries and some orange zest will result in much better cookies than trying to ‘fix’ the other recipe by trial and error.

How much zest do you think might be good? One orange worth? Two? (I mostly buy large navel oranges.)

15

Refrigeration is a good idea, but I was told that it was because it makes the dough colder, so that the exterior of the cookie gets crispier before the interior gets dry. It is, so I was told, like the difference between taking a steak out of the fridge for an hour before cooking it or making it right out of the fridge. In the latter case you can brown it more and it will still be rare, because it started colder.
Flour is quite hydrophilic, it does not require much time to absob moisture after you have mixed both together. And if it needed to, it could just as well do it at room temperature. By which I mean to say: if you want to accelerate the process, don’t put the dough in the fridge overnight, put it in the freezer for a couple of hours. Then mix again, but not too much, or it will heat up again.

16

I’d start with a tablespoon and see how that works for you. Zest is a very strong flavor.

17

A tablespoon of fresh zest might be a lot in a wet batter. You might want to add a little at a time to taste.

18

I once used an ancient cookbook to make ginger snaps, but substituted honey for the molasses I didn’t have. Those were some nice golden cookies.

19

You can sub Karo syrup in for molasses, too, I’ve found.

20

Could be. It’s what I use for my French toast, but I’ve never put it in a batch of cookies.