topic Re: Butter cookie fail today! in Recipes

Butter cookie fail today!

shy bobcat — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 22:46:44 GMT

My butter cookies were a complete fail today. They are basically made of butter, egg yolks, flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and vanilla. I will save the crumbled cookies as an ice-cream topping.

I rolled the dough into balls to bake and in the oven they spread out like a flat mess.

Does anyone have any ideas what may have happened. I followed the recipe and don't want to be intimidated to bake. It seems ever since I stopped using Crisco, my cookies spread flat when baking. This butter cookie recipe did call for butter! Thank you ladies in advance. Merry Christmas to you and yours.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

Kachina624 — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 22:50:41 GMT

Should you perhaps have chilled the dough before handling and rolled it out rather than making balls which warmed it from the heat on your hands?

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

froggy — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 22:56:58 GMT

I hope you didn't substitute margarine for the butter.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

gizmogal — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 23:01:31 GMT

Is your baking powder fresh? It’s not an ingredient used in large quantity, so it sometimes stays in its container for a long time because it doesn’t get used up and repurchased new. The shelf life might have expired or for any reason its effectiveness may be compromised. It’s a leavening agent, so flat cookies implies an improper chemical reaction.

No judgment on your baking abilities. Just suggesting a line of thoughtas you reached out for insights from others.

Perhaps this helps:

https://www.seriouseats.com/2015/12/cookie-science-baking-powder.html

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

shy bobcat — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 23:09:16 GMT

@gizmogal @froggy @Kachina624

Thank you ladies. With your suggestions, I am encouraged to try again.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

staciesmom — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 23:18:47 GMT

I had cookies fail once - I used powdered sugar instead of flour. They were both in the same type of container.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

ECBG — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 23:31:33 GMT

Test the heat in your oven.

Were the cookie sheets cool? If not, they start melting before the baking powder can activate.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

deepwaterdotter — Sun, 23 Dec 2018 23:52:49 GMT

I use this recipe from the back of a bag of flour:

1 1/4 cups powdered sugar

1 cup + 2 tbsp butter

1 egg yolk

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp vanilla

2 3/4 cups flour

Beat sugar, butter, egg yolk, salt, and vanilla together until smooth. Mix in flour until smooth.

Divide dough in half, mold into flat disk, and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate 2-3 hours or overnight.

Let dough soften until still cold, but not rock-hard, about 20-30 minutes.

Sprinkle counter and rolling pin with flour. Roll dough to about 1/8" thickness.

Cut into desired shape and bake on parchment-lined baking sheet in 350 degree oven until edges are barely browned, 12-14 minutes.

Cool on piece of parchment removed from baking sheet and placed on flat surface.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

Carmie — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 00:44:38 GMT

I second the suggestion that your baking power might not have been fresh. I buy a new can every year before Christmas baking and throw out the old one, even it it isn't expired.

I have had too many cookies go flat in the past with old baking powder.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

DiAnne — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 03:01:44 GMT

Could your butter have been too soft. Sometimes putting the cookie dough into the fridge for a while before baking helps.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

Kachina624 — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 03:43:12 GMT

@gizmogal. @Carmie. Her recipe didn't call for baking powder. That recipe has an awful lot of fat for a fairly small amount of flour. It does say to chill the dough and roll out the dough and cut out shapes. I think her dough was too warm.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

Carmie — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 05:05:46 GMT

@Kachina624 wrote:
@gizmogal. @Carmie. Her recipe didn't call for baking powder. That recipe has an awful lot of fat for a fairly small amount of flour. It does say to chill the dough and roll out the dough and cut out shapes. I think her dough was too warm.

Huh? The OP mentioned baking powder as an ingredient.

I do agree that cookie dough should be chilled first. She mentioned that she rolled the dough into balls. I don't see where she cut out shapes.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

gizmogal — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 06:41:37 GMT

@Kachina624 wrote:
@gizmogal. @Carmie. Her recipe didn't call for baking powder. That recipe has an awful lot of fat for a fairly small amount of flour. It does say to chill the dough and roll out the dough and cut out shapes. I think her dough was too warm.

The recipe cited in detail is not the cookie from the original poster. The recipe cited doesn’t include baking powder. But the first post of the thread describes her use of baking powder. These are two separate posts from different people. Original post mentions baking powder. Listed ingredients is in a completely different cookie recipe

Before you correct others, read correctly and comment in context.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

VaBelle35 — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 14:16:42 GMT

Sometimes your brand of butter has too much water in it.

Sometimes it's the flour.

I have posted before that using King Arthur All Purpose flour instead of my usual Gold Medal AP flour made all of my cookies and cakes that I had been making for decades fail.

I use King Arthur for muffins and breads, but Gold Medal for the delicates.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

SharkE — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 14:56:05 GMT

did it call for 'softened butter' and you melted it in microwave?

Use the correct amount of flour ?

If it said 'refrigerate dough' and didn't

I have to make sure I refrigerate Mexican wedding cakes sometimes called

Russian tea cakes (same thing) sometimes called 'Snowballs'.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

FastDogWalker2 — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 18:26:25 GMT

I had the exact same experience this year. I was careful to chill the dough and still zero success. I had to throw the dough out - total bummer!

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

chips — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 18:35:59 GMT

That happened to me with press cookies last year. They would not come out of the press. And then the metal broke. Did not attempt them this year.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

SharkE — Mon, 24 Dec 2018 19:42:55 GMT

Butter Cookies

INGREDIENTS

8 ounces unsalted butter, softened (2 sticks)
1 1⁄2cups confectioners' sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large egg
2 1⁄4cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1⁄4teaspoon salt
colored sanding sugar (red, green or color of choice)

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease 2 cookie sheets.
In a large bowl of an electric mixer at medium speed, mix butter, sugar and vanilla just until blended.
Add the egg and mix well.
In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, soda, cream of tartar, and salt. Add to the butter mixture and mix at low speed until well combined.
Shape the dough into 3/4-inch balls. Arrange the balls 2-inches apart on the cookie sheets. Flatten each ball with a fork as you would a peanut butter cookie. Do this one time. To prevent the fork from sticking to the cookie dough;, dip it occasionally in confectioners' sugar. Sprinkle tops of the cookies with colored sanding sugar.
Bake 8-10 minutes or until lightly colored around the edges. Let cookies cool on the cookie sheets for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

Toppers3 — Wed, 26 Dec 2018 01:54:28 GMT

@DiAnne wrote:
Could your butter have been too soft. Sometimes putting the cookie dough into the fridge for a while before baking helps.

My cookies have been too flat when my dough was too warm, and my pans were too warm too, when I didn't wait for them to cool down enough between bakings.

I also would use margarine instead of butter when baking, because that's what my Mom used to do, and then I learned that using butter is better when baking.

Re: Butter cookie fail today!

Drythe — Wed, 26 Dec 2018 02:11:36 GMT

@SharkE wrote:
did it call for 'softened butter' and you melted it in microwave?
Use the correct amount of flour ?
If it said 'refrigerate dough' and didn't

I have to make sure I refrigerate Mexican wedding cakes sometimes called
Russian tea cakes (same thing) sometimes called 'Snowballs'.

@SharkE

When you have time would you please share MEXICAN WEDDING CAKE Recipe?

@shy bobcat I had the same fail with Mandel Bread last week. 😞