Recipe sharing

[ukaserex]

If you're interested in why choices in the recipe for the fat and the ratio between white and brown sugar work to control the characteristics of the resulting cookie, I point you at the 'Good Eats' episode "Three Chips for Sister Marsha" (episode transcript and recipe links).

I stumbled across this video weeks ago. I always thought of this fellow Alton as a little quirky, but his pet muppet sure knows his cooking chemistry. I also took from it the notion of chilling the cookie dough. I did some experimentation to verify that it made a difference, and it does. It's subtle, but it does. I'm forgoing my purchase of that Kitchen Aid mixer for a while longer. I almost got one off Craig's list for cheap, but the seller flaked with a bogus number.

What I need is a recommendation for the best peanut butter to use for a peanut butter cookie. My palate isn't refined enough to taste the difference between most of the peanut butters. I generally make those decisions with my pocket book, but when making cookies, sometimes it pays to get a little better quality.

[Tacitala]

I did some experimentation to verify that it made a difference, and it does.

I know some of the shortbread cookies my mom used to make required refridgeration for an hour or they wouldn't turn out right.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to keep any of her old recipes.

I'm forgoing my purchase of that Kitchen Aid mixer for a while longer.

When you do get one, make sure it still has it's whisk and bread hook attachments.

What I need is a recommendation for the best peanut butter to use for a peanut butter cookie.

I seem to recall that some major brands add corn syrup now, which will change the consistency just slightly.  So read the label and look at some of the off/store brands (more expensive does not always equal better).  Using chunky vs. creamy will be up to you (I like the extra peanut chunks myself).  Honestly the biggest catch with peanut butter cookies is not burning them- they can go from brown to too brown (to black) pretty quickly.

[srmalloy]

Honestly the biggest catch with peanut butter cookies is not burning them- they can go from brown to too brown (to black) pretty quickly.

This is one of the problems many people have when baking cookies; when they start to brown around the edges, and they're still soft in the middle, they're done; if you wait for them to bake solid all the way to the middle, the outer edge will be overdone. The other big problem is cookie size consistency -- if you have four different sizes of cookie on a sheet, they'll take four different lengths of time to cook, and you won't get them all done properly; a disher like this one will give you a uniform size, so your cookies will cook uniformly.