Bake until the cookies are golden but still soft in the center, 12 to 15 minutes, rotating the baking sheets halfway through. Let the cookies cool for a few minutes on the baking sheets, then transfer them to a rack to cool completely.
How Long to Bake Cookie Dough
| Type of Cookie | Type of Baking Pan | Baking Times |
|---|---|---|
| Drop cookies | baking sheet | 8 – 10 minutes |
| Bar Cookies | 13 x 9 x 2-inch pan | 25 – 30 minutes |
| Bar Cookies | 15 x 10 x 1-inch pan | 20 – 25 minutes |
| Tart Shell or Cheesecake Crust | 9-inch tart or springform pan | 20 – 25 minutes |
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.)
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.
After baking, cool cookies 2 minutes on baking sheet, remove to cool completely.
- For a rounder cookie, slightly round dough corners before placing on baking sheet.
- High Altitude: Bake at 350°F 12-13 minutes.
- Dough may be frozen for up to 2 months if frozen before “use by” date on the package.
However, it may look a bit puffy or soft in the center, too. This is normal and simply means that the cookie may continue baking on the sheet and rack once removed from the oven. Taking cookies out of the oven at this stage will make them softer and chewier. Whereas, overcooking can create brittleness.
Do cookies harden as they cool? Yes, but how hard they become depends on where you cool your cookie. For example, a cookie that’s left on the baking pan will remain chewy, while those moved within minutes onto a cooling rack will be on the crispier side.
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.
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.
Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.
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.
To ensure a chewy texture, take cookies out of the oven when they are still slightly underdone, which often means they will droop over the end of a spatula. Crevices should appear moist and edges on smooth cookies should be lightly browned.
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.
Cookie Dough Baking Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325 – 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Cover your baking sheet with a piece of parchment paper.
- Drop cookies on the baking sheet.
- Gently tap the cookie down to get a good spread and circular shape.
- Allow 2” between each cookie in order to avoid them spreading into each other.
Why You Need to Chill Your Cookie Dough. For starters, chilling prevents cookies from spreading out too quickly once they’re in the oven. If you use a higher fat butter (like Kerrygold), chilling your dough is absolutely essential. Popping your dough in the fridge allows the fats to cool.
If they are something like a butter cookie, make sure you are baking at a low temperature – 200 – 250 degrees F – so that the cookies bake through but do not colour or are just golden.
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.
Which is the superior cookie, chewy or crunchy? Turns out, America has a definitive answer! According to National Today, 35 percent of you like crunchy cookies, but a whopping 65 percent of you LOVE your cookies chewy! (And honestly, is there anything better than breaking into a little ball of soft, gooey goodness?
Why Do Cookies Get Hard? Like all baked treats, cookies are subject to getting stale. Over time, the moisture in the cookies evaporates, leaving them stiff and crumbly. It’s the same thing that happens to breads, muffins, and other baked goods.
When it doesn’t have enough time to set, your just-made decorations are prone to nicks and smudges. Follow this tip: Leave the cookies undisturbed for at least 24 hours to fully dry. Depending on the thickness of your icing and the layers on the cookie, it may take longer.
After about 10 minutes, the cookies should be golden brown around the edges but still soft in the centers. The cookies will continue to cook a bit on the hot cookie sheet if you leave them there for one or two minutes before transfering them to a cooling rack.
So, let your cookies cool just until they hold their shape (generally after about 5 minutes on a cookie cooling rack) and savor them warm while you can. Here’s how to store the rest. So next time you’re wondering, “Do I need a cooling rack to cool cookies” the short answer is … it’s better to have one than not.
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.
Mistake: When cookies turn out flat, the bad guy is often butter that is too soft or even melted. This makes cookies spread. The other culprit is too little flour—don’t hold back and make sure you master measuring. Finally, cookies will also flatten if placed and baked on hot cookie sheets.
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.
“When you bake at a lower temperature, you will get that perfect cookie with a soft center and crisp exterior,” she adds. Just make sure you increase baking time by a couple of minutes or you will end up with gooey underbaked cookies.
What’s in a Chewy Cookie? Well, the long and short answer to chewy cookies is it’s all about the moisture content. Cookies that are dense and chewy incorporate more moisture into the batter. This can be achieved by making substitutions with ingredients, or even just changing the way you incorporate certain ingredients.
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.
The pans are too close to each other or the oven walls. We recommend allowing 1 to 1 1/2 inches between pans and oven walls. The cookie sheet may be too large for the oven and not allowing sufficient heat circulation. The heat is trapped under the pan and the cookies will burn on the bottom before the tops are brown.
Preheat oven 10 to 15 minutes before baking the first sheet or pan of cookies. Check oven temperature with an oven thermometer.
If you substitute bread flour, which is made from a different strain of wheat and is higher in protein, your cookies will be too hard. If you use cake or pastry flour, which are softer, your cookies will be fragile and crumbly.
One of the most common problems that people have with their cookie dough is that it ends up being too sticky. Typical cookie dough should not be that sticky, although sometimes it can be slightly sticky depending on the work environment you are in.
The dough should be soft enough to allow you to poke an indentation with your finger, but the indentation shouldn’t stay. If using 100% butter, start with CHILLED butter right from the refrigerator versus room temperature butter. Cut butter into 1-inch cubes and chill again before using in your recipe.
The ideal thickness to roll out your sugar cookie dough is about 1/4″–that way, they’ll be tough enough to be handled and decorated, but thin enough to stay a little crunchy.
Also note that at temperatures between 160 and 170 degrees in the car, the cookies may bake, but that eggs, which can contain salmonella, won’t cook thoroughly. Consuming raw eggs can be unhealthy – so unless you want to risk a gastrointestinal event, trash any undercooked dough.
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.
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.
But that’s not a safe thing to do. Raw cookie dough contains uncooked flour and eggs. These have the potential to cause food poisoning and bacterial infections like salmonella.
Q: Why are my cookies so puffy and cakey? Whipping too much air into the dough. That fluffy texture you want in a cake results from beating a lot of air into the room temperature butter and sugar, and it does the same for cookies. So don’t overdo it when you’re creaming together the butter and sugar.
While brown sugar keeps your cookies moist and soft, white sugar and corn syrup will help your cookies spread and crisp in the oven. Using more white sugar in your cookies will result in a crispier end product. To achieve a crispy cookie, skip the rest in the fridge.
To make cookies thinner and crispier, you will usually want to aim for more granulated sugar and butter. For softer, chewier cookies, you will want to add much less granulated sugar, slightly more brown sugar, and a fair bit less butter. For cakey cookies, you will often be including even less butter and sugar.
Information. Bakery or homemade cookies can be stored at room temperature two to three weeks or two months in the refrigerator. Cookies retain their quality when stored in the freezer for eight to 12 months.
(Exactly) How to Make Cookies Moist: 9 Easy Ways
- Add Cream Cheese to the Dough. What is this?
- Use Instant Pudding Mix in the Dough.
- Use Brown Sugar instead of White Sugar.
- Underbake the Cookies Slightly.
- Add Sour Cream.
- Add Corn Syrup.
- Store on Sheets of Wax Paper with a Slice of Bread.
- Use Shortening.
Let cookies cool on the pan for several minutes after baking before transferring to cooling rack. How to make cookies crispier: For crisp, crunchy cookies, use all butter and a proportion of white sugar. Use egg yolks in place of a whole egg. Cookies should be baked completely.
Cookies are too greasy
This is probably because the butter was too warm. If you find the cookies are greasy you should chill the dough prior to baking.
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.
Follow our simple tips and techniques and you’ll turn out perfect cookies every time.
- Bake Better Cookies.
- Soften Your Butter.
- Creaming Butter.
- Measure Your Flour Correctly.
- Line Your Pans With Parchment Paper.
- Add Eggs One at a Time.
- Add Flour or Dry Ingredients in Batches.
- Fold in Chocolate Chips by Hand.
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.)
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.
Baked cookies should not be refrigerated.
Baking cookies quickly in a hot oven – at 375 degrees F as opposed to a lower temperature – will make for soft results. They’ll bake fast instead of sitting and drying out in the oven’s hot air. Ever so slightly underbaking your cookies will give you softer results than cooking them the full amount the recipe says.