Brown Sugar and Cinnamon Cookies Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What does adding more brown sugar do to cookies? ›

Brown sugar, meanwhile, is dense and compacts easily, creating fewer air pockets during creaming—that means that there's less opportunity to entrap gas, creating cookies that rise less and spread more. With less moisture escaping via steam, they also stay moist and chewy.

Using all light brown sugar will yield cookies with a lighter flavor (that's not a bad thing!). They'll be buttery with accents of vanilla and a soft interior, but a lighter molasses flavor. Opting for all dark brown sugar will give you a richer flavor and ever-so-slightly softer centers.

Soft cookies have a water concentration of 6% or higher – moisture being the variable in texture. To make cookies crispy, add less liquid or bake it in the oven for longer to dry out the dough.

Baking soda is typically used for chewy cookies, while baking powder is generally used for light and airy cookies. Since baking powder is comprised of a number of ingredients (baking soda, cream of tartar, cornstarch, etc.), using it instead of pure baking soda will affect the taste of your cookies.

Using dark brown sugar when a recipe calls for light will give your final product a more robust taste and a darker color, and it might slightly affect the texture.

The primary purpose of vanilla extract is to add flavour to baked goods. Lacking it, baked goods tend to have a bland and boring taste. Vanilla extract can also contribute moisture to create a soft and fluffy texture.

Baking recipes typically call for unsalted butter because the amount of salt in salted butter varies depending on the brand – there is no “industry standard.” For example, if you use one brand of salted butter in a recipe, and we use another, our baked goods could end up tasting very different from one other.

All-purpose flour is the most commonly used flour in cookie recipes due to its moderate protein content (usually around 10-12%). This balanced protein level makes it versatile enough to produce both soft and chewy cookies as well as slightly crisp ones.

“The result is added tenderness with more structure.” You don't need much of the ingredient to notice significant changes in your favorite recipe. Add a teaspoon or two to your dry ingredient mix and it will drastically change the texture. It's also fun to experiment until you get the exact finish you desire.

So in baking they act the same way in the dough, but the taste and colour will be slightly different. You can substitute dark brown sugar for the light brown sugar in the cookie recipe, however the cookies will be slightly darker in colour and will have a slightly more caramelly/toffee taste to them.

What is the most preferred sugar used in cookies? ›

Granulated sugar: Derived from either sugarcane or sugar beets, this is the most commonly used sugar in baking, and for good reason. It's neutral in flavor and has medium-sized, uniform crystals that are small enough to dissolve into batters and large enough to create air pockets when creamed with butter.

Cornstarch helps product soft and thick cookies. Using more brown sugar than white sugar results in a moister, softer cookie. An extra egg yolk increases chewiness. Rolling the cookie dough balls to be tall and lumpy instead of wide and smooth gives the cookies a bakery-style textured thickness.

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.

By adding extra sugar, you can bake the cookies to a slightly higher temperature without over-baking, which will allow for a crispier final cookie as well as deeper flavor development.

Slightly underbaking cookies with brown sugar in them makes them softer as well. Just make sure to store brown sugar in an airtight environment so it doesn't dry out. Flour plays its part by contributing protein. The lower the protein, the softer your cookies will be.

Room temperature butter is just the right consistency to incorporate air when it's creamed with sugar. These trapped air pockets result in risen, fluffy cookies. If the butter is any warmer, it won't incorporate enough air and your cookies will have less rise.

Cornstarch helps product soft and thick cookies. Using more brown sugar than white sugar results in a moister, softer cookie. An extra egg yolk increases chewiness. Rolling the cookie dough balls to be tall and lumpy instead of wide and smooth gives the cookies a bakery-style textured thickness.