All-Butter Snickerdoodles
By Cecelia JenkinsPublished on October 28, 2020
Time
1¼ hours
Yield
Makes 24 cookies
Ingredients
Before You Begin
When browning the butter in step 3, avoid using a nonstick skillet; the dark color of the skillet’s nonstick coating makes it difficult to gauge when the butter has correctly browned. The cream cheese doesn’t have to be at room temperature for this recipe; pouring the hot butter over it in step 4 will soften it enough to make it easy to mix. The final dough will be slightly softer than most cookie doughs. Trust the times in the recipe and don’t overbake the cookies. They may seem underbaked when you pull them from the oven, but they will deflate and set as they cool.
Instructions
- Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 rimless baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Whisk flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt together in bowl; set aside. Place 1½ cups sugar and cream cheese in large heatproof bowl.
- Melt butter in 8-inch skillet over medium heat. Cook, swirling skillet constantly, until milk solids in butter are color of milk chocolate and have toasty aroma, 3 to 5 minutes.
- Immediately remove skillet from heat and scrape browned butter into bowl with sugar and cream cheese. Stir and mash with rubber spatula until combined. Whisk in oil. Whisk in egg and vanilla until smooth. Stir in flour mixture with rubber spatula until soft, homogeneous dough forms.
- Mix cinnamon and remaining ⅓ cup sugar together in shallow dish. Divide dough into 24 equal pieces, about 2 tablespoons each. Using your hands, roll dough into balls. Working in batches, roll balls in cinnamon sugar to coat, then evenly space balls on prepared sheets, 12 balls per sheet. Using bottom of drinking glass, flatten balls into 2-inch-wide disks, about ½ inch thick.
- Bake cookies, 1 sheet at a time, until puffed and covered with small cracks (cookies will look raw between cracks and seem underdone; they will deflate and set as they cool), 11 to 13 minutes, rotating sheet halfway through baking.
- Let cookies cool on sheet for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack and let cool completely. Serve. (Cookies can be stored in airtight container for up to 3 days.)
- Follow recipe through step 5, then place dough disks on parchment paper–lined plate and freeze until very firm, at least 1 hour. Transfer disks to 1-gallon zipper-lock bag and freeze for up to 1 month. Increase baking time to about 15 minutes.
to make ahead
Time
1¼ hoursYield
Makes 24 cookiesIngredients
Ingredients
Ingredients
Why This Recipe Works
We wanted snickerdoodles with their trademark subtly tangy flavor and crinkly tops, and we wanted a recipe streamlined enough for a busy holiday season. We knew that the traditional ingredient, shortening, plus the creaming step in a stand mixer had to go. We turned to better-tasting butter and melted it so that we could make the cookie dough by hand. To achieve the crinkled effect, we relied on baking soda to react with the moisture and acidic ingredients in the dough and create enough carbon dioxide gas to cause the cookies to rise in the oven and then collapse into that winning look. Cream of tartar (an acidic powdered by-product of wine making) traditionally gives these cookies their tanginess, but since using too much can leave behind a harsh tartness, we found that just 1 teaspoon, in combination with a bit of cream cheese (which also added richness), gave the cookies the right tangy backbone. To make the cookies supremely buttery, we kept the melted butter on the heat until the water in the butter evaporated and the milk solids caramelized; the nutty flavor complemented the cookies’ sweetness and tang. Finally, adding just a bit of oil to the cookie dough yielded cookies with satisfyingly chewy centers but crispy, crunchy edges for irresistible textural contrast.
Before You Begin
When browning the butter in step 3, avoid using a nonstick skillet; the dark color of the skillet’s nonstick coating makes it difficult to gauge when the butter has correctly browned. The cream cheese doesn’t have to be at room temperature for this recipe; pouring the hot butter over it in step 4 will soften it enough to make it easy to mix. The final dough will be slightly softer than most cookie doughs. Trust the times in the recipe and don’t overbake the cookies. They may seem underbaked when you pull them from the oven, but they will deflate and set as they cool.
Instructions
- Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 rimless baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Whisk flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt together in bowl; set aside. Place 1½ cups sugar and cream cheese in large heatproof bowl.
- Melt butter in 8-inch skillet over medium heat. Cook, swirling skillet constantly, until milk solids in butter are color of milk chocolate and have toasty aroma, 3 to 5 minutes.
- Immediately remove skillet from heat and scrape browned butter into bowl with sugar and cream cheese. Stir and mash with rubber spatula until combined. Whisk in oil. Whisk in egg and vanilla until smooth. Stir in flour mixture with rubber spatula until soft, homogeneous dough forms.
- Mix cinnamon and remaining ⅓ cup sugar together in shallow dish. Divide dough into 24 equal pieces, about 2 tablespoons each. Using your hands, roll dough into balls. Working in batches, roll balls in cinnamon sugar to coat, then evenly space balls on prepared sheets, 12 balls per sheet. Using bottom of drinking glass, flatten balls into 2-inch-wide disks, about ½ inch thick.
- Bake cookies, 1 sheet at a time, until puffed and covered with small cracks (cookies will look raw between cracks and seem underdone; they will deflate and set as they cool), 11 to 13 minutes, rotating sheet halfway through baking.
- Let cookies cool on sheet for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack and let cool completely. Serve. (Cookies can be stored in airtight container for up to 3 days.)
- Follow recipe through step 5, then place dough disks on parchment paper–lined plate and freeze until very firm, at least 1 hour. Transfer disks to 1-gallon zipper-lock bag and freeze for up to 1 month. Increase baking time to about 15 minutes.
to make ahead
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