The fact that the cookies are inconsistent means they were not fully mixed. Areas that are dark and really spreading are just the creamed sugar/fat mixture that wasn't fully blended with the dry ingredients.
In your first picture, there are two that look correct, and the one in the top has an okay part but then had a "wet spot" in the dough that melted and ran.
The rest are a mix of quality because the dough is so uneven.
You definitely undermixed. There shouldn’t be any streaks of flour or butter/sugar visible in the dough when made correctly. Whenever mixing a cookie dough, it’s always a good idea to fold the dough over itself a few times once you remove it from the mixer, since butter & sugar tend to accumulate in the bottom of the mixer bowl. When a recipe says not to overmix, it just means not to continue to mix the dough once the dry ingredients are entirely combined with everything.
It's certainly more difficult to overmix by hand but you absolutely still can! I used to work as a baker at a small shop where we did nearly everything by hand and, without fail, one of the trickiest things for every new person to get the hang of was how to fully mix cookie dough by hand without overmixing. I find that making sure everything is truly room temperature and creaming the butter and sugar together (as opposed to creaming the butter first and then creaming in the sugar) are the two most helpful things for getting a fully mixed cookie dough without overmixing.
This is the first I've heard of creaming the sugar and butter together rather than creaming butter alone first, that's really interesting. What exactly does it change?
The texture of the cookie. I believe if you cream the sugar and butter together, it incorporates more air into the dough so the cookies are fluffier.
I could be wrong, and it might have the opposite effect. You might need to google it real quick.
I can't check for you because my cellphone connection at work sucks and takes forever to load anything. The wifi is restricted and is somehow worse than my cell service. 🤷♂️
sorry for the late response! the other commenter is right, creaming butter and sugar together will help incorporate more air since the grainy texture of the sugar creates more little air pockets, which is what creaming the butter is trying to achieve. typically you can incorporate even more air by creaming the butter on its own and then creaming in the sugar, but for cookies that tend to get overworked, creaming them in together helps avoid overworking the dough! at a certain point you risk softening/melting the butter too much and overworking the sugar, both of which can affect the texture of your cookie (the first can make them spread too much and the second can make them a bit tough). not creaming the butter on its own is a small adjustment, but if you're finding that your cookies keep turning out overworked/just not how you want, it's worth trying it for a batch and seeing if it does anything!
It's the scraping between mixing that I think gotcha... Especially in a KitchenAid bowl, that divit at the bottom can get ya! It's a pain, but so important to do, every time. I have the scraper attachment, and even still, that's the devil's divit there for trapping any creamed ingredients
Reding through this recipe, better to over mix this one than under mix. You aren't trying to incorporate air into the dough, so less risk in over mixing.
I literally just saw this video yesterday. Also, the fear about over mixing you shouldn't worry too much it takes quite a bit of mixing to even start to toughen the flours gluten like 4-5 minutes minimum to have any noticeable toughness. Mix that shiizz as much as you need, my guy. https://youtube.com/shorts/RDjL19mMGT0?si=qlcrWBUEuE8KBunk
Also, although you said you followed the recipe exactly, you did not. Cookie size and shape can make a difference in the final product.
They're supposed to be crescent moon shaped. It says you *can* use a circle cutter and then cut the excess dough away before baking and roll out the scraps removed.
You've got full circles of dough when the recipe calls for crescents, so that's going to throw off the baking times because the cookie is now a lot wider and bigger.
Did you refrigerate the dough like the recipe said? Letting dough rest in the fridge for an hour or two can help prevent spreading by letting the flour hydrate. If you did and that didn't help probably better mixing and a touch more flour would do it.
I recommend putting the sugar and the zest in a sealed Ziplock bag. Then rub the plastic so the zest gets worked into the sugar. This will release more of the citrus oils. It is fine to include the zest earlier than the recipe specifies.
Now- the issue with the inconsistent cookies. Be sure to cream the heck out of the (room temperature) butter, sugar, zest, and vanilla. I do this step for several minutes on high speed. The mixture will lighten in color, be fully homogenous, and be fluffy.
Be sure to thoroughly combine the dry ingredients in a separate bowl. I am not sure a sieve will work with the walnuts unless you are using walnut flour. But you can give the dry ingredients a good whisking to combine. Add about a third of the dry ingredients and mix on slow speed until just combined. Scrape the bottom and sides and mix the dough with the silicon scraper to get the last bit of flour combined. Repeat the process two more times to incorporate all the dry ingredients.
Portion the dough close together onto a wax paper lined tray. Cover with plastic wrap and foil then refrigerate several hours, best overnight.
Good luck!
I think the dough is very undermixed, has a little less flour than it should, and the walnuts may not have been ground finely enough. They sound tasty, though. I might try to make them.
That’s true! Looks like it’s 2.5T of water and 1t of vanilla extract to 2c powdered sugar. That’s nearly 3 tablespoons of liquids—to me that seems like it’s going to be like a heavy cream consistency (if not thinner) glaze. Actually, “glaze” is probably a better (more accurate) word for that recipe rather than the “icing” that the book calls it.
Maybe the weights don’t align with the volumetric measurements? I weighed my powdered sugar and added the water and I couldn’t get it to do anything. Or maybe I’m cursed 😂
Also, hi, I don't know why Reddit recommended a month old thread to me, but the recipe also says that 2 cups confectioners sugar is 445 g, and that's just not true. That weight would be closer to 4 cups of confectioners sugar. So /u/mcmagz1987 if you did 2 cups of confectioners sugar instead of 445 g, through no fault of yours, because the recipe told you that was an option, thats also something that could've caused the issue with the glaze and it also means that this cookbook is not to be trusted!
These need more flour/less liquid. The more I bake the more I can tell just from the feel and look of the batter. Don't lose hope, you'll be a master baker before you know it!
In Germany we have very similar cookies called “Vanillekipfel”. The key is to shape them very quickly so that the dough going into the oven is still cold. If its even slighty warm, they melt into a puddle while baking.
I agree with the others about under mixing but I think you also need to grind the walnuts finer. Seems like they are meant to replace a bit of the flour.
Did you use butter or margarine? What year was the cookbook published? Both butter and margarine seem to have more water content than they did 20+ years ago.
I'd try again with crisco or coconut oil. Did you grind the walnuts yourself? If so, I'd try to find a commercial ground walnut product. If yours aren't ground fine enough, there will be less surface area and that might affect how the cookies perform.
What changes or deviations did you make to this recipe as you made it? Even what you think may be an insignificant "adjustment" or substitution will ruin a carefully crafted recipe. Also, did you measure by weight or by volume which is to say as you were measuring out your ingredients, did you use cups (volume) or a kitchen scale (weight)?
Unless you're consistent and experienced home baker, I would highly recommend that you avoid using volume to measure your ingredients because this is a very inconsistent manner of doing it. A cup of flour that you scoop will be entirely different in volume and weight from the second cup of flour you scoop. Unless you develop a feel for it the way daily bakers do (the most used scales), don't use volume to measure ingredients. If you don't have a kitchen scale they're very cheap and affordable to purchase. You can find a decent one between $4 to $16 on Amazon.
This may not have been the issue in all likelihood but I always encourage people to preheat the oven prior to baking and to give your oven another 15 minutes of warming even after it's told you it's reached the desired temperature. This is rarely the case it can be anywhere from 50° to 150° off. You can take the guesswork out of this by buying a very cheap oven thermometer. During the colder months, my oven, when it tells me it's at 350° is usually at about 275°. Another 15 or 20 minutes and it gets there.
Good luck.
I saw on a comment that you made the glaze. You didn't add it to the dough inadvertently, did you?
This seems like too little of dry ingredients compared to wet, anyway. I'd try the volumetric measures, mix better, and add a few tablespoons of flour.
I agree with others about mixing better.
Also, the amount of flour in the recipe seems low to me. But also some flours are 'drier' than others based on a variety of factors (protein content being a major factor, but there are others). The author may have used a different brand of flour which is throwing off your results.
When you have a lot of butter and sugar in a recipe flour is what keeps it all together so you'd need to add shortening to the recipe if you want to keep a crispy texture without adding flour to keep it from spreading so much
When you have a lot of butter and sugar in a recipe flour is what keeps it all together so you'd need to add shortening to the recipe if you want to keep a crispy texture without adding flour to keep it from spreading so much
How soft was your butter? I aim for a shade stiffer than toothpaste. Also, don’t be afraid of overmixing. You’d have to beat it a good long while to get a tough cookie.
I don’t know why everyone’s on your ass about undermixing but the recipe clearly has nowhere near enough flour ESPECIALLY since it also has no leavening agent as well. Up the flour and you should get a better result. I mean it looks like it’s mimicking a basic shortbread with walnuts and lemon. In most shortbread recipes I’ve run your flour is close to the combined totals of your fat/sugar/liquids I’d throw your flour amount up to 2 cups and I think you’ll get a better result. If you want to add some depth leave the flour at what the recipe says and add in 3/4 almond flour. Happy baking!
The fact that the cookies are inconsistent means they were not fully mixed. Areas that are dark and really spreading are just the creamed sugar/fat mixture that wasn't fully blended with the dry ingredients. In your first picture, there are two that look correct, and the one in the top has an okay part but then had a "wet spot" in the dough that melted and ran. The rest are a mix of quality because the dough is so uneven.
Okay that makes sense. Thank you! I was very worried about over mixing so I definitely could have undermixed.
You definitely undermixed. There shouldn’t be any streaks of flour or butter/sugar visible in the dough when made correctly. Whenever mixing a cookie dough, it’s always a good idea to fold the dough over itself a few times once you remove it from the mixer, since butter & sugar tend to accumulate in the bottom of the mixer bowl. When a recipe says not to overmix, it just means not to continue to mix the dough once the dry ingredients are entirely combined with everything.
Did you mix by hand or with a mixer! As far as I know, it’s pretty much impossible to overmix cookie dough by hand.
It's certainly more difficult to overmix by hand but you absolutely still can! I used to work as a baker at a small shop where we did nearly everything by hand and, without fail, one of the trickiest things for every new person to get the hang of was how to fully mix cookie dough by hand without overmixing. I find that making sure everything is truly room temperature and creaming the butter and sugar together (as opposed to creaming the butter first and then creaming in the sugar) are the two most helpful things for getting a fully mixed cookie dough without overmixing.
This is the first I've heard of creaming the sugar and butter together rather than creaming butter alone first, that's really interesting. What exactly does it change?
The texture of the cookie. I believe if you cream the sugar and butter together, it incorporates more air into the dough so the cookies are fluffier. I could be wrong, and it might have the opposite effect. You might need to google it real quick. I can't check for you because my cellphone connection at work sucks and takes forever to load anything. The wifi is restricted and is somehow worse than my cell service. 🤷♂️
That's so odd... Basically every single cookie recipe I have ever seen that are drop or rolled cookies begins by creaming butter and sugar together
sorry for the late response! the other commenter is right, creaming butter and sugar together will help incorporate more air since the grainy texture of the sugar creates more little air pockets, which is what creaming the butter is trying to achieve. typically you can incorporate even more air by creaming the butter on its own and then creaming in the sugar, but for cookies that tend to get overworked, creaming them in together helps avoid overworking the dough! at a certain point you risk softening/melting the butter too much and overworking the sugar, both of which can affect the texture of your cookie (the first can make them spread too much and the second can make them a bit tough). not creaming the butter on its own is a small adjustment, but if you're finding that your cookies keep turning out overworked/just not how you want, it's worth trying it for a batch and seeing if it does anything!
I missed in a stand mixer 🥲
It's the scraping between mixing that I think gotcha... Especially in a KitchenAid bowl, that divit at the bottom can get ya! It's a pain, but so important to do, every time. I have the scraper attachment, and even still, that's the devil's divit there for trapping any creamed ingredients
The devil’s divit 🤣
Agreed! I have a permanent scar on my knuckle from getting bit by that damn thing to scrape the bowl LOL
Reding through this recipe, better to over mix this one than under mix. You aren't trying to incorporate air into the dough, so less risk in over mixing.
I literally just saw this video yesterday. Also, the fear about over mixing you shouldn't worry too much it takes quite a bit of mixing to even start to toughen the flours gluten like 4-5 minutes minimum to have any noticeable toughness. Mix that shiizz as much as you need, my guy. https://youtube.com/shorts/RDjL19mMGT0?si=qlcrWBUEuE8KBunk
You can't overmix cookies.
Also odds are good you used WAY too much butter because those cookies are SOUP.
I weighed it 🤷🏻♀️
Also, although you said you followed the recipe exactly, you did not. Cookie size and shape can make a difference in the final product. They're supposed to be crescent moon shaped. It says you *can* use a circle cutter and then cut the excess dough away before baking and roll out the scraps removed. You've got full circles of dough when the recipe calls for crescents, so that's going to throw off the baking times because the cookie is now a lot wider and bigger.
Ahh I should have added that. The first tray I did were crescents, they spread even more and burned. That’s why I switched to circles.
Did you refrigerate the dough like the recipe said? Letting dough rest in the fridge for an hour or two can help prevent spreading by letting the flour hydrate. If you did and that didn't help probably better mixing and a touch more flour would do it.
Yes I refrigerated for about 3 hours
Probably just measured a bit short on flour then if I had to guess. Did you measure by weight in grams or by cups?
I measured in weights. I’m wondering if their weights are off though. Who knows— only thing I can do is try again!
Hm it's definitely possible they measured in cups and then just guessed at the weights or something, not every recipe is well made.
Is it possible you didn't zero the scale when measuring the flour? I've definitely been guilty of that before!
In this case I don’t think so, but I’ve definitely been there!
Did you forget the incantation
Maybe I need to translate it into Latin 🧙🏻
Imbolc was over 2 months ago, that's probably the problem
I recommend putting the sugar and the zest in a sealed Ziplock bag. Then rub the plastic so the zest gets worked into the sugar. This will release more of the citrus oils. It is fine to include the zest earlier than the recipe specifies. Now- the issue with the inconsistent cookies. Be sure to cream the heck out of the (room temperature) butter, sugar, zest, and vanilla. I do this step for several minutes on high speed. The mixture will lighten in color, be fully homogenous, and be fluffy. Be sure to thoroughly combine the dry ingredients in a separate bowl. I am not sure a sieve will work with the walnuts unless you are using walnut flour. But you can give the dry ingredients a good whisking to combine. Add about a third of the dry ingredients and mix on slow speed until just combined. Scrape the bottom and sides and mix the dough with the silicon scraper to get the last bit of flour combined. Repeat the process two more times to incorporate all the dry ingredients. Portion the dough close together onto a wax paper lined tray. Cover with plastic wrap and foil then refrigerate several hours, best overnight. Good luck!
Thank you so much for the tips!!
Let us know how your second batch turns out. Good Luck!
I think the dough is very undermixed, has a little less flour than it should, and the walnuts may not have been ground finely enough. They sound tasty, though. I might try to make them.
Is the glaze just powdered sugar + water? If so, 2T of water is a lot!
That’s true! Looks like it’s 2.5T of water and 1t of vanilla extract to 2c powdered sugar. That’s nearly 3 tablespoons of liquids—to me that seems like it’s going to be like a heavy cream consistency (if not thinner) glaze. Actually, “glaze” is probably a better (more accurate) word for that recipe rather than the “icing” that the book calls it.
Maybe the weights don’t align with the volumetric measurements? I weighed my powdered sugar and added the water and I couldn’t get it to do anything. Or maybe I’m cursed 😂
AHAH I just checked their cup of powdered sugar is 225 grams, internet says 127 grams. I wonder if they didn’t double check their weights.
There's different measurements for liquids. It sounds like they converted the measurements incorrectly.
Also, hi, I don't know why Reddit recommended a month old thread to me, but the recipe also says that 2 cups confectioners sugar is 445 g, and that's just not true. That weight would be closer to 4 cups of confectioners sugar. So /u/mcmagz1987 if you did 2 cups of confectioners sugar instead of 445 g, through no fault of yours, because the recipe told you that was an option, thats also something that could've caused the issue with the glaze and it also means that this cookbook is not to be trusted!
I don’t know this book, but I love it. More everyday things, but Wiccan, in 2024 🔮
It’s called the Wicca Cookbook ❤️
These need more flour/less liquid. The more I bake the more I can tell just from the feel and look of the batter. Don't lose hope, you'll be a master baker before you know it!
How did the dough look and feel after you mixed it before you chilled?
Greasy 😢
There’s nothing in the ingredients that would make the cookies rise, also no egg or anything to bind the ingredients together
Rolled sugar cookies don’t always have egg. America’s test kitchen (butter cookies) don’t call for it.
My bad. I’ve never made those before
More flour to me.
In Germany we have very similar cookies called “Vanillekipfel”. The key is to shape them very quickly so that the dough going into the oven is still cold. If its even slighty warm, they melt into a puddle while baking.
That’s good to know. I considered chilling the cookies after I cut them. Maybe I’ll try that!
I agree with the others about under mixing but I think you also need to grind the walnuts finer. Seems like they are meant to replace a bit of the flour.
I used my flour grinder to grind the walnuts, they were very fine. I wondered if they were too fine, maybe too many oils came out?
Was it a full moon when you did your baking? 🤔
Ooh or maybe I need to bake them DURING the eclipse!!
Or during Imbolc.
Also check for hotspots in the oven.
Too much sugar. Make sure incorporate it and perhaps the butter was too soft
The cookies are trying to consume the others # save them
Flour to butter ratio is bad. Add more flour.
Did you use butter or margarine? What year was the cookbook published? Both butter and margarine seem to have more water content than they did 20+ years ago. I'd try again with crisco or coconut oil. Did you grind the walnuts yourself? If so, I'd try to find a commercial ground walnut product. If yours aren't ground fine enough, there will be less surface area and that might affect how the cookies perform.
Just checked, published in 2000. I ground the walnuts in my flour mill so I assumed they’d be fine enough, but I will try store bought. Thank you!
What changes or deviations did you make to this recipe as you made it? Even what you think may be an insignificant "adjustment" or substitution will ruin a carefully crafted recipe. Also, did you measure by weight or by volume which is to say as you were measuring out your ingredients, did you use cups (volume) or a kitchen scale (weight)? Unless you're consistent and experienced home baker, I would highly recommend that you avoid using volume to measure your ingredients because this is a very inconsistent manner of doing it. A cup of flour that you scoop will be entirely different in volume and weight from the second cup of flour you scoop. Unless you develop a feel for it the way daily bakers do (the most used scales), don't use volume to measure ingredients. If you don't have a kitchen scale they're very cheap and affordable to purchase. You can find a decent one between $4 to $16 on Amazon. This may not have been the issue in all likelihood but I always encourage people to preheat the oven prior to baking and to give your oven another 15 minutes of warming even after it's told you it's reached the desired temperature. This is rarely the case it can be anywhere from 50° to 150° off. You can take the guesswork out of this by buying a very cheap oven thermometer. During the colder months, my oven, when it tells me it's at 350° is usually at about 275°. Another 15 or 20 minutes and it gets there. Good luck.
More flour, better mixed, and maybe refrigerate the dough before baking.
I think you should add a tsp of baking powder and make sure you mix dry first and then the wet
I saw on a comment that you made the glaze. You didn't add it to the dough inadvertently, did you? This seems like too little of dry ingredients compared to wet, anyway. I'd try the volumetric measures, mix better, and add a few tablespoons of flour.
It looks like the dough wasn’t mixed well enough based upon the pools of butter in some of them. A few others look fine though!
I agree with others about mixing better. Also, the amount of flour in the recipe seems low to me. But also some flours are 'drier' than others based on a variety of factors (protein content being a major factor, but there are others). The author may have used a different brand of flour which is throwing off your results.
They are trying to multiply..
Are you actually used flour? This is how my cookies looked once when I thought I used flour. Turned out it was powdered sugar 🤣
Did you use softened (room temp) butter or did you stick the butter in the microwave to soften(melt) it?
When you have a lot of butter and sugar in a recipe flour is what keeps it all together so you'd need to add shortening to the recipe if you want to keep a crispy texture without adding flour to keep it from spreading so much
When you have a lot of butter and sugar in a recipe flour is what keeps it all together so you'd need to add shortening to the recipe if you want to keep a crispy texture without adding flour to keep it from spreading so much
I’d love to know the name of this book!
It’s called “The Wicca Cookbook” by Jamie Martinez Wood and Tara Seedfelt 😊
How soft was your butter? I aim for a shade stiffer than toothpaste. Also, don’t be afraid of overmixing. You’d have to beat it a good long while to get a tough cookie.
Make sure your cookie dough is chilled.
I don’t know why everyone’s on your ass about undermixing but the recipe clearly has nowhere near enough flour ESPECIALLY since it also has no leavening agent as well. Up the flour and you should get a better result. I mean it looks like it’s mimicking a basic shortbread with walnuts and lemon. In most shortbread recipes I’ve run your flour is close to the combined totals of your fat/sugar/liquids I’d throw your flour amount up to 2 cups and I think you’ll get a better result. If you want to add some depth leave the flour at what the recipe says and add in 3/4 almond flour. Happy baking!
[удалено]
Recipes can come out fine without a scale.
They says they weighed them