A Pox Upon My Cookies! Help, They're Flat!
For many days over the course of a year, I baked perfect cookies. And then one day, I did not. And every day thereafter, I did not. What happened in between the days? I've done all I know how to figure it out. Last year, I posted a perfect little recipe for Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies that people seemed to love. I whipped those cookies up early and often. Then, a couple weeks ago, they started going flat on me. And, oddly, it was a slow process. First, just their edges cracked and were flat-ish, but they still had a relatively high and cakey middle. Then with the next batch, the edges started cracking and turning way too dark, despite my cooking on a Silpat sheet, which supposedly never burns cookies. So what the hay?! I turned to the internet, where there were many thousands of postings on the flat cookie problem. Answers from experts were exactly as I had predicted. Most likely a butter thing. Suggestions led me to believe the butter was melting and the dough running and spreading out flat before the cookies' edges had time to set. The dough needed to be properly chilled before baking. Nevermind the fact that I had never ever before needed to chill this dough before baking. I figured that was the problem now. So I made up some dough and chilled it. It was rock hard. I baked. They were flatter than EVER before. I lowered the temp of the oven since they also seemed to be burning on bottom now, even with a Silpat. Nevermind I had never lowered the temp before. Anyway, they still flattened. I basically ended up having to pull them out when they were so extremely raw that I couldn't scoop them out of the pan. It was the only way I could keep them from running completely flat and burning on bottom.
Do you know how many batches of dough I've made by this point? How many sticks of butter, cups of flour, etc., trying to figure this out. I have been determined to once again bake the cookies I had baked for a year before the curse set in. Each time, I try to "fix" something different. Next I ditched the Silpat, thinking maybe it had lost its, whatever, Silpatyness. I used parchment paper. What this accomplished was to show me just how much butter I was losing in the baking process. It was running very yellow all over the pan. WHY??!! OH WHY ME, YE WIZARDS OF COOKIE MAKING??!!
Back to the drawing board. What had I done differently? I had started rolling the dough into logs like you might find at the store so I could cut perfectly sized cookies every time. AHA! That must be the problem. I'm overworking the dough. I whipped up another batch and stopped touching it when the dough came together in the bowl. I scooped it with a spoon and never touched it with my hands. (Nevermind that I had rolled and cut the dough many times before without ending up with flat cookies. I ignored that in the name of this mad science.) THIS time it would work. Nope. Flat cookies. I beat the butter, sugar, egg and vanilla very very well together in the first step. Flat cookies. I didn't beat them so well together. Flat cookies. I let the butter get very soft. Flat cookies. I kept the butter very chilled. Flat cookies.
Why, in the name of all that is good about cookies, can't I bake them now? What has happened? A pox on my house? Listen, I was a person who softened the butter by putting in the microwave, rolling the dough into logs or not, leaving the dough out on the counter for an hour while I put people down for naps, etc., and my cookies always came out the same, cakey, wonderful, doughy cookies I intended. Until one day they did not, and now no matter what I do, the good cookies won't return. I am so truly baffled, I cannot do anything but beg an expert to tell me what to do. I promise you people, I have not changed anything, until I started changing everything in an effort to figure this out.
Is it my pans? My ovens? ARRRRRGGGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!
--Sweet B
copyrighted photo of flat cookie courtesy of The Repressed Pastry Chef at I Really Like Food dot com.
Xiaoding on February 28, 2010 at 04:50 PM
I don't do cookies, but...
Get some tube store cookie dough, bake it. Is it ok? Then the oven is good.
Get some King Arthur flour, is it ok? Then it's the flour.
WEIGH THE FLOUR.
I must disagree with the "things have changed" thing, my cakes come out fine. Every time. I use the same stuff everyone else does.
Are you sifting? Always sift, unless you want a heavier cake. Even box mixes rise more after sifting. Sometimes dramatically more. Sifting may shorten cooking time.
Americas Test Kitchen cookbook is excellent, try one of their recipes...with regular flour. With bottled water. With average butter. Is it ok? Then it must be something in your house.
Still problems? Have SOMEONE ELSE do it, in your kitchen. If they are ok, you know what that means.
kate on February 28, 2010 at 08:10 PM
I had that happen today - 2 different batches of the same cookie recipe. The first came out perfect. The second came out flat, undone in the center, too done on the edges. Same ingredients, proportions, methods, oven.
Kay on February 28, 2010 at 08:40 PM
Thank heavens I am not the only one! I have been my extended family's "super cookie baker" for the past 40 years. Family and friends stop by just to raid my cookie jar, particularly for chocolate chip cookies. Suddenly, this past year, my cookies went flat. I tried buying new baking powder, flour, etc. Nothing has worked! If anyone comes up with the answer to this problem, please publish it to the world! In the meantime, we have an empty cookie jar. Better to retire than to produce inferior products :)
Lee on February 28, 2010 at 08:44 PM
I had this problem, too. I tried new baking powder and new baking soda (both of which I use in my cookies), and it didn't help. Then I switched butter brands, and that is what did it for me. Now I only buy real butter (salted); and only a brand I trust (it happens to be from Trader Joe's, which is a great store, but is not national). That solved the problem for me.
By the way, some years ago, there was a great article (I think in the Wall Street Journal) about the radical differences even between different kinds of butter. Maybe you can find it on the Web.
You might also experiment with the eggs. As Michael Pollan explains in The Omnivore's Dilemma, what mostly goes into most industrial-food produced eggs is corn. But when chickens eat grass and more natural chicken-feed, it changes the quality and color of the egg yolks, and how the eggs react with the food they are baked in.
Great question; thanks for posting it!
Rose Bright on March 01, 2010 at 07:11 AM
I, too, was going to mention use extra flour and half shortening or margarine. It's also important to make sure you're using real cane sugar with baked goods (as opposed to beet sugar). How can you tell? Make sure somewhere on the bag it says "real cane sugar". Anything else is beet sugar (and usually cheaper, and "house" brands).
Andy on March 01, 2010 at 02:54 PM
Not much constructive to add. Two notes:
1. It is possible that during your heyday, if you had given your cookie recipe to someone else, they might well not have had much luck. Meaning that even the most detailed instructions are not sufficient, and that there is some intuition / intangible / x-factor at play. For all this time, things have been rolling along for you, but after the first 1-few times things haven't worked, you've started second-guessing yourself and lost "it." Or not.
2.
When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Alniyat
Then peace might guide the planets
But your cookies will be flat
Good luck.
Tracy Schneider on March 11, 2010 at 11:19 AM
Sweet B. I hope you come up with an answer soon! I, for one, think the perfect chocolate chip cookie is a flat one, and have wondered what I need to do to my recipe to assure that they always come out this way.
Samo on April 02, 2010 at 07:25 PM
So I just baked these and noticed something among my 3 cookie-sheets worth of baking. (One sheet in the oven at a time). My oven is super old and the knob for the temperature just turns so it is difficult to get the temp just right, especially for the ?25 and ?75 degree recommendations. Because of this, I have a oven thermometer inside.
When I put the first sheet in, the temp said 350 and it said 375 when I took them out. Those cookies came out fine. The second sheet turned out slightly flatter cookies, but not close to as flat as your picture. (in at 375, out at about 390). I turned down the knob on the oven a bit and waited a bit for it to cool before putting the third sheet in. The last sheet turned out gorgeous! It was just above 350 the whole time.
So this could be one or two things for me. First, the oven temp. Secondly, it could be that the bottom of the bowl had slightly more flour. I also used King Arthur White Whole Wheat.
Did you get your cookies to work for you again?
Cheryl on June 24, 2010 at 01:27 PM
I am here for the same problem...made great cookies for years, now they're flat. I got to believe it's the baking soda. It's the only thing that makes sense. Is everybody using Arm & Hammer? Did they change their formula?? I'm going to look for a different brand (not a store brand because it's likely boxed by A&H)
Chris on August 21, 2010 at 11:27 PM
I am so glad I found this website. I have been experiencing the same problem! For years, I was the family "cookies master". I made all sorts of fantastic, delicious cookies for friends and family and everybody loved them... for years, then, suddenly, I could not make good cookies. I too, like others here, tried everything I could think of--- changed oven temperatures, amount of flour, amount of butter, temperature of butter, temperature of bowl, spoon, beaters, temperature of baking sheets, reasing cooking sheets, no stick cookie sheets, parchment on cookie sheets ( I didn't try foil on cookie sheets), temperature of batter, mixing with beaters, hand mixing with spoon, exhaustive mixing, almost no mixing, light mixing, medium mixing, warm eggs, cool eggs, old eggs, fresh eggs, creaming butter, cutting in butter, rolling dough, scooping dough, butter, margarine, increasing baking soda, ....
nothing has worked. I no longer bake cookies, sadly.
I believe something in the ingredients has changed.
D Richards on October 17, 2010 at 09:13 PM
I am 53 yrs.old and have been baking and using my same favorite cookie recipes since I was a teenager with excellent results. About 1 year ago my cookies started going flat and that was the end of my being able to produce good cookies using the same recipes, ingredients and techniques that ALWAYS turned out great! What happened? I have also tried ALL of the suggestions from cooling dough, adding extra flour, checking dates on soda & eggs, trying Crisco or margarine instead of butter (even though the butter had always worked before), oven thermometer, etc.!!! Any and all suggestions and NOTHING works...Please someone give me an answer!!!!
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