Grandma's Sour Cream Sugar Cookies Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What is the secret to making cookies soft and chewy? ›

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.

Sugar sweetens the cookies and makes them an enticing golden brown. Adding too little sugar can affect the taste and texture of cookies. Adding too much can cause them to be brittle. Take your time creaming the sugar and butter together at the beginning.

The sour cream in this dough does a couple of good things – it makes the texture tender, a little flaky and a little cakey; and it also makes it just a touch tangy. The dough is very easy to roll and to work with, just be sure to chill it thoroughly after you make it.

Add more complex proteins, like malted milk powder and brown butter. Caramelizing the sugar beforehand brings bright notes to your cookies, but you can further expand your dessert's flavor profile by playing with proteins.

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.

The leavening power of baking soda is about three to four times stronger than baking powder. This means that you need a lot less baking soda in your recipes. If a recipe calls for baking soda and you only have baking powder, you need to use the right baking soda to baking powder conversion.

Less flour means there's less to absorb all the wet ingredients in your cookie dough. Spoon and level that flour or, better yet, weigh your flour. Don't over-mix the cookie dough. Cream the butter and sugar for only as long as you need to—a recipe usually specifies the amount of time.

Over-working the dough yields a tough cookie, which is not at all what you want. The very best sugar cookies are soft and tender. → Follow this tip: One of the keys to great sugar cookies is mixing the dry ingredients only until they're just incorporated, and not a second longer.

Granulated sugar

Using granulated white sugar will result in a flatter, crispier and lighter-colored cookie. Granulated sugar is hygroscopic, so it attracts and absorbs the liquid in the dough. This slows down the development of the gluten (flour), which makes the cookies crispier.

Can you over mix butter and sugar for cookies? ›

Undermixed butter and sugar looks gritty and chunky, which can lead to dense cookies and cakes. It is possible to overmix the butter and sugar. If you overmix, the butter will separate out of the mixture and it will be grainy and soupy. Be sure to stop once your butter becomes light and fluffy.

Sour cream is one of the fattiest dairy products; the extra fat content (for example, adding sour cream to a cake instead of milk) will make the cake moister and richer, says Wilk. "Fat, in any form (butter, lard, cream, etc.) shortens gluten strands, which essentially leads to the most tender baked goods," she adds.

Greek yogurt: This is a good substitute as it has a similar tangy flavor and creamy texture. Use plain Greek yogurt in the same amount as the sour cream in the recipe.

The ingredients you used could be the culprit – using different sugars, melted butter, baking powder or baking soda can alter a cookie's texture and taste.

Place a slice of bread on top of the cookies and cover the plate with plastic wrap. The moisture from the bread will be absorbed by the cookies and soften them. Reheat the cookies in the microwave for about 10 seconds. Be careful not to overheat them, as this can cause them to become even more dry and hard.

Sugar cookies, to me, should have a buttery dryness to them, but crumble easily. I've used shortbread cookie dough to make decorated sugar cookies and they turn out great. They're rigid enough to survive handling, but have a nice buttery chew.

One method for adding flavor to sugar is burying whole ingredients (like coffee beans or vanilla beans) in a container of sugar. Over time, the oils and small particles from the ingredient impart aroma and flavor into each spoonful of sugar.