I paged through Nancy Baggett's Simply Sensational Cookies looking for a basic drop cookie recipe and decided to try her "Crispy-Soft Cinnamon-Vanilla Monster Cookies." The pretty full-page photo helped draw me in, along with the description of the "whisper-crisp texture" that is "tender yet crispy." I love cinnamon and I love a crispy cookie.
The recipe is labeled as "easy," which is accurate. To make the dough, you beat softened butter, canola oil, powdered sugar, light brown sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt together until light and fluffy; add an egg, egg yolk, and vanilla; and incorporate flour. You chill the dough for 10-15 minutes to firm up slightly and then form it into balls. The recipe instructs you to divide the dough into 24 equal parts, but I used a #24 scoop to portion it out and I got 29 cookies. You dip the oiled bottom of a glass or jar into a mixture of sugar and cinnamon and use it to flatten each ball of dough before baking.
This dough was quite sticky even after chilling for a bit. The cinnamon-sugar mixture was relatively light in color (1/3 cup sugar to 1 teaspoon cinnamon) and the finished cookies were light as well; I followed the directions to avoid overbaking and baked the cookies just until light golden brown around the edges.
My cookies didn't look much like the ones in the cookbook photo. Mine were slightly puffy with perfectly rounded edges. The ones in the cookbook photo were perfectly flat with slightly ragged edges, and they looked like they were darker and covered in more cinnamon.
I was not impressed by this cookie and would not make it again. It tasted fine. But it was not crispy in the slightest. In fact, the texture wasn't chewy either, but sandy and soft. Soft cookies have their place in the world, but I didn't like the texture of this cookie at all, especially because it was promised to be crispy. And I would have preferred a stronger cinnamon flavor. I should have just stuck with a snickerdoodle.
Recipe: "Crispy-Soft Cinnamon-Vanilla Monster Cookies" from Simply Sensational Cookies by Nancy Baggett.
Previous Posts:
The recipe is labeled as "easy," which is accurate. To make the dough, you beat softened butter, canola oil, powdered sugar, light brown sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt together until light and fluffy; add an egg, egg yolk, and vanilla; and incorporate flour. You chill the dough for 10-15 minutes to firm up slightly and then form it into balls. The recipe instructs you to divide the dough into 24 equal parts, but I used a #24 scoop to portion it out and I got 29 cookies. You dip the oiled bottom of a glass or jar into a mixture of sugar and cinnamon and use it to flatten each ball of dough before baking.
This dough was quite sticky even after chilling for a bit. The cinnamon-sugar mixture was relatively light in color (1/3 cup sugar to 1 teaspoon cinnamon) and the finished cookies were light as well; I followed the directions to avoid overbaking and baked the cookies just until light golden brown around the edges.
I was not impressed by this cookie and would not make it again. It tasted fine. But it was not crispy in the slightest. In fact, the texture wasn't chewy either, but sandy and soft. Soft cookies have their place in the world, but I didn't like the texture of this cookie at all, especially because it was promised to be crispy. And I would have preferred a stronger cinnamon flavor. I should have just stuck with a snickerdoodle.
Recipe: "Crispy-Soft Cinnamon-Vanilla Monster Cookies" from Simply Sensational Cookies by Nancy Baggett.
Previous Posts:
- "You Will Never Lose, but Is It a Winner?: [Mindy Segal] Snickerdoodles," June 5, 2015.
- "Just Like Someone Else's Grandma Used to Make: Cream Cheese Snickerdoodles," January 25, 2015.
- "Baked Sunday Mornings: Brown Butter Snickerdoodles," September 29, 2013.
- "Snickerdoodle Dandy [Alice Medrich Snickerdoodles]," April 6, 2009.
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