Verticle height equals cakey to me.
Flat and crisp is one thing, tall and cakey is another.
Linda C

I dunno..I use Sol's Brown Sugar Chocolate Chip cookie recipe for White Chocolate Macs.

I remember Alton Brown doing a show with detailed explanation of how to get three different types of cookies. Unfortunately I didn't retain all the information, but I think he said that using shortening instead of butter and maybe an extra egg (?) would give more height. Something about the difference between white and brown sugar -- different proportions of white to brown will affect the results. He said a lot more, too. I wish I had recorded it.

Easy! Squash 'em! Make little balls, or put spoonfuls, onto the baking tray, and press down with a fork. Allow plenty of room for spreading. That gives them a head start for 'thin and crispy', even if the recipe doesn't call for it.

That's how I like them, too. And that's how a biscuit ought to be - a cake should be cake-y, a biscuit should be thin and crisp, a cookie is halfway in between, and then there are scones. Where I come from.

Oh, and you do know of course that the oven should be very hot, at least 200C (400F), and cooking should be quick - about 10-12 minutes. I have some recipes for cooler, slower cooking, but they don't work quite so well, IMO.

Size matters, too. They work best if the end result is about 5cm (2") in diameter.

Don't allow them to touch each other during the cooking process. They'll almost always end up soft if they do.

Unless I am misreading Sands post, I think the quest here if for the cookies to be taller and more cake-y NOT thinner and crispier.

I saw the same Alton Brown that carnelian mentined but didn't record it either, but I did find some information by googling "Alton Brown chewy Cookies". I know, not exactly what you were looking for but I figured it would get me to his cookie show link.

I also found this reprint from Cooks Illustrated -

http://home.att.net/~jserdmann2/Recipe-Chocolate-ChipCookies.html

Which talks a little about the hows and whys. There was a thread on eGullett comparing Altons recipe and method to the CI recipe and tips and the consensus was that CI was better. I would give them both a try and see which you like. I also found the Alton Brown cakey cookie link.....

Alexa

Here is a link that might be useful: Alton Browns Puffy Cookie

Hi Sands,

I prefer my cookies chewy also, and I'm always trying to find a way to keep 'em that way:-) Some tips that work for me are to chill your dough, at least a couple of hours, before you drop them onto parchment lined cookie sheets. Parchment paper is a baker's best friend. It helps keep the cookies from spreading also. As Carnelian mentioned, replacing some of the butter with shortening (they now have trans fat free!)can keep your cookies thicker and chewier. Shortening has a higher melting point than butter, so the cookies stay a bit thicker with less spread.

Let us know how they come out! I have a good white chocolate macadamia nut cookie recipe that turn out pretty chewy and thick - let me know if you'd like it and I'll be happy to post. Happy Tuesday!
DONNA

Looks like I may have confused a few people, lemme clarify:

What I got: flatter, crispy cookies
What I wanted: more cakelike cookies with less spread

Don't get me wrong I dig flat crispies but in this case it was too much spread. Cali was reading it right - but I'm sorry I didn't make that clearer.

Thanks for the tips so far though!

There are many things that can alter a cookie recipe. Some things we unwittingly do, and other are things we can alter/adjust for making changes.

1. What type of pan did you bake them on? Shiny, dull, dark? Did you use parchment paper on your pans? Did you grease the pan, not all recipes require greasing and the greasing can cause the cookies to spread.

2. Did you start with room temperature butter or butter that was too warm and partially melted? Room temperature is defined to have a temperature of 65-67F as measured with an Instant Read Thermometer. Perfectly softened butter should give gently to pressure (you should be able to leave a fingerprint and slight indentation on the stick) but shouldn't be soft in appearance. Butter that is too soft or is partially melted results in dough that is too soft, causing cookies to spread too much. (source: Baking 9-1-1 and Betty Crocker's Cookie Book)

Chilling your dough for 30-minutes before baking them can make a difference in the rise of the cookie, especially when baking in warm/hot ambient temperatures in the kitchen. The fat in the cookie dough may already be softening at room temperature when you want it to soften when it hits the heat of the oven - not before.

3. Did you bake on cool pans, or hot/warm pans? Not allowing the pans to completely cool before baking on them will cause the fat in the cookie dough to melt before it's supposed to, creating flatter cookies than when using a cool pan.

4. Adding a tablespoon or two of flour to the recipe can alter the cookie, especially when the temperature is warm in your kitchen.

5. How you mix cookies and the type of flour you use can change the cookies texture due to gluten development. If you stir them beyond where the dry ingredients are mixed in, or tend to use a stand mixer, you can develop too much gluten in the flour and the cookies will be tough, if they are supposed to be tender. Mix the sugar and fat with an electric mixer, but add the dry ingredients and mix by hand. A Danish Dough Whisk is an invaluable tool for mixing cookies and quick breads by hand. Electric stand mixers tend to over-mix ingredients unless you are very diligent and stop it as soon as ingredients are mixed.

6. Information from "Understanding Food" Principles and Preparation - by Amy Brown - 2nd edition.

For puffy, soft, pale cookies:
-Use cake flour (which is a low protein flour, acid), or a low-protein all-purpose flour such as Martha White or White Lily. This results in more steam and puff; less browning. If you are using whole grains for flour, choose soft wheat varieties, or low-gluten spelt for cookies, not hard wheat varieties that are higher in protein.

-Shortening (high melting point)- less spread

-All brown sugar (hygroscopic, acid)- soft and moist, less spread when used with egg

-Egg - Moisture for puff; less spread with acidic ingredients

For thin, crisp cookies:
-Use all-purpose flour (higher-protein). Use a portion of rice flour for REALLY crispy cookies. All-purpose flour also browns more than low-gluten flour.

-Butter - it has protein in it and allows more spread and browning.

-Baking soda (alkali) - increases browning

-Corn syrup (glucose) - browning, and increases crisping

-White sugar (sucrose) - crisp

-No egg - more puff; more spread

-Grainlady

Wow Grainlady, I just copied and printed your whole very informative post! So can you replace all the AP flour with cake flour to get puffy, soft cookies, or just a portion of it?

Sands, I swear by chilling the dough and using parchment. Maybe try also using some cake flour, like Grainlady said, to replace some of the AP flour.

Lots of good info here!
DONNA

There's a time and a place for vegetable shortening, and if you're looking for puffy cookies, then, vegetable shortening with its high melting point will help with the volume. And because shortening is pretty bland, I'd use a combination of butter and shortening. Shortening for volume, butter for flavor.

Also, adding a couple of tablespoons of flour to the batter will also yield cakier, vertical cookies.

Sol

Donna (lackboys3)-

I judge baked goods at fairs, so I've received quite a bit of training and have done a lot of self-study on the subject because I need to know the science of baking and ingredients so that I can tell people what went wrong with their foods, or how they can improve their recipe.

There's so much science to consider when making any changes to a recipe, and you need to consider ALL the ingredients and what they do in the recipe, not just the flour type.

For instance, if you normally use AP flour in a crispy cookie recipe and you choose to use White Lily or Martha White (southern all-purpose flour which have lower gluten levels than AP) or cake flour, you will get a completely different cookie texture - that's a given. But what texture? That depends on the other ingredients in the recipe. Chances are, if the ingredients lend themselves to "crispy", they'll remain so no matter what type of flour you use. It's the nature of the ingredients in that type of cookie.

Gluten in flour absorbs moisture, so if the liquid ingredients aren't also changed in the recipe and you use low-gluten flour, the dough may be more moist because less is absorbed by the lower-gluten content in the flour, which could make a higher-rising, less crispy, cookie.

But you could also end up with a cookie that is more tender (like a pie crust or a shortbread) than crispy, from changing the type of flour. Not puffy or chewy at all. It depends on the other ingredients in the recipe.

Puffy and chewy are actually opposites when talking about cookies. Puffy is more cake-like, while chewy is dense and moist. Crispy is just that, it's dry and snaps when broken in half.

"Puffy" (according to "Baking 9-1-1" by Sarah Phillips) equals more flour; chewy equals more eggs, fat, and sugar (in the recipe). So choose your recipes according to the ingredients list for the type of cookie you want. It's easier to find a recipe that is appropriate, than to alter recipes.

As with all baking, it's a ratio of ingredients, and each ingredient does something to the mix. Alter them, and you will have a different kind of cookie.

* Many differences come simply from how a person measures ingredients. If a person packs their flour into the cup by dipping the cup into the flour and scraping the cup up the side of the bag/canister, they may be adding as much as 1/8-1/4 c. of flour - per cup - to the recipe, than the person who fluffs the flour, spoons it into the cup and levels it.

* Accidently using bread flour, instead of all-purpose flour, and you may have a tough/dry cookie from the additional gluten absorbing more hydration than all-purpose flour would.

* Using whole wheat flour for all-purpose flour in a cookie recipe will alter texture. Most commercial whole wheat flour is milled from hard wheat, which is higher in gluten than all-purpose (which is milled from both hard and soft wheat varieties). The added bran also absorbs more moisture, which can cause the cookie to be dry and hard if you don't note the hydration of the cookie dough and adjust it before baking.

* Moisture level in flour always varies from bag to bag and season to season, not to mention how and where it's stored once it's in the kitchen. It may be very dry in the winter, and will require using a slightly different amount to get the correct hydration in the cookie dough. It can also be loaded with a lot of moisture from being stored in the paper bag it comes in, in a humid kitchen. In which case, it already contains a lot of moisture and a recipe may need more flour to achieve the correct hydration. That's why all measurements for flour in a recipe are just good guesses.

*Using butter that is too soft (softer than "room temperature" may require a little more flour to get the correct hydration of the dough.

*What size dollop of dough one bakes can also make textural differences.

*Substituting part or all honey for sugar, which absorbs and keeps moisture, will make a cookie more moist, and possibly "puffy".

*How long the dough is baked effects the end result. My SIL never fully bakes cookies of any type. She only half-bakes them to keep them "chewy". A result of unbaked moisture left in the cookies. She bakes them just until they are "set", removes them and allows them to stand on the hot pan for 5 minutes or so before removing. This is one way to get chewy cookies, but not all cookies are supposed to be chewy....

*What ingredients are there to create steam to help cookies puff - usually eggs. Using egg whites only has a drying effect on cookies.

*What leavening agent is used in the recipe also makes a difference. Baking soda makes a cookie spread and brown more, but if you add too much baking soda, it makes the cookies bitter.

Baking powder, on the other hand, produces lighter-colored and puffier cookies. Other leaveners include steam (created from liquids such as water, milk, or cream) which causes the cookie to puff. Too much liquid with a low-gluten flour and you won't have enough gluten structure to make a good cookie. They'll be too tender and will fall apart.

*Allowing cookie dough to sit at room temperature or in a hot kitchen for long periods of time can cause the texture of cookies to alter.

*If the cookies are supposed to be puffy, don't bake them on a greased sheet. Choose an ungreased sheet or parchment paper. Greased sheets promotes spreading. Greasing a sheet may benefit low-fat cookies, to aid them in spreading properly. Parchment paper doesn't promote spreading - it provides a non-stick surface.

*Cookies that require low hydration, such as rolled dough for sugar cookies, will make crisp cookies. If you over-work the dough (usually from second cuts - where you take the scraps from the first batch and re-roll it), there will be more gluten developed and the cookies will not only be crisp, but tough. You can avoid tough cookies by using southern all-purpose flour (Martha White or White Lily) and roll the cookies out on powdered sugar instead of flour. The additional sugar will melt into the cookies for a delicate, crispy, cookie, while the flour will be adding more gluten and toughness.

-Grainlady

sol, I agree, a combo of butter and shortening makes chewier, cakier cookies for me. And I nearly always add a bit more flour than the recipe calls for, because I like the thicker cakey/chewy cookie better than the flat and crisp ones.

Well, unless you are talking gingersnaps, which are a different animal altogether!

Annie

I use Smart Balance spread (regular, not light) instead of butter or shortening in cookies and they turn out fine, and do not spread too much.

Grainlady, thank you so much for all the wonderful information. I copied and pasted everything!!

I've thought about buying the book "How Baking Works" by Paula Figoni but now I think I might just put it on my Christmas List.

Thanks again!

Michelle