Cookie Dough Fudge | Easy recipe w/ Chocolate Chips & White Chocolate! (2024)

FAQs

Why do you have to refrigerate chocolate chip cookie dough before baking? ›

Popping your dough in the fridge allows the fats to cool. As a result, the cookies will expand more slowly, holding onto their texture. If you skip the chilling step, you're more likely to wind up with flat, sad disks instead of lovely, chewy cookies. Cookies made from chilled dough are also much more flavorful.

In excess amounts, it sucks up the moisture from other ingredients like milk, eggs, and butter, leaving you with a drier, fluffier cookie whose texture feels almost bread-like. And if you've ever ended up with cookies that look like hard scoops of brown ice cream, you know the problem all too well.

Chilling cookie dough before baking solidifies the fat in the cookies. As the cookies bake, the fat in the chilled cookie dough takes longer to melt than room-temperature fat. And the longer the fat remains solid, the less cookies spread.

As a general rule of thumb, you should refrigerate cookie dough for at least 30 minutes and up to 24 hours. More than that, and you won't see a noticeable difference in the final product. Once the dough has chilled, let it warm up at room temperature until it's just pliable (about 5 to 10 minutes).

Insider asked three chefs to share how to take store-bought cookie dough to a whole new level. They said rolling the dough in spices or a fun garnish can elevate your cookies. The chefs also recommended adding salty mix-ins like pretzels, chips, or nuts to your dough.

Putting a slice of fresh white bread in the container with the cookies will help the cookies stay soft: fresh bread is moist, and that slice will give up its moisture for the greater good: keeping the cookies from drying out.

Prep Instructions

HEAT oven to 350ºF (or 325ºF for nonstick cookie sheet). SPOON dough by tablespoonfuls 2 inches apart onto ungreased cookie sheet. BAKE 12 to 15 minutes or until edges are golden brown. COOL 1 minute; remove from cookie sheet.

Room temperature butter is just the right consistency to incorporate air when it's creamed with sugar. These trapped air pockets result in risen, fluffy cookies. If the butter is any warmer, it won't incorporate enough air and your cookies will have less rise.

Unless you want extra-crispy cookies, avoid overmixing your dough. "Overmixing your dough will result in flatter, crispier cookies," Cowan said. If you overmix, you will end up aerating (adding air to) the dough, which causes the cookies to rise and then fall, leaving you with flat cookies.

Dry – “Dry” or “Crumbly” dough is a product of over-mixing or using too much of any ingredient during the mixing process. This can be reversed by adding one to two tablespoons of liquid (water, milk or softened butter) to your mix.

What is in cowboy cookies? ›

Saddle up, partner–we're making Cowboy Cookies! Full of flavor and texture, this recipe combines coconut, pecans, oats, and chocolate to make one unique cookie, no horse or lasso required.

"When your cookie dough is not refrigerated, the butter is at room temperature. Therefore the heat from the oven reacts with the butter quickly, making it spread thinner," says Epperson. And while some people prefer a crunchy, thin cookie, there are arguably many more people who like soft, thick cookies.

“Chilling your dough creates a greater depth of flavor because the flour breaks down and releases its sugars, giving you a sweeter cookie,” explains Woods, who has won dozens of blue ribbons at the Iowa State Fair.

Here's what our Test Kitchen recommends when quickly chilling cookie dough in the freezer: Place the cookie dough in the freezer for one-quarter of the recommended refrigerator time. The dough can be wrapped in plastic, scooped into balls for baking on a cookie sheet, or left in the mixing bowl, covered.

HOW LONG CAN I STORE YOUR DOUGH? If you prefer to eat our dough at room temperature it is absolutely safe to keep out of the refrigerator for a day or two. Technically speaking butter can stay at ambient temperatures for up to two weeks without spoiling!