Gooey Salted Caramel Vanilla Butter Cookies | Homemade Cookie Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Is it better to use salted or unsalted butter for sugar cookies? ›

Unsalted butter gives you complete control of the overall flavor of your recipe. This is especially important in certain baked goods where the pure, sweet cream flavor of butter is key (butter cookies or pound cakes). As it pertains to cooking, unsalted butter lets the real, natural flavor of your foods come through.

Brown sugar, meanwhile, is dense and compacts easily, creating fewer air pockets during creaming—that means that there's less opportunity to entrap gas, creating cookies that rise less and spread more. With less moisture escaping via steam, they also stay moist and chewy.

In a pinch, you can replace unsalted butter with salted, as long as you reduce the amount of additional salt in the recipe. For instance, if a recipe calls for 1/2 cup unsalted butter, plus 1/2 teaspoon salt, you could substitute 1/2 cup salted butter (which typically — though not always!!

The biggest difference between sugar cookies and butter cookies is that sugar cookies are often rolled thin and cut out using cookie cutters. While butter cookies will hold their shape while baking, the dough is much softer and for best results should be piped onto a baking sheet and then baked.

All other factors being equal, using salted butter instead of unsalted butter in a recipe will result in a baked good containing more salt. If you want or need to use salted butter in place of unsalted butter — and the recipe calls for adding salt — omit the salt or use less salt than is called for in the recipe.

It all comes down to flavor! Salted butter will almost always add a little something extra when it comes to taste. It's also great for those who like the combination of sweet and salty, like in the case of cowboy cookies.

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.

All-Purpose Flour: The Versatile Choice

If you're looking for a safe bet or are new to cookie baking, all-purpose flour is your go-to option.

And if you come across a recipe that calls for unsalted butter and all you have is salted butter, simply decrease the salt in the recipe by the same ratio above—1/4 teaspoon of salt per 1/2 cup of butter.

The best butter for your baked goods depends on what type of recipe you're whipping up. Unsalted, American-style butter works well in goods like cookies, pound cakes and pancakes that require the high-fat content of conventional butter and more flexibility with salt and flavor content.

What does extra sugar do to cookies? ›

By adding extra sugar, you can bake the cookies to a slightly higher temperature without over-baking, which will allow for a crispier final cookie as well as deeper flavor development.

Unsalted, American-style butter works well in goods like cookies, pound cakes and pancakes that require the high-fat content of conventional butter and more flexibility with salt and flavor content.

Here's why: Most importantly: unsalted butter ensures that you can control the amount of salt you add to your cakes, cookies and Fig and Almond Breakfast Cake. Different companies add different amounts of salt to their butter.

“Most people think the butter should be so soft that it's broken down, but the most important thing is that you want a little bit of give to the butter.” If you want to get technical, she says the precise temperature should be between 63 and 68 degrees — where it's cool to touch, but your finger can leave an indent.

Salt is a flavor enhancer that makes sweet baked goods somewhat sweeter, balances the bitter and rounds out the savory. However, sometimes salt is a key flavor note. In some brown sugar, molasses, chocolate and/or caramel baked goods you may taste a salty note on your tongue before the sweet.