Will Resting Your Cookie Dough Yield Better Cookies? (2024)

FAQs

Will Resting Your Cookie Dough Yield Better Cookies? ›

The short answer is: Yes. Resting your dough in the refrigerator will almost always yield better results. But why? Chilling your cookie dough in the refrigerator after mixing it allows the flour to hydrate and gives the other ingredients time to blend, resulting in a richer, more well-rounded flavor profile.

So while resting the dough means you're another 30 or 60 minutes (or, if you're really committed, 72 hours) away from cookies, it also means those cookies will be chewier, gooier, and more delicious.

Cool down your dough for a tastier, chewier cookie.

There's a few reasons why, but one important part is it gives the butter in your dough a chance to firm up before baking. The colder your dough is before it heads into the oven, the less it will spread during baking, which makes for loftier cookies.

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.

Finally, too-hot cookies will likely fall apart in your hands. However, as we all know, warm cookies are a wonderful thing. So, let your cookies cool just until they hold their shape (generally after about 5 minutes on a cookie cooling rack) and savor them warm while you can.

“Well-rested dough will be fully hydrated, easier to work with, and yield a better texture,” says BA's deputy food editor Hana Asbrink. A bit of patience will reward you with chewy, bouncy noodles. It's a step you just can't skip.

The dough should generally be proofed for around 1 to 4 hours at a warm temperature or overnight (or more) at a cold refrigerator temperature. As the proofing temperature increases, the total fermentation time will decrease.

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).

“If the dough has risen too long, it's going to feel fragile and might even collapse as you poke it,” says Maggie. If this is the case, there's a chance you can save your dough by giving it a quick re-shape. Learn more about this fix in our blog on saving overproofed dough.

Cookies become hard when the moisture in them evaporates. This can be caused by leaving them out in the air for too long, baking them for too long, or storing them improperly. The lack of moisture makes the cookies hard and dry, which makes them difficult to enjoy.

Can I put undercooked cookies back in the oven? ›

Light colored cookies with dark speckles typically indicates that the cookies are underbaked. You can stick the stone back in the oven for another few minutes and they should finish baking. So how do you know when to bake longer than the recipe calls for? It helps if you have a thermometer in your oven.

Too much sugar, too much butter, or too little flour can all contribute to cookies that are on the run.

Leaving your dough to rise for a longer time helps develop flavour in your finished bread too, so there are benefits to giving your dough plenty of time to rise.

But the truth is, the primary reason bakers chill their dough is to prevent cookies from spreading too much. Chilling firms up the fat (usually butter) in the dough, ensuring that the dough doesn't spread too quickly in the oven.

If you're checking on shaped dough for the second rise/proof, then it should also be about double in size. Feel: Bread dough that has successfully risen/proofed will spring back slowly when poked and leave an indent. If it snaps back too quickly, it needs more time.