6+ Sourdough Cookie Recipes (2024)

FAQs

Why put sourdough starter in cookies? ›

Plus, since sourdough starter is tangy, your chocolate chip cookies will have a slight tang that's quite pleasant, like snickerdoodles. And, by using up sourdough discard, you are contributing to reducing food waste. Sourdough starter is, in essence, a fermented mixture of 1:1 flour and water in weight.

Over the past decade-plus of baking, I've tested all manner of flour from whole grain wheat to spelt to einkorn, and while they all do work, my preferred flour to use when creating a sourdough starter is whole grain rye flour and white flour (this can be all-purpose or high-protein bread flour).

That's right—just by looking at the way your dough sticks to the mixer you can tell whether you have too much flour, not enough flour, or too many eggs. In this case you can counter the imbalance straight away, adding more wet ingredients or more flour until you get the consistency you want.

After a few days, your daily 1/4 cup flour and water won't be enough to sustain your entire jar of starter, and your starter will be slow and sluggish, not much better than discard itself. But that's not necessarily a bad thing, depending on what you want to bake with it.

And you guessed it..the more starter you use, the faster your dough will ferment - resulting in a less sour loaf. Using less starter in your recipe will help slow down the fermentation process.

With each sourdough starter feeding, you'll be discarding some to avoid it from becoming overly acidic. Most will compost or trash this discard, but you can save it and use it in other recipes!

If you don't discard your sourdough starter, it will grow too big and be unmanageable. Not to mention you will go through an unmentionable amount of flour.

The World's 'Oldest' Sourdough Starter Was Made With 4,500-Year-Old Yeast.

There are two main acids produced in a sourdough culture: lactic acid and acetic acid. Acetic acid, or vinegar, is the acid that gives sourdough much of its tang. Giving acetic acid-producing organisms optimal conditions to thrive and multiply will produce a more tangy finished product.

Why do you put honey in sourdough bread? ›

You'll find I use honey in many of my recipes. I love to use it in my no-knead 100% whole wheat sourdough bread because it makes it much softer and less dense than it would be without it. Subbing it in recipes that call for sugar is not usually as simple as a one-to-one sub, though.

Keeping the lid on for the first part of baking allows steam to expand between the gluten fibers to rise the bread and create a fluffy loaf. Step 4: Remove the lid and bake for an additional 12-14 minutes or until the crust is crispy and golden brown. Once you take the lid off, the bread likely won't rise anymore.

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.

Overmixing your batter can lead to runny cookies.

I mixed the batter more than I should have both during the creaming stage of the recipe and after adding the flour. As a result, the cookies came out light and airy, and I was able to taste the butter more prominently in this batch than in others.

A low proportion of sugar relative to flour reduces spread, keeping the cookies thick. A high proportion of mix-ins helps thicken the dough. Blending chocolate chip styles creates a more dynamic flavor. Overnight refrigeration hydrates the flour, again helping the cookies stay thick.

Sourdough Starters Versus Commercial Baker's Yeast

Sourdough breads just taste better—they're more complex, more aromatic, and more adaptable to a wider range of flavors than commercial yeast.

Tenderizer: The acidity in sourdough discard weakens gluten development and reacts with chemical leaveners which results in soft and fluffy baked goods. Fermentation: Adding sourdough to baked goods also imparts the magic of fermentation.

Fed sourdough starter refers to a starter that has been fed flour and water (preferably by weight). You should feed the starter equal or greater than its weight after discarding a portion. You should wait at least 2-4 hours or until the starter is at its peak before you use it in your baking.

Although the beneficial microbes in the starter tend to be lost during the baking process, the fibre and plant compounds, called polyphenols, become more bio-available. These act as an important fuel source for our gut microbes, which explains why sourdough is a gut-friendly choice.