No joke: The dairy-free snickerdoodle
Pillowy soft, cinnamony, hilarious sounding, and dairy-free? Could it be?
The snickerdoodle!
Method
The recipe is sourced from my youngest sister, who used to stress-bake these in college. The original source is of unknown origin, please let me know if you can identify it!
Ingredients:
1 cup butter (I used my go to, Imperial margarine- see previous recipes for more commentary).
1 1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 tsp salt
2 2/3 cup flour
2 Tbsp sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
Set oven to 400F (although you might want to hold off and do this when you start to shape the dough, depending on how fast you are but also especially if you refrigerate the dough before baking, see tip 4).
Cream butter and 1 1/2 cup sugar sugar (see tip 1).
Add egg and vanilla and mix.
Add cream of tartar and salt and mix.
Add flour (see tips 2-3).
Roll the cookies in a mixture of the remaining 2 T sugar and 2 tsp cinnamon.
Bake 8-10 minutes (mine were perfect at 9). Let cool and rest on baking pan for 5 minutes before transferring to wire rack or eating immediately.
Dairy-free adaptation and baking tips:
1. When the recipe calls for creaming your "butter" and sugar for a while, and you have the equipment or muscle power, do it! It truly makes a difference for lift and texture of the cookies. (See Figures 1-3).
Figure 1. Just starting to mix. Observe coarse sand texture and color.
Figure 2. In progress...
Figure 3. Flooooof
2. Unless you enjoy cleaning up flour explosions, cover your mixer after you add in the flour (Figure 4). I believe they sell covers to fit your mixer, but a kitchen towel can also work just fine. It's nice when you have a glass bowl, because then you can still observe when the flour is mixed in.
Figure 4. Preventing flour power.
3. On that note, if you did not already know, please do not overmix once you add the flour. In contrast to tip 1, mixing too much at this stage develops gluten and will make the texture bread-ier instead of cookie-er. Mix until you JUST cannot see any more huge flour streaks. I often will take stop the mixer when I can still see some streaks, and complete the step with a spatula.
4. I found the dough a little too soft for shaping at this point (Figure 5). It was manageable, but much easier after I refrigerated the rest of the dough for 30 minutes. I observed a slight difference in the baked result but not much (there are two of the un-refrigerated dough in Figures 8 & 9, can you spot them? I may or may not remember which ones they were).
Figure 5. All mixed, but very soft.
Figure 6. Ready to coat.
Figure 7. Cloaking.
Figure 8. Ready, set...
Figure 9. Bake!
Figure 10. Ready, set...
Figure 11. Sprinkle!
Results
See Figures 12-13.
One reviewer provided this unsolicited gem, "I had a cup of coffee just so I could have one of these cookies."
I said something like, "I'm so glad you enjoyed, that's kind of you to say," but also I was thinking, "just one?!" Side note: there were very few left at the end of the day.
Figure 12. All packed up and ready to go.
Discussion
In conclusion, funny and adorable name, delicious cookie (with variations!), even when made free of dairy!
The only substitution was margarine for the butter, and that may or may not have led to the softer texture of the dough and the improvement upon refrigerating before shaping and baking.
Whether baking or eating, these will be sure to destress you and bring you joy (this advice is for culinary, educational, and entertaining purposes only, and does not constitute mental health treatment or a doctor-patient relationship. Always seek advice from a physician, psychologist, or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have about your physical or mental health).
What would you like to see for future directions- for these cookies, and for this blog? Please let me know what you'd like to see next!
Thanks for reading and have a great day!