Sourdough Sugar Cookies Recipe, What's Cooking America (2024)

FAQs

Are sugar cookies an American thing? ›

The sugar cookie is believed to have originated in the mid-1700s in Nazareth, Pennsylvania. German Protestant settlers created a round, crumbly and buttery cookie that came to be known as the Nazareth cookie. Jumbles are the earliest form of sugar cookies.

The yeast and bacteria in your sourdough starter actually feed off the sugar from the starches in the flour. They essentially don't need any extra food. In fact, while adding sugar to the dough may provide "fast food" for your sourdough yeast, this quick food source is unlikely to provide any protein.

Despite all the mysticism and lore about creating the concoction, a sourdough starter is merely a naturally fermenting mixture of flour and water. Add water to dry flour, let it sit on the counter for a few days, and you'll see nature weave life into a once lifeless lump: bubbles will appear and the mixture will rise.

As with any sourdough recipe, before you start baking bread, you want to make sure that your sourdough starter is as strong as possible. My basic sourdough recipe uses just 50g of starter for 500g of flour (so just 10% of starter).

While there is no official national cookie of the US, the classic chocolate chip cookie is king. That's according to many polls conducted over the years with the most recent being from Crumbl Cookies by One Poll.

It might just be this one. Ever the crowd-pleaser, the chocolate chip cookie is renowned for its balance of richness and sweetness. The traditional recipe for these cookies includes butter, eggs, chocolate chips, and brown sugar, but it can be tweaked to fit a variety of tastes and occasions.

Is sourdough bread good for diabetics? Sourdough bread is made through a slow fermentation process, which may cause this type of bread to raise blood sugar more slowly than other breads. As a result, sourdough bread could be a great choice for those with diabetes.

The secret to sourdough is simple: water. The more water you add to your dough will affect how open the crumb (bigger holes and softer texture) will be once it's baked.

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).

Is it worth making your own sourdough starter? ›

I should take a moment here to state that you definitely should try to make your own sourdough starter. Don't let my failures preclude you from attempting your own batch. The process is easy (like, ridiculously so) and if all goes according to plan, a rewarding experience. That said, sometimes you just need a shortcut.

If you don't get rid of the excess, eventually you'll have more starter than your feedings can sustain. 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.

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!

Many no-wait recipes that call for discard will have no problem at all using a starter straight from the fridge. But for other recipes, like bread, for best results I suggest taking it out of the fridge, feeding it, and allowing it to be nice and active before using it. This usually takes about 4-12 hours.

If you have too much starter compared to the additional flour and water you're adding, your hungry starter consumes all the nutrients and then it's not as bubbly.

Let's have a hearty hip-hip-hooray for the German Protestants, who settled in Nazareth, Pennsylvania, and invented the early sugar cookie. Their crumbly cookie made with butter and shaped into round or keystone shapes were a sweet hit from their formation in the late 1700s.

Nearly 93% of all American households serve and enjoy cookies as treats or after meals. However, it's the chocolate chip cookie that's the most popular in the U.S. and around the world.

Biscuit vs Cookie

American cookies are baked desserts, often sweet, that range in texture and density. Hard or crisp cookies are called biscuits in the U.K. while the chewier dessert can be identified as a cookie.

The earliest known record of a cookie is from the 7 ^th Century in Persia, which is now known as Iran. This was one of the first countries to harvest sugar cane, one of the main ingredients in cookies. Many of the first cookies in America were adapted from other countries.