Sticky chocolate crinkle cookies

[Anna N]

 

 I made these cookies with the intent to send them off to my son-in-law's place of employment as a meeting snack. They are very tasty but they are also "sticky".  The ones on the left-hand side at the front are just as they came out of the oven about an hour ago and they are very sticky. I attempted to remedy the situation by sifting more icing sugar over the others but I don't believe it has done much good. If they were for kids or just intended for eating at home stickiness would not be such an issue. In the workplace I suspect it's not going to go over well at all.  Is this the nature of these cookies? Is there anything I can do to mitigate the stickiness. If I had some cupcake liners I would simply put a couple in each  but I am all out  and there is no time for shopping.  Any suggestions?

[Toliver]

It sounds like your solution (more powdered sugar) should have worked.

I make a recipe called "Butterballs". It has 4 sticks of butter in the recipe. Once baked and cooled, you're supposed to roll the cookies in powdered sugar to coat the outside. That was where my mom stopped dealing with them...leaving them once-rolled in powdered sugar as is. But what I discovered is that if you let the powdered sugar-covered Butterballs sit overnight, the butter in the cookie sucks up the powdered sugar, leaving a mottled look on the exterior and giving the cookie a slightly "gummy" feel. My solution, which worked well, IMHO, was to roll the cookies in powdered sugar a second time. That pretty much did the trick, making the exterior look pretty again and feeling drier to the touch. 

You just have to warn the cookie eaters not to wear black when eating the cookies as the powdered sugar on the cookie tended to "snow" when the cookie was being consumed.

 

I would suggest immersing the sticky odd-looking cookies in powdered sugar, shaking off the excess, to a) make them look edible and b) hide the stickiness.

You would probably have to do this to all of the cookies to make them look consistent. 

Good luck!

[Anna N]

4 minutes ago, Toliver said:

It sounds like your solution (more powdered sugar) should have worked.

I make a recipe called "Butterballs". It has 4 sticks of butter in the recipe. Once baked and cooled, you're supposed to roll the cookies in powdered sugar to coat the outside. That was where my mom stopped dealing with them...leaving them once-rolled in powdered sugar as is. But what I discovered is that if you let the powdered sugar-covered Butterballs sit overnight, the butter in the cookie sucks up the powdered sugar, leaving a mottled look on the exterior and giving the cookie a slightly "gummy" feel. My solution, which worked well, IMHO, was to roll the cookies in powdered sugar a second time. That pretty much did the trick, making the exterior look pretty again and feeling drier to the touch. 

You just have to warn the cookie eaters not to wear black when eating the cookies as the powdered sugar on the cookie tended to "snow" when the cookie was being consumed.

 

I would suggest immersing the sticky odd-looking cookies in powdered sugar, shaking off the excess, to a) make them look edible and b) hide the stickiness.

You would probably have to do this to all of the cookies to make them look consistent. 

Good luck!

 

 Thank you. I will try that. I have to have them ready for pick up at 5:30 so I don't have too long to let them sit and absorb much of anything!  I knew the icing sugar might be a bit of an issue but the stickiness/ gummy feel really bothers me.

[MelissaH]

Nothing to add beyond what's already been said, except that King Arthur sells a powdered sugar that they claim is non-melting. I haven't tried it.

 

Can you share the recipe?

[Anna N]

1 hour ago, MelissaH said:

Nothing to add beyond what's already been said, except that King Arthur sells a powdered sugar that they claim is non-melting. I haven't tried it.

 

Can you share the recipe?

 

Here

[LindaK]

I’ve had this problem too. Here’s what I think was happening:

 

When rolling the balls of dough, after the first dozen or so, inevitably my palms end up coated with a thin layer of chocolate—which means the balls of dough have a light sticky layer of this melted (or at least higher temp) dough on the exterior.  I think this makes a difference to the confectionary sugar coating. Whether it melts more readily or gets absorbed into the dough, I don’t know. But inevitably some of my cookies were like yours.

 

My assembly line technique used to be: roll a ball of dough, roll in confectionary sugar, place on cookie sheet. Continue til finished. Hold unbaked sheets in fridge.

What I now do: roll all the dough balls without coating them in confectionary sugar, put them on a cookie sheet and into the fridge to chill for a few minutes.  When it’s time to bake, take from the fridge enough dough balls for a batch, roll them in confectionary sugar, then put the sheet straight into the oven.

 

It doesn’t take any more time. For me, it’s solved the problem. Here’s the batch I made yesterday (sorry for the poor lighting, but it's the cookies that matter ;-)

 

[Anna N]

Thanks so much!  Yours look perfect. I will certainly try your method next time. 

[MelissaH]

@Anna N, have you made this particular recipe before? It looks to me like the recipe itself might be at least partially to blame. It looks to me as though there's too much fat in the dough for the dry ingredients to handle, and the excess fat on the outside gets caked with the powdered sugar in the same way that a bad doughnut does.

 

This is what's left of the batch of chocolate crackle cookies I made yesterday morning, from the Serious Eats recipe. Mine are not at all sticky; the cookies that look a little less powdery are the ones that lost some of their sugar coat while I was moving them around. Comparing this one to the one you used, this one has nearly the same amount of butter, but half again as much flour (and three times the amount of cocoa, but no melted chocolate). The Serious Eats recipe has twice the eggs and a bit more than twice the sugar, to compensate for the additional unsweetened dry ingredients. I found the sweetness level of these to be pretty close to what I like: the cookie isn't super-sweet, except for the outside coating. I'd make these again. FWIW, my technique was: make the dough and let it rest in the fridge overnight. The next morning, scoop all the dough into appropriate size balls. Then roll all the balls smooth between my hands. And then roll each smooth ball in a bowl of powdered sugar before placing it onto a cookie sheet. I wound up with three cookie sheets full, which I baked all at once in my oven with the convection fan blowing. I might have gotten lucky in that I didn't think about the fan, but the sugar adhered well enough that it didn't all blow off and make a sticky mess inside the oven.

 

I believe that overall, your recipe has a higher percentage of fat, and that's what is triggering the sticky outsides. I think next time, I'd try a different recipe before giving up on the concept.

[Anna N]

 This was the first time I attempted the recipe. Perhaps indeed it was at fault.   Thanks for your attempt to solve my problem. Next time I will give your recommended recipe a try.