5 Tips for Baking Perfect Cookies Every Time

With these 5 tips for baking Perfect Cookies yourself, a delicious cookie is now a piece of cake. Because baking a tasty biscuit always comes down to the same thing: good preparation, accurate measurement, and knowing your oven. And if you follow these tips, you can bake the best cookies from now on!

5 Tips for Baking Perfect Cookies Every Time

A grey underground with a stack of cookies with a blue ribbon. Two blue coffee cups in the left corner.

Weigh everything well

White plates and cups holding ingredients on a white background

One of the most important things about baking cookies is mise-en-place; in other words, prepare everything well. Read your recipe twice, weigh and measure all the ingredients and have everything ready, so you only have to add it.

Cold, cold, cold!

Are you finding troubles that your cookies won't hold shape or drip? Then probably your ingredients and materials aren't cold enough. If the recipe tells the dough should be cooled in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes, make sure you are (longer isn't a problem, but don't shorten the time). And use a cold baking plate. Even more, after every step, put the baking plate back in the fridge so everything remains cold. You will see it works.

Measuring is knowing!

While adding ingredients to taste when cooking is best, it is an entirely different story when baking cookies. The ratio of wet versus dry, creaminess, and so on is very close. Therefore, always use a good scale. American recipes often work with cups and spoons, which increases the chance of errors. I advise converting that to weight and weighing it anyway because measuring = knowing. (And all my recipes are in US customary, e.g., cups and oz and Metric grams, ml, etc.

Baking paper or baking mat

A grey baking plate with a green baking mat on top.

Use baking paper or a baking mat. Your cookies will stick less, and you will get them off the baking tray well after baking. So don't forget to do it. Preferably bake the cookies with top and bottom heat. All recipes on the site list the temperature for top and bottom heat (unless otherwise noted). If you only have a convection oven, lower the temperature by 30 °F (20 °C).

Cooling down on a rack

Do not let the cookies cool on the baking mat after baking, but let them harden for a while (about 5 minutes), and then place them on a grid. The air can then go around it, and your cookies will become crispy, crispy, and harden well.