If you’ve ever made cookie dough and had it come out thin, it may have left you questioning how to thicken cookie dough. If this is you, be sure to stay tuned. While there are many reasons this phenomenon happens, the truth is that it can fairly easily be fixed with just a few remedies. Ready to learn what those remedies are? Join me as I dive deep into how to thicken cookie dough in this post.
Table of Contents
- How to Thicken Cookie Dough
- How Do You Thicken Edible Cookie Dough?
- How to Thicken Cookie Batter Without Flour
- What Can I Do if My Dough Is Too Thin?
- How Thick Should Cookie Dough Be?
- What Makes Cookie Dough Thicker?
- Can You Add Flour to Already Made Cookie Dough?
- How to Thicken Cookie Dough: Flour, Cornstarch, and Chill!
- FAQs
How to Thicken Cookie Dough
Add Flour
In most cases, adding flour to your mixture will help thicken your dough significantly.
When adding more flour, be sure to only do one tablespoon at a time. Try not to exceed two tablespoons of extra flour. Though achieving the correct consistency is important, adding too much flour may cause your cookies to come out dense, unflavorful, dry, crumbly, and unappetizing.
Thus, a little goes a long way when adding extra flour to cookie dough.
Add Cornstarch
In case you aren’t aware, cornstarch is often added to cookies for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it is added to cookie dough to make it less sticky. Other times it is added to make cookies more chewy. In addition to these reasons for adding cornstarch to cookie dough, it can also be used to make cookie dough thicker.
When using cornstarch, only use a couple of teaspoons if your aim is to make your dough thicker.
Chill the Dough
Chilling the dough is an almost surefire way to make your cookie dough thicker, but just be aware that this usually only works if your cookies contain butter. Attempting to chill cookies that contain oil instead of butter may not thicken cookie dough the same way that cookie dough with butter will.
In most cases, you’ll see that cookie dough recipe will actually instruct you to chill the dough. This is often done to achieve the right consistency and to prevent runny dough. Be sure that you follow this advice, as neglecting to do so may cause your cookies to spread and become thin and flat.
Beat the Sugar
This might sound like an odd one, but one way you can help with thickening cookie dough is to make sure you properly beat the butter and sugar. This means that you should mix the two, preferably with a hand or stand mixer, until the batter becomes fluffy and turns a pale color.
This should be done before adding other wet ingredients. When beating butter and sugar together, it helps create thickness and volume that will aid in plumping up your cookie dough.
How Do You Thicken Edible Cookie Dough?
Remember that edible cookie dough can be thickened in much the same way that normal cookie dough can. Just be sure to follow the original recipe when making cookie dough edible, and only add a bit of milk at a time to prevent thin cookie dough.
Outside of this advice, feel free to add more flour or even a bit of cornstarch yoto your edible dough. This can help make the edible cookie dough more thick and enjoyable.
How to Thicken Cookie Batter Without Flour
If you’ve got runny cookie dough but no flour, try adding cornstarch to the mix. The cornstarch can help thicken things up while also making the cookies soft and chewy. You can also chill the dough to make the cookie dough look and feel thick.
What Can I Do if My Dough Is Too Thin?
As previously mentioned, there are many ways that you can ensure that your cookie dough isn’t too thin.
For the sake of convenience, I’ve added a section on how to thicken both bakeable cookie dough and edible cookie dough. I hope this helps!
Bakeable Cookie Dough
To thicken bakeable cookie dough, remember that adding flour or cornstarch usually helps. It can also help to chill your dough after mixing.
Remember that which of these methods will work best will depend on how much extra liquid is in the dough. Too much liquid, whether it is too much butter or too much milk, can spell disaster when it comes to the consistency of your cookie. Thus, it is imperative that you balance the wet ingredients with the dry to prevent runny cookie dough.
Edible Cookie Dough
What’s worse than thin cookie dough? Thin edible cookie doughs, that’s what!
Because edible cookie dough can’t be baked, consistency is very important. Therefore, when you end up with thin cookie dough that has too much moisture, it can be hard to know exactly how to proceed.
Remember that when making edible cookie dough, recipes often call for milk to replace the liquid that comes from the missing egg. Sometimes recipes like this allow you to experiment with the milk until you reach the “desired” consistency.
When this is the case, it’s important that you go easy with the extra moisture. Do your best to follow the recipe exactly and only add a tablespoon or two of milk at a time.
If you do end up with thin edible cookie dough, remediate the issue with a bit of flour or cornstarch. You can also refrigerate the dough much like you can for bakeable cookie doughs.
How Thick Should Cookie Dough Be?
When you’re making cookie dough, you should aim for the dough to match a consistency similar to soft clay or playdough. It should be soft, squishy, and moldable. However, this description of cookie dough thickness is highly subjective and will depend on the type of cookie recipe you use.
Some cookie dough recipes may be much thinner and stickier, and others may be thicker (like chocolate chip cookies).
To know for sure what kind of consistency your cookie dough should be, look closely at the recipe and look for any special notes concerning how the batter should turn out.
What Makes Cookie Dough Thicker?
There are a variety of ways that you can thicken cookie dough.
Some ways include adding additional ingredients, while others involve technique.
Check out the following ways you can thicken your wet dough the next time you find extra liquid in your batter.
Can You Add Flour to Already Made Cookie Dough?
Yes, you can absolutely add flour to already-made cookie dough. However, it may be more difficult to incorporate evenly this way.
Thus, you may end up with chunks of flour spread throughout the dough rather than being fully mixed in.
How to Thicken Cookie Dough: Flour, Cornstarch, and Chill!
If you’ve got cookie dough that’s too wet and sticky, remember that you’ve got options. Adding flour and cornstarch or simply chilling the dough are all popular ways to thicken your dough.
Additionally, you can try beating your sugar and butter for a longer amount of time to ensure that the mixture becomes thick and fluffy.
I hope this helps! See you next time!
FAQs
How do you thicken cookie dough without flour?
You can use cornstarch, or you can place the dough in the refrigerator for 30 minutes to 1 hour.
What do I do if my cookie dough is too runny?
Cookie dough that is too runny can still be cooked in some instances. However, if you want to remediate the issue, try popping it in the fridge for a while until it begins to harden a bit.
Why is my cookie dough so watery?
There are many reasons that cookie dough can end up too liquidy. It can be lacking certain dry ingredients, have too much liquid, or could simply be a bad recipe.
How do you make cookie dough more firm?
Try adding flour or cornstarch. You can also freeze the dough and bake it from frozen.
How to thicken cookie batter without flour or cornstarch?
Other ways to thicken cookie batter without flour or cornstarch include chilling or freezing the dough or beating the butter and sugar for a substantial amount of time to create more volume in the dough.
Can I bake runny cookie dough?
You can! But in most cases, it will result in flat and crispy cookies that are very prone to spread. If that’s okay with you, then be my guest!
How to make cookie dough less sticky?
To make cookie dough less sticky, add a tablespoon or two of flour and knead it in. If you can, do this prior to adding your mix-ins as the flour will be easier to incorporate this way.
