Old cookie recipe with Crisco as an ingredient.

[kentc]

I have baked this cookie on and off for decades. Although I love its texture, I've grown to dislike the mouthfeel and taste I get from the vegetable shortening. The recipe calls for equal measures of butter and shortening. Do I simply double the butter and eliminate the shortening, or is it more complicated than that?

The recipe is in tablespoons and cups, not weight.

 

[chassis]

Butter will result in more buttery flavor and less structure (more spread when baked).

Structure from shortening is hard to substitute for. Lard is an option but a meat/animal flavor could result.

 

[Ricksza]

Butter will result in more buttery flavor and less structure (more spread when baked).

Structure from shortening is hard to substitute for. Lard is an option but a meat/animal flavor could result.

How about if you refrigerate or freeze the cookies before baking?

 

[kentc]

Thanks for both replies. I think I will experiment a bit. Recipe calls for 6 tablespoons of butter and six tablespoons of shortening. [ will make next batch with 7 butter and 5 shortening. Batch after that 8 to 4 and so on, till failure or success.

Refrigerating is worth trying also I think. Freezing not really sold on. Concerned that exterior would get excessively browned/dry before interior is properly set.

 

[chassis]

Add temperature+time as an element to your experiment. You could try all butter, freeze, then bake at a high-ish temp for 5 minutes, then lower the temp. You could open the oven door for 10 seconds to dump some heat after the first 5 minutes.

 

[Ima]

In trying to reduce dairy, I recently substituted butter in a cherry-choc oatmeal cookie for margarine (which, like Crisco, also contains solidified partially hydrogenated oil) in a 1:1 ratio. The dough seemed too liquid, but not to be deterred, I baked one cookie - it spread out massively and was oily. I added more flour until the dough was more firm, and baked a second cookie - it baked well.
So I learned that, when substituting, you may need to experiment with the flour until dough consistency is correct.

Then I made the dough into short columns (2.5cm long), froze them, and a few weeks later baked them from frozen. In the oven, the little columns collapsed into beautiful round cookies. The baked texture was crispy on the outside and chewy on the inside. A delightful success. Baking cookies straight from the freezer is a wonderful trick!