Baking cookies is a waste of time. Better to just buy them at bakery

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I want is Panera’s Kitchen sink cookie recipe so I can stop buying them and just make them at home.

With the toffee, chocolate and pretzels, this copy at recipe will be pretty pricey to make:

https://www.tablespoon.com/recipes/copycat-panera-kitchen-sink-cookies/9242e80e-8a83-4c61-9464-75a7ace4acd8

Thanks! I have everything in my pantry but the toffee. I’ll give it a try!

[Anonymous]

This thread is making me giggle…there’s a bakery in my hometown that is “famous” for their cookies, which have an OMG Secret Ingredient. They post about it on Facebook, their ads all talk about the Secret Ingredient. We’re all just like—it’s salt. Y’all make salty cookies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t like most of those giant bakery cookies. Can’t they just be normal sized?

I tend to agree but these are in-between the too large ones (which are visually unappealing) and regular sized. They're perf.

Wow, it would take my 14-year-old about 10 minutes to come up with a recipe to yield a good-quality homemade cookie that size. She wouldn’t call them “perf,” though, she’s too mature for that. We’d have fun baking them, too, because we are good bakers and we don’t balk at kitchen clean-up.

I picture OP with flour all over her face, sweating and wringing her hands in the kitchen, as an infomercial announcer asks, “Has THIS ever happened to YOU?” Close-up on OP as she cries, “There’s GOT to be a better WAY!”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think if you find a small business that makes something perfectly, it's actually silly to try and compete with it at home. We're not taking about a large sum of money. A good fresh chocolate chip cookie as good as they make it should probably be $5.

[Anonymous]

This thread inspired me to make cookies last night. So easy, so good, and like a PP, I like being able to control what goes into them.

[Anonymous]

I just baked pumpkin muffins and reduced the sugar. Love being able to improve a recipe, and make up my own on occasion.

[Anonymous]

I never really like bakery cookies but admit that if I found a really great one I’d probably be there daily. I got a really good cookie at some fancy place at the new Moynihan train station food court but I can’t remember the name of the place. It was better than homemade.

For the person asking about Irish butter, the only baking I use it in is pies. I use 1/3 kerrygold and 2/3 Crisco which for me is perfect — I realize crisco is polarizing, but I don’t care for a full butter crust.
Otherwise we buy American butter for baking. I put it on the grocery store list as “unsalted American butter”. I usually get land o lakes but would be interested if other bakers notice a difference in brand.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread inspired me to make cookies last night. So easy, so good, and like a PP, I like being able to control what goes into them.

Same! And mine were delicious.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am good at baking and make really good cookies. And I can make them for a lot less than $3 a cookie, even with inflation costs of groceries.

It sounds like you just aren’t very good at baking and don’t like it, which is fine. But other people feel differently.

Sure, a (potentially mediocre) home recipe produces more than 4 cookies, but what family needs a dozen+ cookies? Diminishing returns, you know. And gluttonous. Between the potential for mediocre cookies and too many sweets and all the time and cleanup, wiser to just go buy 4 really spectacular cookies. Support a local business, too.

What an odd post. Not everyone is a mediocre baker, a poor shopper, and might not share your family's specific cookie preferences. My family would be disappointed and puzzled if I wasted $12 on 4 potentially mediocre store bought cookies, rather than the delicious tried and true ones we bake.

$6 each butter/chips? Yes the butter might be $6 a box now but you don't use the entire box on a batch of cookies. You can cook/bake other things with most ingredients. Although I get the feeling this is more of a DoorDash household.

[Anonymous]

Do large glass baking dishes make better chocolate chip cookies? Whenever I use baking sheet pans, it seems like half the time they get too hot too quickly and overcook the bottom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get your point Op. But you don’t know the ingredients “your bakery” is using. They may be using cheap bleached flour and shorting or a mixture of cheap butter and shortening. Probably a lesser quality chocolate too. They just taste good bc they hit the fat/sugar craving and you aren’t doing any work.

But let’s given them some credit and assume they are using European butter, King Arthur flour and good quality chocolate. You only have 1 cookie each and then done. Maybe that is what your prefer? But I have three kids. I buy the best ingredients and when I make cookies, I end up with at least 24. The kids can have a couple each, take one in their lunch, or I can freeze half for later. It just makes more sense to bake myself

The bakery makes them. And they are using great butter (I feigned an allergy and confirmed) and the chocolate is good because I can isolate and taste the chunks of it. A recipe at home doesn't make 24 of the size I can buy for $3, it makes 12 at that size. And our family doesn't need or want 12. So if we freeze 8 of them, I guess we have 8 mediocre thawed out cookies for the next two weeks, which nobody is very enthused about. I'd rather just buy the perfect fresh professional ones for $12 each time we all crave one. That's $36. Versus around $12 or so for the 12 from our mediocre homemade batch. $24 premium in a month to avoid all cookie cleanup, wasted time, risk, eat the best cookies, and support a small local business. Seems to be a no-brainer to me. ymmv

Yes, ymmv. So why do you think your way is better and those who do this differently are wasting their time?

Yes i do. If you are going to bake with crap, just buy it

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Could someone share a good recipe with European butter?
I use European butter and the recipe I follow doesn’t work well I guess due to different fat content, my cookies turns out flat.

+1. And none of the recipes have this warning.

Interesting. I had no idea but have also noticed this. But flat cookies taste just as good so i don't really care that much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am good at baking and make really good cookies. And I can make them for a lot less than $3 a cookie, even with inflation costs of groceries.

It sounds like you just aren’t very good at baking and don’t like it, which is fine. But other people feel differently.

Sure, a (potentially mediocre) home recipe produces more than 4 cookies, but what family needs a dozen+ cookies? Diminishing returns, you know. And gluttonous. Between the potential for mediocre cookies and too many sweets and all the time and cleanup, wiser to just go buy 4 really spectacular cookies. Support a local business, too.

NP. Ohhh you’re a troll. Got it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is a really odd post. I have no problems with someone buying the cookies/baked goods at a bakery. I love a good bakery as much as the next person. But, to say makes such a broad, sweeping generalization that it's better to buy cookies at the bakery, is just wrong. Sure, it's convenient and you sometimes get specialty cookies that aren't easy to make at home. But, it's also more expensive and a lot of pleasure and rituals can surround the baking of cookies.

I just did a calculation of what a base sugar cookie recipe would cost me - less than $6 for a batch without chocolate chips. You don't have to even use 'good butter'. I didn't include the cost of using the oven because it's just pennies. Nor did I include the cost of mortgage or utensils because those are sunk costs - I'd pay for them whether I made cookies or not. I also didn't include the cost of my time because it wouldn't take me any longer to bake cookies than to run to the store to get them and I'm also avoiding the cost of gas.

^^PP here. I calculated the costs using the prices on Costco's website. I didn't include the cost of salt/soda because the amounts are so small and cheap. I also use the imitation vanilla recommended by America's Test Kitchen and it's just as cheap. It's only pennies that are missing from here and not worth wasting my time to calculate.
1.17 Eggs
0.20 flour
1.67 sugar
2.25 butter
5.28 Total

Imitation vanilla? As if!

[Anonymous]

"What family needs a dozen+ cookies?"