Pecan Sandies Cookie Recipe With Powdered Sugar (2024)

FAQs

How does powdered sugar affect cookies? ›

Powdered sugar (also known as confectioners' sugar) contains cornstarch. The cornstarch absorbs moisture from the rest of the ingredients, making an extra tender and chewy cookie.

Use powdered sugar instead of flour to roll your dough: if you're like me and use every bit of your dough, I recommend using powdered sugar instead of flour to roll your dough.

Place the cookies on wire racks to cool completely. The confectioners' sugar will melt a bit and get sticky; that's ok. Once the cookies have completely cooled, roll in confectioners' sugar again. This is when the sugar will really stick.

The brown sugar contributes a faint butterscotch note that is characteristic of a Pecan Sandie (much like the effect it has on the flavor of Butter Pecan Ice Cream). The powdered sugar makes for a tender and slightly crumbly texture.

You'll end up with a grainy, unappealing texture. Lastly, store-bought powdered sugar generally includes corn starch, which prevents it from caking together. This can lead to unpredictable outcomes when you interchange the two.

Can powdered sugar be substituted for granulated sugar in recipes? A. It is not recommended to substitute powdered sugar for granulated sugar. Since powdered sugar has a much finer texture, and it contains a small percentage of cornstarch to prevent caking, substituting can give you unexpected results.

Confectioners' sugar, on the other hand, is powdered sugar with starch added, to prevent it from caking as it sits. Most sugar companies use cornstarch, which helps keep the confectioners' sugar from melting into cakes, cookies, and other sweets, like Fry Bread, when it's dusted over their tops.

Cream of tartar makes cookies chewy, as it precludes the sugar in the dough from crystalizing, which would lead to crispiness (ie: the opposite of chewiness).

Warm weather during the summer can bring on butter bleed, which happens when the butter from the cookie stains the royal icing and leaves it looking blotchy.

For this technique, you'll want to decorate your cookies before baking. We recommend using decorative sugar (also known as colored sanding sugar), Turbinado sugar (coarse golden sugar) or pearl sugar (coarse clear sugar). It all sounds super fancy but it's really very easy!

How do you keep powdered sugar from melting on cookies? ›

Using cornstarch to keep your powdered sugar from melting is as simple as adding a small amount to the powdered sugar and mixing well. The next time you need to finish a bake with powdered sugar, put this simple trick into practice by using about 1 teaspoon of cornstarch per 1/4 cup of powdered sugar.

These cookies are named after their crumbly texture. They have a sandy or breadcrumb-like texture when the flour and butter are mixed together. Pecan Sandies are also a sandy color, which makes the name very fitting.

The key with shortbread is not to overhandle it. Make the dough exactly as instructed, but don't mess around making shapes or over rolling the dough - you will end up with delicious but tough biscuits.

The main enemy of crispy cookies like biscotti, pecan sandies, gingersnaps, or crispier chocolate chip cookies is moisture. To keep them dry and crunchy, you'll want to keep these cookies in an airtight container that's not completely sealed, which will help to keep moisture and humidity at bay.

Unlike granulated sugar, powdered sugar dissolves easily at room temperature, with no real agitation needed. That makes it great for glazes, buttercreams, frostings, icings, mousses—basically anywhere where the mixture won't be cooked or where a smooth texture with no hint of graininess is especially vital.

Granulated sugar

Using granulated white sugar will result in a flatter, crispier and lighter-colored cookie. Granulated sugar is hygroscopic, so it attracts and absorbs the liquid in the dough. This slows down the development of the gluten (flour), which makes the cookies crispier.

Sugar creates texture

Sugar easily binds with water, which accomplishes two main things. 1) It locks in moisture, keeping your baked goods from drying out; and 2) It inhibits the development of gluten which keeps your cookies, cakes and sweet breads softer.

Powdered sugar is extremely fine and so the sugars dissolve quickly. You use powdered sugar most often when the resulting product won't be cooked to dissolve the sugar - such as when making icings and glazes.