Brown Butter Snickerdoodles

Recipe post day two. I told you you guys would be seeing a lot of these. Yesterday consisted of waking up, watching The Hills on Netflix (We feel like we are LC and Heidi in the first season when they move into their LA apartment), eating breakfast in bed and blogging. After my lazy morning I decided to make another one of my pinned recipes just to keep my momentum up on accomplishing my goal! 

I originally pinned  these brown butter salted caramel cookies, but when I was on the site to get the recipe I found a version that didn't call for the caramel. I opted for the simple version and started gathering my ingredients.  I had everything for these cookies except cream of tarter. Cream of tarter  is a staple in snickerdoodles, but I really didn't want to have to go to the grocery store to buy one thing. First off groceries cost money, and second off, one thing? No, not worth it. 

Now that I have entered the world of having to buy my own groceries I have realized how expensive it is. I was going up and down the aisles the other day picking the cheapest option and getting the generic brand of as much as possible. I even saved the coupons the check out guy gave me. Noooo please don't let me turn into a crazy coupon lady.

It is the best feeling when you find a recipe and have all the ingredients on hand. I was set on making these cookies and not having cream of tarter wasn't going to get me to the store or stop me from making them. Enter, substitutions. I am a risky baker. I bake like you are supposed to cook. I never sift things when it says to, I usually always double the amount of vanilla extract, I eyeball the measurement of flour and just throw things in here and there. This is completely against the rules of baking. But oh well, things usually turn out just fine. 

I found if I used three teaspoons of baking powder it could replace the combination of baking soda and cream of tarter. Perfect, no grocery store trip for me, and I went on with baking! 

Below is a copy of my adapted recipe using baking powder, but here is the link for the original recipe. I also used these instructions to brown butter in the microwave. This is so much easier than doing it over the stove and it worked perfectly. 

Brown Butter Snickerdoodles
makes 36-40 cookies

For the cookies:
2½ cups All-purpose Flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoons Cinnamon
¼ teaspoons Salt
2 sticks Unsalted Butter
1¼ cup Dark Brown Sugar
½ cups Granulated Sugar
1  Egg
1  Egg Yolk
1 Tablespoon Vanilla Extract
1 Tablespoon Plain Greek Yogurt

For the rolling mixture:
¼ cups Granulated Sugar
2 teaspoons Cinnamon

Directions:
Whisk together the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt in a bowl and set aside. 

Place two sticks in a microwave safe bowl and cover with a plate. Microwave for 5 minutes and you will have perfect browned butter. Set aside to cool. 

With an electric mixer, mix the butter and sugars until thoroughly blended. Beat in the egg, yolk, vanilla, and yogurt until combined. Add the dry ingredients slowly and beat on low speed just until combined.

Chill your dough in the refrigerator (important!) until the dough is cold about 30-60 minutes, or place in freezer for about 20 minutes if you are super eager, although I cannot promise the same results if you do this. Fridge is always best! If you desire a puffier cookie, keep the dough in the fridge overnight.

Preheat the oven to 350ºF.

Once dough is chilled, measure about 1 1/2 tablespoons of dough and roll into balls. Meanwhile, mix the rolling mixture ingredients in a bowl. Roll balls in the cinnamon-sugar rolling mixture. Place dough balls on cookie sheet, 2 inches apart. If you desire a thinner cookie, flatten the tops of the cookies a tiny bit (very tiny) with your hand.

Bake the cookies 8-11 minutes or until the edges of the cookies begin to turn golden brown. They will look a bit underdone in the middle but will continue to cook once out of the oven. Bake longer if you like crispier cookies. Cool the cookies on the sheets at least 2 minutes. Remove the cooled cookies from the baking sheets after a few minutes and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

It is probably illegal for me to say this, but take some risks when baking. Eyeball the measurements, use substitutions and live a little. These cookies turned out great with my version of baking them!

Annie