On food and cooking the science and lore of the kitchen ( PDFDrive ) 1077

combining them Flour Most cookies are made with pastry or all-purpose flour, but both bread flour and cake flour produce doughs and batters that spread less (thanks respectively to more gluten and more absorbant starch) A high proportion of flour to water, as in shortbread and pastry-dough cookies, limits both gluten development and starch gelation — as little as 20% of the starch in some dry cookies is gelated — and produces a crumbly texture A high proportion of water to flour, as in batterbased cookies, dilutes gluten proteins, allows extensive starch gelation, and produces either a soft, cakelike texture or a crisp, crunchy one, depending on the method and how much moisture is baked out of the cookie For doughs that need to hold their shape during baking — those rolled out and stamped with a cookie cutter — a high flour content and some gluten development are necessary The baker gives fluid batters some solidity by chilling them, and then shapes them by extruding them through a pastry pipe or setting them in molds A coarser but more fragile backbone can be created by replacing some or all of the flour with ground nuts, as in classic macaroons made only with egg whites, sugar, and almonds Sugar Sugar makes several contributions to cookie structure and texture When creamed with the fat, or beaten with egg, it introduces air bubbles into the mix and lightens the texture It competes with the flour starch for water, and raises the starch gelation temperature nearly to the boiling point: so it adds hardness and crispness A large proportion of pure table sugar, sucrose, contributes to hardness in another way The proportion of sugar in some cookie doughs is so high that only about half the sugar ... by chilling them, and then shapes them by extruding them through a pastry pipe or setting them in molds A coarser but more fragile backbone can be created by replacing some or all of the flour with ground nuts, as in classic... bubbles into the mix and lightens the texture It competes with the flour starch for water, and raises the starch gelation temperature nearly to the boiling point: so it adds hardness and crispness... crispness A large proportion of pure table sugar, sucrose, contributes to hardness in another way The proportion of sugar in some cookie doughs is so high that only about half the sugar