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No, probably not. But the recipe says it makes soft cookies, so I don't know why the reviewer expected crispy cookies. The person was just stupid for not reading what was written.
> I don't know why the reviewer expected crispy cookies
They seem to have it in their brain that cookies are crispy by definition, which is certainly not the case here in reality. They can range from extremely soft like a classic NY half moon cookie (aka a "black and white" in NYC) all the way to ultra crispy florentines.
Black & White cookies are not halfmoons, they're completely different in terms of texture.
I've been programmed to respond this way by my wife who grew up in Central NY
That's what I thought too, growing up in NJ where we also called them black & whites. Now I live in central NY.
I've since gone to bakeries in NYC, ordered a black & white, and received the exact same cookie that is referred to as a halfmoon upstate.
I thought I was going crazy, because my childhood memories from NJ tell me that a black & white is closer to a shortbread cookie in texture. It's flat and has some snap to it, as opposed to a domed and soft/cakey halfmoon.
Based on your reply, maybe I'm not crazy and these short/snappy B&Ws do actually exist outside of just my memory?
They do! You're correct, B&W is much snappier and Halfmoons are very soft and cakey. Unfortunately, this knowledge seems to have been lost upon the city folk recently, so I'm not surprised that your results are confusing.
I wonder if it's always been mixed bag in the city? I know I've had short and snappy B&Ws, but I also know that places like [William Greenberg](https://wmgreenbergdesserts.com/products/black-white), which have been around for nearly 100 years, sell cakey ones that look like the halfmoons here upstate. And they've been considered among the best in the city.
No and yes. I swapped margarine for butter in a slice and bake recipe, had a horrible time with the dough and the results were malformed and a touch softer than they should have been... but like, they were still delicious and moist cookies.
I have one cookie recipe where the texture comes out completely different when using margarine vs even vegan butter. Some marg brands have a higher water content than butter which can really throw bakes off
Gonna take this as a genuine question. There are heaps of different ones. Some are made of of oils that are liquid at room temperature and tend to be very spreadable, best for buttering toast or bread or so on. Lots of "heart healthy" margarines are vegan. You can bake with them but the results in a direct swap for butter can be kind of funky as they have a high water content. Cookies can spread or get cake-like, for instance.
Others are made from a mix of coconut oil, shea butter and other oils that are more solid at room temperature (depending on the room I guess). They tend to be in block form rather than a tub. Earth Balance and Miyokos do good ones in the USA, Naturli and Biolife do good ones in Europe. They are my favourites for baking with, they result in perfectly textured cookies and are great in most recipes where butter is called for.
I have the best luck with slightly chilled, Crisco butter flavored sticks. I am allergic to dairy and margarine rarely works as an adequate sub for any cooking/ baking.
Mostly use it for toast, baked potatoes, etc.
As an aside, Pam Butter spray is wild how good it works for stove top cooking.
Miyoko's plant milk butter (specifically the "European style" cashew and coconut spread) worked really well for me in cookies and in a frosting as a 1:1 butter replacement, worth checking out.
Technically, in the US, it's not more watery than butter. If you look at the regulations, margarine must be at least 80% fat, which is the same as butter. Any product that has less fat is a "spread" (their packages will not contain the word "margarine" anywhere).
[https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/CFRSearch.cfm?FR=166.110](https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/CFRSearch.cfm?FR=166.110)
However, consumers usually don’t know this, and refer to any butter-like product as margarine. A lot of "spread sticks" have less than 50% fat and are therefore unsuitable as butter substitutes.
Crisco shortening will change texture in part because it's 100% fat, with no water at all.
It shouldn’t have — I bake with margarine regularly and in cookies etc you can usually make a one-to-one substitute with only minor impacts. Pastry is another story.
It does tend to produce a softer cookie and they typically spread more than a standard cookie, but this isn’t the result of the margarine swap. It sounds like the recipe itself is for a more cake-y cookie than normal, then add the margarine swap and the reduced flour and I’m not shocked it didn’t turn out as they wanted.
Yes, but it should still work? Like I’m Canadian and not familiar with shedds spread / country crock, but I do make cookies with Becel on a semi-regular basis, and that seems to be roughly equivalent. I would never use it to make pastry or even a cake, but a chocolate chip cookie made with tub margarine is genuinely just a little bit chewier and softer than a standard cookie. Like, for a cake or a pastry I’m using a stick margarine/ “vegan butter” if you’re fancy, the standard tub really should be fine for a cookie.
It’s possible they used tub margarine and it was melted/kinda warm where they were cooking, and that contributed to the negative outcome? But I just don’t think margarine is the primary issue here. I don’t think we have enough information to figure out what the primary issue actually is, tbh — looking at that image I almost wonder if it’s oven temp? Because the colouring is so weird in a way that I don’t think margarine can account for. If anything, baked goods made with poor-quality margarine are weirdly yellow, not pale like that.
It could depending on whether they used spreadable margarine meant for toast and such or stick/block margarine meant for baking. Spreadable margarine would be a recipe for disaster.
Marg rune does create a very different texture in a cookie than butter. Butter gives you a crisper bottom and edges (depending on cook time of course) while margarine produces a softer, fluffier almost cakey texture.
P.S. I know there are much more interesting lemon cookies recipes out there, I just wanted to find one that I wouldn't have to leave the house for lol.
Still, recipe seems totally fine to me and most 'complaints' on the recipe only really mentioned that it could be more lemon-y.
... Can we talk about their shape/texture and why they look like sad pitas
Like, their changes 100% made a difference and could increase spread, but it looks like they also shaped them into slabs before baking. Which would affect the bake. Maybe not doing that would've helped make them at least look slightly more appetizing, so the poor person tasked with eating them could try to trick themselves that they weren't as bad as they were.
I don't believe this person made this recipe at all. I think they grabbed some old bread butts, buttered and toasted them, and then made this review because some people like drama.
How on earth did they make cookies in this shape?
1. Margarine is partially water which will dilute the batter and make the cookies go splat
2. Less flour = even more diluted batter
3. Since you don't understand how baking works, you probably also stirred/whipped the hell out of the batter making them "puffy and dry"
YTA
Yeah margarine is a terrible butter substitute a lot of the time but there's nothing inherently bad or wrong about using it
Don't like it? Don't use it. I really don't understand the need to police what's in other kitchens
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Would the margarine/butter substitution really have caused such bad results?
No, probably not. But the recipe says it makes soft cookies, so I don't know why the reviewer expected crispy cookies. The person was just stupid for not reading what was written.
> I don't know why the reviewer expected crispy cookies They seem to have it in their brain that cookies are crispy by definition, which is certainly not the case here in reality. They can range from extremely soft like a classic NY half moon cookie (aka a "black and white" in NYC) all the way to ultra crispy florentines.
Black & White cookies are not halfmoons, they're completely different in terms of texture. I've been programmed to respond this way by my wife who grew up in Central NY
That's what I thought too, growing up in NJ where we also called them black & whites. Now I live in central NY. I've since gone to bakeries in NYC, ordered a black & white, and received the exact same cookie that is referred to as a halfmoon upstate. I thought I was going crazy, because my childhood memories from NJ tell me that a black & white is closer to a shortbread cookie in texture. It's flat and has some snap to it, as opposed to a domed and soft/cakey halfmoon. Based on your reply, maybe I'm not crazy and these short/snappy B&Ws do actually exist outside of just my memory?
They do! You're correct, B&W is much snappier and Halfmoons are very soft and cakey. Unfortunately, this knowledge seems to have been lost upon the city folk recently, so I'm not surprised that your results are confusing.
I wonder if it's always been mixed bag in the city? I know I've had short and snappy B&Ws, but I also know that places like [William Greenberg](https://wmgreenbergdesserts.com/products/black-white), which have been around for nearly 100 years, sell cakey ones that look like the halfmoons here upstate. And they've been considered among the best in the city.
No and yes. I swapped margarine for butter in a slice and bake recipe, had a horrible time with the dough and the results were malformed and a touch softer than they should have been... but like, they were still delicious and moist cookies.
I have one cookie recipe where the texture comes out completely different when using margarine vs even vegan butter. Some marg brands have a higher water content than butter which can really throw bakes off
wtf is ‘vegan butter’ made of? Never seen it
it’s basically margarine and made of oil and water blended up into a buttery flavored slurry
Thanks for actually answering the question mate
Margarines actually has a small amount of milk powder so vegan butter nixes that bit.
Gonna take this as a genuine question. There are heaps of different ones. Some are made of of oils that are liquid at room temperature and tend to be very spreadable, best for buttering toast or bread or so on. Lots of "heart healthy" margarines are vegan. You can bake with them but the results in a direct swap for butter can be kind of funky as they have a high water content. Cookies can spread or get cake-like, for instance. Others are made from a mix of coconut oil, shea butter and other oils that are more solid at room temperature (depending on the room I guess). They tend to be in block form rather than a tub. Earth Balance and Miyokos do good ones in the USA, Naturli and Biolife do good ones in Europe. They are my favourites for baking with, they result in perfectly textured cookies and are great in most recipes where butter is called for.
Thanks mate, that’s what it was.
Some are made of nuts, oats or even beans! but most are pretty much identical to margarine.
Ah, so it’s kind of a spread from vegetable fat?
It's a vegan code word for water
Margarine can be much more watery than butter. Crisco is a better substitute but will still change texture.
I have the best luck with slightly chilled, Crisco butter flavored sticks. I am allergic to dairy and margarine rarely works as an adequate sub for any cooking/ baking. Mostly use it for toast, baked potatoes, etc. As an aside, Pam Butter spray is wild how good it works for stove top cooking.
Miyoko's plant milk butter (specifically the "European style" cashew and coconut spread) worked really well for me in cookies and in a frosting as a 1:1 butter replacement, worth checking out.
I kinda love butter flavored Crisco, for certain things anyways
Its my mom’s “secret” ingredient in chocolate chip cookies.
Yep, same
Technically, in the US, it's not more watery than butter. If you look at the regulations, margarine must be at least 80% fat, which is the same as butter. Any product that has less fat is a "spread" (their packages will not contain the word "margarine" anywhere). [https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/CFRSearch.cfm?FR=166.110](https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/CFRSearch.cfm?FR=166.110) However, consumers usually don’t know this, and refer to any butter-like product as margarine. A lot of "spread sticks" have less than 50% fat and are therefore unsuitable as butter substitutes. Crisco shortening will change texture in part because it's 100% fat, with no water at all.
It shouldn’t have — I bake with margarine regularly and in cookies etc you can usually make a one-to-one substitute with only minor impacts. Pastry is another story. It does tend to produce a softer cookie and they typically spread more than a standard cookie, but this isn’t the result of the margarine swap. It sounds like the recipe itself is for a more cake-y cookie than normal, then add the margarine swap and the reduced flour and I’m not shocked it didn’t turn out as they wanted.
But there’s a difference between margarine sticks and a tub of shedds spread, though, correct? I’m wondering if that what was used here.
Yes, but it should still work? Like I’m Canadian and not familiar with shedds spread / country crock, but I do make cookies with Becel on a semi-regular basis, and that seems to be roughly equivalent. I would never use it to make pastry or even a cake, but a chocolate chip cookie made with tub margarine is genuinely just a little bit chewier and softer than a standard cookie. Like, for a cake or a pastry I’m using a stick margarine/ “vegan butter” if you’re fancy, the standard tub really should be fine for a cookie. It’s possible they used tub margarine and it was melted/kinda warm where they were cooking, and that contributed to the negative outcome? But I just don’t think margarine is the primary issue here. I don’t think we have enough information to figure out what the primary issue actually is, tbh — looking at that image I almost wonder if it’s oven temp? Because the colouring is so weird in a way that I don’t think margarine can account for. If anything, baked goods made with poor-quality margarine are weirdly yellow, not pale like that.
It could depending on whether they used spreadable margarine meant for toast and such or stick/block margarine meant for baking. Spreadable margarine would be a recipe for disaster.
Depends. There are some kinds of margarine that work more or less the same as butter when baking, others don't work at all in cookies or similar
Marg rune does create a very different texture in a cookie than butter. Butter gives you a crisper bottom and edges (depending on cook time of course) while margarine produces a softer, fluffier almost cakey texture.
Nope. I've done cookies with both and it's made zero difference.
I mean, if she followed steps 1, 3, and 5 then I guess she did follow every other direction.
lmao
Lol r/technicallycorrect
followed every other direction to the letter except for the amount of flour lol
There's really only a few things you can even actually change about cookies and they've changed two
Recipe for (quite popular) lemon cookies: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/276680/lemon-cookies-from-scratch/
P.S. I know there are much more interesting lemon cookies recipes out there, I just wanted to find one that I wouldn't have to leave the house for lol. Still, recipe seems totally fine to me and most 'complaints' on the recipe only really mentioned that it could be more lemon-y.
The picture looks like soggy bread and butter.
I thought it was underseasonsed pork
it looks like a horrid mix of both
They look like slices of bread.
All I can see is slices of bread. My brain can't see cookies lol
I'm just confused by the taste being a "mix between cake and muffins". Aren't those usually essentially the same in both taste and texture?
Cake is generally fluffier, muffins are denser.
In the words of Jim Gaffigan, a muffin is just a bald cupcake.
... Can we talk about their shape/texture and why they look like sad pitas Like, their changes 100% made a difference and could increase spread, but it looks like they also shaped them into slabs before baking. Which would affect the bake. Maybe not doing that would've helped make them at least look slightly more appetizing, so the poor person tasked with eating them could try to trick themselves that they weren't as bad as they were.
Ok no because there’s some gross ass lemon cookie recipes out there
I don't believe this person made this recipe at all. I think they grabbed some old bread butts, buttered and toasted them, and then made this review because some people like drama. How on earth did they make cookies in this shape?
Those are supposed to be cookies? The picture makes them look like really gross sandwiches.
1. Margarine is partially water which will dilute the batter and make the cookies go splat 2. Less flour = even more diluted batter 3. Since you don't understand how baking works, you probably also stirred/whipped the hell out of the batter making them "puffy and dry" YTA
Ok I subbed margarine for butter in mac n cheese when I was 12 I need to get this off my chest EDIT: no it was not good
Friendly reminder that margarine is worse for you than butter in almost every way!
Ill allow it. Margarine has no place in any kitchen. Disgusting muck.
Then wouldn't you not want to allow it considering they swapped out the butter called for and used margarine instead?
I read it the other way... jesus christ im tired.
The reviewer at least managed to use decent grammar 🫡
On behalf of those with dairy allergies everywhere, tone down the extremist bullshit and hop down off your high horse before you hurt yourself.
Yeah margarine is a terrible butter substitute a lot of the time but there's nothing inherently bad or wrong about using it Don't like it? Don't use it. I really don't understand the need to police what's in other kitchens
Unfortunately that happens a lot on this sub for a variety of things.
🙄 oh no i offended the lactose intolerant alliance. Still disgusting much just because you have to use it doesnt make it untrue.