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).

Use Powdered Sugar.

The powdered sugar works to keep the dough from sticking to your work surface just like flour, but the powdered sugar dissolves into the cookie when baked. Meaning, no raw flour taste or cookie coated in white dust.

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!

Is confectioners sugar the same as powdered sugar? ›

Although the terms are often colloquially used interchangeably, they are not the same. Powdered sugar is similar to confectioners' sugar but without the cornstarch. Because the words are often mistaken for each other, you will even find "powdered sugar" in the grocery store that is actually confectioners' 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.

According to Pastry & Baking Arts Chef-Instructor Norma Arellano-Salazar, these popular cookies are also called snowballs or pecan sandies on the East Coast of the United States, as they resemble snow or sand thanks to their powdered-sugar dusting. Some even refer to them as Russian tea cookies.

What Are Pecan Sandies? Pecan sandies get their name because they have a sand like, fine texture and they have chopped pecans in them. They are a shortbread style cookie.

Powdered sugar can be used for several purposes in baked goods: Sweetener: provides a sweet flavor. Tenderizer: interferes with gluten formation, protein coagulation and starch gelatinization. Shelf life improvement: reduces the amount of water available for microbial deterioration.

On the other hand, cookie dough made with confectioners' sugar will bake up tender, with a melt-in-your-mouth texture (think of Mexican wedding cookies and other snowball cookies). Don't be tempted to use granulated sugar to make frostings and icings — you'll end up with an unappealing gritty texture.

High sugar content increases spread, especially granulated sugar. Fine sugar or confectioner's sugar decreases spread. Adding extra sugar to sweeten a recipe can have a consequence.

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.