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Recipe Review
Kelli Foster
Kelli FosterSenior Contributing Food Editor
Kelli is a Senior Contributing Food Editor for Kitchn. She's a graduate of the French Culinary Institute and author of the cookbooks, Plant-Based Buddha Bowls, The Probiotic Kitchen, Buddha Bowls, and Everyday Freekeh Meals. She lives in New Jersey.
updated Dec 11, 2019
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One thing you should know about Trisha Yearwood is that her recipes are nearly as popular as her music. That’s right — in addition to being a Grammy award-winning country music star, Trisha Yearwood is also a New York Times best-selling cookbook author (several times over!) and host of the Food Network show Trisha’s Southern Kitchen, which is in its 15th season.
With that said, it probably won’t surprise you to learn she has a wildly popular snickerdoodle recipe on Food Network’s website. It has a five-star rating with nearly 150 rave reviews from commenters who have been making this recipe for years. Naturally, I had to see what all the fuss was about, so I included it in our showdown of the all-time best snickerdoodle cookie recipes. Here’s how it went.
Get the recipe: Trisha Yearwood’s Snickerdoodles
How to Make Trisha Yearwood’s Snickerdoodles
Right off the bat, I noticed three ingredients in these cookies that made me raise my eyebrows: salted butter (unsalted is the norm since it gives you more control over the amount of salt), medium eggs (large is standard in most recipes), and what seemed like a small amount of ground cinnamon (two teaspoons) for four-dozen cookies.
Still, I went in with an open mind. To begin, you’ll combine softened salted butter and vegetable shortening with granulated sugar and eggs, then mix thoroughly with an electric mixer. In a separate bowl, you’ll sift together the dry ingredients (flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt), then stir these into the wet ingredients.
In a small bowl, you’ll stir together granulated sugar and ground cinnamon for the cookie coating. Without resting the cookie dough, you’ll scoop out about a tablespoon of dough, shape into a ball, and roll each in the cinnamon-sugar before placing on an ungreased cookie sheet. The cookies are baked until the edges are set but the centers are still soft, eight to 10 minutes. You’ll transfer the cookies to wire racks for cooling as soon as they come out of the oven.
My Honest Review of Trisha Yearwood’s Snickerdoodles
This was my first time making one of Trisha Yearwood’s recipes. I’ll give it points for being easy to follow, but it turns out I was right about the small amount of cinnamon — this recipe really skimps on the cinnamon-sugar coating. In fact, I actually ran out with a few cookies to go. I did, however, enjoy the salted butter — the cookies were not too salty, and in fact had a very balanced flavor.
Classic snickerdoodles have soft, chewy centers with crisp edges, so that’s what I was expecting and hoping to find here. Instead, the texture of these cookies really missed the mark. The cookies were puffy and dense — by far the most dense of the four recipes I tried. I also found the dough to be crumbly and hard to work with at first, and a few commenters had the same complaint. These cookies are fine, although unmemorable, and there are other recipes that make a much better snickerdoodle.
If You’re Making Trisha Yearwood’s Snickerdoodles, a Few Tips
Large eggs will work just fine. There’s no need to buy a carton of medium eggs just for this recipe. Two large eggs (the standard size eggs used in most recipes) will work just fine.
Swap the vegetable shortening for an equal amount of butter. There’s no reason to buy shortening just for this recipe. If you don’t have vegetable shortening handy or prefer not to use it, you can swap an equal amount of softened butter.
Use more ground cinnamon and sugar. Up the cinnamon and sugar to use 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon and 2 tablespoons granulated sugar. This will ensure you have plenty to give each cookie a generous coating.
Rating: 5/10
Have you ever madeTrisha Yearwood’s Snickerdoodles? Tell us what you thought!
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