Name: Brown Sugar Cookies
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 14 min
Ingredients: ½ cup unsalted butter; ¾ cup light brown sugar; 1½ cup all purpose flour; ½ tsp pink sea salt; ½ tsp cream of tartar; 1 Tbsp milk; ½ cup sprinkles (optional)

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As a kid, my favorite thing about the grocery store was getting samples from the bakery of the sprinkle coated sugar cookies. They were soft, sweet, and so colorful. Now that I’m an adult, though I still love sprinkles, elevated flavors hold more of a draw. So, today, we’re making brown sugar cookies.

Brown sugar cookies on a tray with one leaning against a glass of milk with christmas baubles in front.

What Makes Brown Sugar Cookies So Great

Sugar cookies are pretty good, right? They’re also pretty bland. As far as cookies go, they’re more about looking nice than they are about big flavor.

So, when you go into brown sugar cookie territory, you’re saying, I want a simple cookie, but I want it to taste amazing. To get that big flavor, we’re going to do 3 things.

3 Tips for Big Flavor in Your Brown Sugar Cookies

First, we’re going to swap the sugar for brown sugar. However, we’re not going for exact. Where in my sprinkle cookie recipe, I call for 1 cup of pure cane sugar, we’re going to do 3/4 cup brown sugar here.

Why? Because you pack brown sugar into the cup to measure, so you’re actually getting more sweetness than you think. Also, you don’t want the sugar to be the only thing you taste.

Second, we’re going to brown the butter. Now, sometimes, when you’re browning butter, it turns a pretty orange-goldenrod color, and you stop there. This time, we’re going to brown it right to the edge of being burnt.

Let it go just past that golden amber tone and then kill the heat. Give it a stir for about a minute. Then, pour it into your container and set it right in the fridge to slow the cooking down. Give it about 45-50 minutes to solidify.

Third, we’re going to remove the vanilla. This is weird, right? Why would I remove something for bigger flavor? Well, browned butter has a really good flavor and when mixed with brown sugar it is almost caramel-like. However, when you add in vanilla, the strangest thing happens.

Those caramel flavor notes you worked so hard for take a backseat and all you taste is the delicate vanilla flavor. You have to search for the brown butter. That’s no fun. So, by simplifying, we make the flavor bolder.

To Coat in Sprinkles or Not?

I love sprinkles. And around the holidays, I feel like the best way to make your favorite cookies extra festive is to load up the jimmies, hundreds-and-thousands, and sanding sugar and just floor it.

For my sprinkle mix, I combined those 3 types of sprinkles in a bowl (I used Wilton’s Holiday Mix 6-cell Sprinkles). You could also get premixed sprinkles like the Christmas Traditions mix from Sprinkle Pop.

You can use whatever you like, but you should try mixing different types together for a little extra fun.

And if you choose to completely skip past the sprinkles, that’s cool, too! As I say in most of my posts, this is your bake, so do what feels good to you.

Brown sugar cookies on a tray with one broken in half in front of a glass of milk with christmas baubles in front.

Working with Brown Butter

There are a couple things you should know about working with brown butter. It’s not all that complicated, but if you like to know how things work, keep reading.

I’ve said a couple times that you’ll brown your butter a little darker than you’re used to. You’ll know if it’s burnt because it will smell acrid, but just up until then, it’ll smell gorgeous.

So, go by smell and trust you instinct.

You, then, need to chill it to stop the cooking process. This will also help it to solidify up a bit. We covered this in my chocolate chip cookie recipe as well. A little less than an hour in the fridge will help it firm up while still being soft.

When you use regular butter, you want it room temperature and softened. The same is true with browned butter. So, that’s how we’re getting to that point.

Now, when you go to cream it with the sugar, you’re looking for the texture of buttercream. This will take about 5 minutes in the stand mixer on medium speed. It will get really nice and fluffy and light.

Broken brown sugar sprinkle cookie next to a glass of milk with sprinkle swirls in it.

Cream of Tartar vs. Baking Soda

This recipe also calls for cream of tartar rather than baking soda. This was the result of experimenting. Baking soda is my go-to with cookie recipes, but with standard sugar cookies and snickerdoodles, you’ll often see cream of tartar as the leavening agent.

What it does is makes your cookies pillowy, but as you can see from the interiors, they’re not necessarily cakey. They are chewy and tender, and there’s no hint of bitterness like you might get with baking soda.

This is another tip to make the flavor of brown butter the real star of your cookies. Of course, if you don’t have any, don’t be afraid to sub in 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda. They will still turn out just fine.

Hand dipping a broken brown sugar sprinkle cookie into a glass of milk with red and green swirls left in the milk.

Making Your Brown Sugar Cookies the Right Size

Usually I make some pretty small cookies. I’m a fan of portion control, and small cookies make me feel better about eating five of them at a time. No, this time we’re making them pretty big. This recipe makes twelve cookies.

So, you’ll spoon out 3-Tablespoon sized balls to start. If you are rolling them in sprinkles, give them a little roll between your palms to smooth them out first. Then, toss them in your chosen sprinkles.

If you’re going without sprinkles, you can still roll them in your palms for a smoother texture, or you can just plop them out onto your baking sheet and go.

The main thing is that you have 12 even-sized dough balls so you know your cookies are large enough. Obviously, there’s nothing wrong with smaller cookies, but your texture is going to come out different.

Why Size Matters

We’re going to bake these babies at 350ºF for 12-14 minutes. Does that sound familiar? Yes, that’s because we always bake our cookies for that long.

When you bake smaller cookies, you end up with something that’s closer to cooked in the middle and a little browner on the outside. However, when you go larger, you end up with less baking on the inside (because… science).

So, the reason I want you to make these cookies big is that the inside will be just to the edge of underbaked. It’s moist, chewy, melt-in-the-mouth, and so good.

You can, of course, go a couple of minutes longer for them to be more done in the middle. That’s up to you, though.

Tools You’ll Need to Make Brown Sugar Cookies

Here’s what you need to make delicious brown sugar cookies:

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