Cookie Food Lab Hannah Wimberley Objective: In this lab I will be observing how flours with different levels

of gluten protein affect the texture and quality of Chocolate Chip Cookies. I suspect that the bread flour will produce the best cookie. Bread flour has more gluten in it, which means that the cookie will be chewy. The cake and rice flours will probably produce the worst cookie texture, there is little gluten in both and I suspect that they will be flat and crunchy.

Introduction: The different flours used in this experiment will be all-purpose, bread, cake, and rice flour. Wheat flour has two main classifications, winter and spring. These can be broken down into sub groups, soft, hard, white, and red wheat. For this lab I will be using white wheat flour. Depending on brand or the region where it is purchased, flour may be composed of all hard or soft wheat or a blend of the two. Hard wheat is wheat with hard, dark-colored kernels with high gluten content. This type of wheat is used for baked goods that need sturdier webbing such as bread. Soft wheat has lower gluten content, which makes it ideal for baked goods such as cakes or biscuits, which have a finer crumb. All-purpose flour, which is a combination of both soft and hard wheats, has a gluten content of 9-11%, while bread flour has a higher gluten content of 12.5-14%. Cake flour and rice flour have the lowest gluten contents of the four flours used in the experiment. Cake flour has about 8% gluten content, and rice flour has no gluten. Daley, Regan. (2001). In The Sweet Kitchen. New York: Artisan Flour is used to create the main structure in baked goods. Flour consists of starches and proteins. These starches can be broken down into complex carbohydrates or even simple sugars. Flour binds to the liquids and fats in batter and dough, creating a uniform and homogeneous

mixture and ensures that all of the ingredients in the recipe are evenly distributed. The gluten protein that exists in the flour lends structure to baked goods. The gluten is formed by two proteins found in the flour and the addition of liquid. The two proteins are glutenin and gliadin. Agitating or kneading the dough works the flour and builds up gluten networks. The more protein that is in the flour, the more gluten formed. If a leavening agent is added, it causes the dough to rise via the release of carbon dioxide. While dough is rising, existing gluten threads touch and create more links in the dough. While the dough is baking, the proteins and starches in the flour transform to become sturdy webbing. Cookies were originally created by accident. Cooks would test the temperature of their wood fire oven by placing a small amount of cake batter on a baking sheet. These cookies were called "koekje", meaning "little cake" in Dutch. Cookies resembled biscuits, which were used by ancient Roman armies as rations because they kept easily. These biscuits were improved by cooks in the middle ages. They added eggs, butter, and cream to enrich the flavor and texture of the biscuit. History of Cookies. Whats Cooking In America. Retrieved July 7, 2010

Chocolate chip cookies were accidentally developed by Ruth Graves Wakefield, owner of the Tollhouse Inn. One day Ruth was making her favorite cookies, which called for the use of bakers chocolate. She substituted a semi-sweet chocolate bar cut up into bits. However, unlike the baker's chocolate, the chopped up chocolate bar did not melt completely, the small pieces only softened. Chocolate chip cookie quickly became popular. Safety: Oven mitts for removing the hot baking sheet from the oven, protective Clothing to protect my skin from hot surfaces, Clean hands, working surface, and utensils for sanitary reasons, apron for

protecting my clothing from food stains, gloves for serving food and Hair up in ponytail to make sure there are no contaminants in the cookies.

Equipment: 2 heavy not- nonstick baking sheets, Electric stand mixer w/ paddle attachment, parchment paper, 1 small glass bowl, gas oven, wooden spoon, measuring cups & spoons, spatula, cooling racks

Materials: Dry Ingredients: 1 Cup tightly packed light brown sugar Cup Granulated sugar 3 cups + 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking soda teaspoon salt 16 ounces semi-sweet chocolate Wet Ingredients: 1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature 2 large eggs 1 teaspoons pure vanilla extract Procedure Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line two heavy, not nonstick, baking sheets with parchment paper, or lightly butter them, and set aside. In the bowl of an electric stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and both sugars until light and fluffy. Add the eggs,

one at a time, beating well and scraping down the sides of the bowl after each addition. Beat in the vanilla. Sift the flour, baking soda and salt together into a small bowl. Add the dry ingredients to the butter-sugar mixture, mixing until just combined. Fold in the chocolate chips. Using your hands, shape knobs of dough about the size of a large walnut into balls and place them 2 inches apart on the baking sheets. Stagger the rows of cookies to ensure even baking. Bake 14-17 minutes, or until the tops are light golden brown. Cool the cookies on the sheets for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire racks to cool completely. Bibliography: Types of Wheat. Commodity Futures Seasonal Analysis for Traders. Web. 06 July 2010. From,
http://www.commodityseasonals.com/types_of_wheat.htm

Six Basic Classes of Wheat. SmallGrains.Org. 07 July 2010. From, <http://www.smallgrains.org/WHFACTS/6classwh.htm>. Daley, Regan. (2001). In The Sweet Kitchen. New York: Artisan History of Cookies. Whats Cooking In America. Retrieved July 7, 2010

I obtained these graphs by tallying up the scores that people gave each cookie for all of the categories. For appearance, the cookie that was most liked was Cookie A, which was the allpurpose flour. This cookie was puffed up and golden brown on the outside. The mixture of highgluten and low-gluten flours gave the cookies a nice appearance, there was enough gluten for the cookie to hold its structure, but not so much that it didnt spread out when in was baked.

The cookie with the best texture was Cookie C, which was made with Cake Flour. I suspect that this cookie was most liked because it was soft and had a small crumb. This was because the cake flour had very little gluten in it, which allowed the cookie to spread out more during the baking process. Cookie C also had the best taste. I believe this is because the cake flour has very little taste and therefore does not contribute any flavor to the finished cookie. This allows the taste of the butter, sugar, and chocolate to become more prominent. Results: Originally, almond flour was going to be used for my 4th, gluten free flour. Unfortunately I was only able to find almond meal. When I baked these cookies they did not hold together because the egg was the only binding product in the batter. The cookies spread out into a flat sheet and were inedible. The cookie that was most liked overall was the cake flour. I predicted that the bread flour was going to be the most liked, so my hypothesis was incorrect. My assumption that the rice flour was going to be least liked was correct. I feel that even though the cake flour had very little gluten which did little for the texture of the cookie, the flour gave the cookie a pleasant taste and appearance. Even though I was focusing on the texture the different flours gave the cookies, I learned that the flours also provided a different taste for every cookie. If I were to redo this experiment I would set up several different mixing bowls so that I would not have to clean the bowl every time I made a different batter.