The Ultimate Tip For Preventing Misshapen Cookie Logs

Fresh-baked cookies are delicious, but if you aren't feeling up to making a whole batch from scratch, you might be able to grab some pre-made dough from your grocery store's baking section. This dough is ready to bake, making it easy to whip up a sweet batch of treats. You can also make homemade cookie dough and seal it with plastic wrap to save in your fridge or freezer for later.

Pre-made cookie dough is typically sold in a cylindrical shape, sealed in a plastic cover. This shape makes it easy to bake up some nearly identical cookies, all of the same diameter. Unfortunately, as the log of dough adjusts to room temperature, it can lose some of its shape. This can leave you with flat-edged cookies, rather than the perfectly round shape you were going for.

Fortunately, two cookbook authors have discovered a way to prevent this, and now you can, too.

Paul Arguin and Chris Taylor of Flour Sugar Butter are award-winning bakers and cookbook authors. In the duo's book "Fabulous Modern Cookies," they share a tip for making sure your slices of cookie dough stay perfectly round. It can be frustrating to slice your dough, only to find that some of them have a flat edge, while others are perfectly rounded.

To keep the cookies looking uniform, Arguin and Taylor suggest moving the log around while cutting, explains The Washington Post. They attribute the flat edge to the pressure from the knife, which presses the entire log down as it slices the dough. To remedy this, try flipping the log so that the side resting on the cutting board changes with each slice. This will keep the pressure evenly distributed.

Additionally, they suggest that smaller cookies make for more even slices. They recommend keeping the diameter of each cookie between a minimum of one inch and a maximum of two and a half inches.

While it's easy to grab a pre-rolled package of cookie dough at the grocery store, it can be quick and easy to roll and refrigerate homemade cookie dough, too. According to a blog post on Martha Stewart's website, freshly mixed dough should be rolled up and refrigerated for up to a full day. Allowing the dough to chill can firm up the cookies and preserve the shape once baked.

To make a homemade roll, King Arthur Baking Company suggests employing the help of some parchment paper and a sharp-edged knife. Add the mixed dough to the center of the parchment sheet, shaping it into a log with your hands first. Then, wrap the entire thing with the parchment sheet and use your knife to carefully press the crevice where the dough rests on the cutting board. The site says to use pressure around the entire roll continuously, and you'll end up with a perfectly cylindrical roll of cookie dough.

The next time you bake a batch of cookies, try rotating the dough with every slice, and watch as your cookies come out perfectly round.