True to their name, these special Melting Moments are melt-in-your-mouth little shortbread cookies made with brown butter and covered in snowy white powdered sugar. They are the perfect treat for the winter holidays.
If you love shortbread cookies, (and who doesn’t love shortbread cookies?) you will love these delicious brown butter melting moments. Brown butter is an absolute must in this melting moments recipe for that extra special flavor!
Table of Contents
Why this recipe works
- This recipe is very simple with just 7 ingredients that you most likely already have in your pantry and fridge.
- It is egg-free for those of you who don’t or can’t consume eggs!
- The brown butter takes these cookies to another level with amazing flavor, you won’t want to go back to making them with regular butter ever again.
- The added cornstarch gives these cookies that well loved melt-in-your-mouth texture.
- They may be covered in powdered sugar but they are not cloyingly sweet, so don’t be afraid to let it snow powdered sugar on these!
Ingredients and substitutions
As always, you’ll find the complete list of ingredients and quantities in the recipe card at the end of this post. Below are some notes and substitution tips for each ingredient:
- Butter – we start with unsalted butter and brown it to give these melting moment cookies their special flavor. I don’t recommend using salted butter in this recipe as it may turn out too salty.
- Sour cream – since browning butter removes all the water in the butter, adding a little bit of sour cream will add water back into the dough so it doesn’t turn out crumbly. You can use yogurt here as well.
- Vanilla – vanilla extract is added for flavoring. Make sure to use pure vanilla extract and not artificial vanilla flavoring.
- Flour – this recipe was tested using all purpose flour so I don’t recommend using a different type of flour here.
- Cornstarch – is added to get that melt-in-your-mouth texture. There is no substitution for cornstarch.
- Salt – I always use kosher salt in all my recipes. If using table salt, use about half to two thirds as much.
- Powdered sugar – part of the powdered sugar is used to sweeten the cookie dough, and the rest is used to roll the baked cookies in. While powdered sugar already contains cornstarch, we are still adding cornstarch separately in this recipe to achieve that melt-in-your-mouth texture without having to add too much powdered sugar.
Tools you’ll need
- A fine mesh sieve to sift the dry ingredients. This will help break up the powdered sugar and cornstarch. If you don’t have one, simply mixing the dry ingredients together with a whisk will suffice.
- A whisk, spatula and mixing bowl to make the dough. This cookie dough can be made entirely by hand, no electric mixer needed.
- A medium cookie scoop to divide the dough (unless you have a kitchen scale). You can also use a tablespoon instead.
- A baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat to bake the cookies on.
- A kitchen scale is optional but recommended to weigh the ingredients as well as to weigh cookie dough when you divide it.
How to make melting moments
The following instructions, step by step photos and tips are here to help you visualize how to make the recipe. You can always skip straight to the printable recipe card at the end of this post.
First, prepare the brown butter to give it a chance to cool down before you start making the dough. For more details and tips, check out my post on how to make brown butter. You do not need to strain the milk solids.
Once the brown butter is cooled, beat it with the room temperature sour cream or yogurt until well combined.
Sift flour, cornstarch, and ½ cup of powdered sugar together in a small mixing bowl. Add salt and mix with a whisk to distribute evenly. Add the flour mixture to the brown butter mixture and mix with a spatula to form a dough.
Tip: I always add salt separately after I sift the other dry ingredients because the salt granules are too large to pass through the fine mesh sieve.
Refrigerate the dough for 1 hour before dividing into 1 oz portions. Roll them into balls and bake in a 350°F oven until the bottom edges are golden brown, about 15 – 16 minutes.
Allow the cookies to cool completely on the baking sheet before rolling them in the remaining powdered sugar to cover them generously.
The testing process
Flour to cornstarch ratio: I tested this melting moments recipe with half flour half cornstarch and ¾ flour ¼ cornstarch. The half flour and half cornstarch cookies were almost too fragile; they melted in your mouth immediately but I was a little afraid to pick them up. The ¾ flour and ¼ cornstarch cookies were melty enough without falling apart as soon as you touched them.
Dough temperature: room temperature dough spreads a little more than dough that has been refrigerated. Dough that has been refrigerated overnight will spread even less. You can make the dough and leave it refrigerated a couple of days before baking and it will be just fine.
Size: I used a small cookie scoop to make smaller cookies and a medium cookie scoop for larger cookies. I like the larger size better because it gives you two bites instead of one. But you can choose, either size will work. This recipe makes about 19 large cookies or 34 small cookies. Bake smaller cookies for 13 minutes.
Brown butter vs. regular butter: I made these both ways, but the regular butter version just seems to be too ordinary and like it was missing something. Of course the brown butter version won.
How much powdered sugar to use: I tried rolling the melting moments in sugar while they were still warm and then rolled them in sugar again when they cooled completely. I also tried rolling them in sugar just once after they cooled. I prefer rolling just once since this added just enough sugar making the cookies not too sweet.
More baker’s tips
- Chill the dough – chilling the cookie dough before dividing it into balls makes it easier to handle. Chilling also develops flavor, and helps the cookies bake up taller.
- Make ahead – you can make the cookie dough a few days ahead and keep it refrigerated. You can also freeze a large batch for the holiday.
- To flatten or not to flatten – you do not need to flatten the dough balls before baking. However, if you want uniformly flat cookies, you could choose to flatten them with the bottom of a measuring cup or a fork.
FAQs
Melting moments are unleavened, egg free, butter cookies. They are very similar to shortbread cookies. They’re usually coated with powdered sugar like snowball cookies. Sometimes, they are made as sandwich cookies with buttercream in the middle.
Cornstarch is the secret ingredient that makes them super tender and melt-in-your-mouth.
You can easily transport these cookies to holiday parties but I don’t recommend shipping them as they are quite delicate and won’t hold up through being tossed around on the delivery truck.
Storage
These melting moments cookies will keep at room temperature in an airtight container for up to a week.
They don’t need to be refrigerated. And since they are covered in powdered sugar, if you refrigerate them, the powdered sugar will melt and get absorbed into the cookies.
You can freeze unbaked cookie dough balls for up to 3 months. Bake directly from the freezer, simply increase baking time by 1-2 minutes. Make sure to divide the dough into balls before freezing.
More holiday cookies
- Linzer cookies
- Chocolate marshmallow cookies
- Biscoff butter cookies
- Red velvet white chocolate chip cookies
- Ginger molasses cookies
Hungry for more?
Melting Moments
Equipment
Ingredients
- 8 oz unsalted butter, 226 g, browned
- 2 tablespoon sour cream, or yogurt, room temperature, 30 g
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1 ½ cup all-purpose flour, 196 g
- ½ cup cornstarch, 60 g
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 ½ cup powdered sugar, 150 g, divided
Instructions
- To brown butter, heat unsalted butter in a light color saucepan over medium heat. Once the butter melts, it will become foamy. When the foam subsides, you will see clear bubbles, start whisking continuously at this point to keep the milk solids from burning. When the butter is caramel in color and smells nutty, turn off the heat and set aside to cool. This will take around 8 – 9 minutes.
- Beat together cool brown butter and sour cream until well combined.
- Sift flour, cornstarch, and ½ cup of powdered sugar together in a small mixing bowl using a fine mesh seive. Add salt and mix with a whisk to distribute evenly.
- Add the flour mixture to the brown butter mixture and mix with a spatula to form a dough. Refrigerate the dough for 1 hour.
- Divide cookie dough with a medium cookie scoop (1 ½ tablespoons) or pinch off 1 oz portions using a scale. Roll into balls and place on a lined baking sheet about 2” apart.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F.
- Bake, one baking sheet at a time if they don’t all fit on 1 baking sheet, for 15-16 mins until the bottom edges are golden brown.
- Remove the baking sheet from the oven and place it on a cooling rack. Let cookies cool completely on the baking sheet.
- Roll cookies in powdered sugar generously.
Notes
- Chilling the cookie dough before dividing it into balls makes it easier to handle. Chilling also develops flavor, and helps the cookies bake up taller.
- You can make the cookie dough a few days ahead and keep it refrigerated. You can also freeze a large batch for the holiday.
- You do not need to flatten the dough balls before baking. However, if you want uniformly flat cookies, you could choose to flatten them with the bottom of a measuring cup or a fork.
- Make sure to only use ½ cup of powdered sugar in the cookie dough. The remaining 1 cup is used to roll the cookies in. In total, you probably won’t use up the entire 1 ½ cup of sugar.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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