What does it do?

Question

Take a simple cookie recipe Ingredients
1 cup unsalted butter
1 cup crunchy peanut butter
1 cup white sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda


Can someone tell me what each ingredients do in the recipe.
I know flour is the base. Peanut butter is for the flavor.
But what about the eggs or why two kinds of sugar. Or baking soda and baking powder

Answer 1

You have some good answers. I just wanted to add a little bit. White sugar makes a crisper cookie and brown sugar makes a moister softer cookie. Peanut butter not only adds oil to the recipe, the peanut butter adds flavor. Baking powder and baking soda both add lift to the item. One starts working the minute it is mixed in and the other uses heat to activate. The baking powder requires heat to activate and the soda generally has an acidic product in the recipe to activate it - like sour milk. Eggs hold everything together and when whipped, add air to the recipe to hold it up. For instance, if you put the eggs in the cake without separating the yolks and whipping the whites, you have a shorter denser cake - but a moister one. If you separate out the yolks, whip them and fold them in, you have a lighter, dryer cake.

Answer 2

Baking powder and soda allow the cookies to rise and be soft on the inside, rather than be flat, like a cracker. Butter makes them soft and tender, as does the egg yolk. The brown sugar makes the sweetener less bland, more complex. The white of the egg is protein and acts as a binder to hold everything together. Baking soda and salt also add flavor, like when you put salt on food.

Answer 3

Butter is the flowing ingredient
Peanut Butter is flavor and the oil
White Sugar is the solid binder
Brown Sugar is Texture control
Eggs are the binder of all the Ingredients
Flour is Base
Baking Soda and Powder chemically give the lift to the flour
Salt , measured to control the salt content not controlled in the butter plus opens the olfactory senses