Need Cookie Baking Help/advice!
Baking By confectionsofahousewife Updated 30 Nov 2009 , 6:18pm by GeminiRJ
I am baking cookies for a cookie bouquet that a client is picking up on Tuesday. I don't usually do cookies so I am not real familiar with my recipe or how it bakes. I am using the "Sugar Cookie V" recipe from allrecipes. I have tried different thicknesses when rolling the dough (3/8 inch and 1/4 inch). The 3/8 inch ones spread so badly that it was hard to tell what shape the original cookie cutter was. The 1/4 inch ones spread and looked too thin. The thing is, I used this recipe before for the first time about three weeks ago and I felt like the cookies came out great. I made leaves and they didn't blend together into unrecognizable blobs. Today I made a mitten and the thumb blended into the rest of the mitten and it looks weird. My husband and mother assure me that they look fine and once I put icing on them people will be able to tell what they are.
How does everyone get such nice crisp, raised edges on their cookies? Mine look that when I first cut them out of the dough, but not so much once they are baked. Adivce?
You should try NFSC next time, look on the recipe section, they bake amazingly well, exact same shape as when you cut them out of the dough. For now what I'd do is after cutting them go back with a knife and exagerate a little where you notice they are going to come together while baking. HTH
I know with my sugar cookies the dough is rolled out on parchment and then shapes cut out. I then move my cut outs on the parchment to a cookie sheet and place in the freezer for about 10 min. Sometimes the rolling out will soften your dough too much which will cause spreading too. My cookies have come out perfect everytime using this method. Maybe it can help you too. 
Use NFSC.
If you want a super sharp shape, just re-cut them after they come out of the oven.
Here's a thread where I describe what I did and a link to cookies done this method: http://cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-649283-tshirt.html
If they are spreading, it sounds like you need to add more flour. When I use NFSC, I mix the dough, cut the cookies and they go straight into the oven. I don't chill or partially freeze the dough and I get minimal spreading. But if the dough looks thin or "gooey", I've no problem adding more flour to get it to the right consistency. Some folks are afraid to alter the recipe .... don't be. I view a recipe as merely a "suggestion and guideline!" 
If you want a super sharp shape, just re-cut them after they come out of the oven.
This worked great for me when I did my niece's wedding favors, as the cookies wouldn't have fit in the bags if they had spread. The only problem I had was that there were a lot more crumbs generated without the "baked egde". By the time I had decorated them, and handled them throughout the process, the majority of the crumbs had gone away. But still something to think about...messy, messy.
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