Easy Snickerdoodles without Cream of Tartar

These Snickerdoodles without Cream of Tartar are soft and chewy with sweet cinnamon flavor. Total crowd-pleasers! 

Jump to:

• Why Make This Recipe
• 🥗 Ingredients
• 🥣 Step-by-Step Instructions
• 🧐 Recipe FAQs for Snickerdoodles without Cream of Tartar
• Storing and Freezing Snickerdoodles
• 👩‍🍳 Expert Tips
• Other Delicious Cookie Recipes
• 📖 Recipe
• More About Molly

Why Make This Recipe

• Delicious flavor: Snickerdoodles are a classic cookie, and are a perfect addition to any cookie tray!
• Great for make-ahead: These cookies can easily be made in advance, and stay soft and chewy for several days after baking.
• Easy ingredients: Think cream of tartar is a key ingredient? Not at all. Read on for the easy trick to replace the leavening and slightly tangy flavor that comes from the cream of tartar in a traditional snickerdoodle recipe.  

🥗 Ingredients

• Sugar: This recipe uses two types of sugar, both granulated and light brown sugar. You could replace the light brown sugar with dark brown sugar for a slightly deeper flavor. Alternatively, you could choose to use all granulated sugar instead of adding in the brown sugar. 
• Butter: I like to use unsalted butter and add salt to the recipe, but if you only have salted butter, you can use that, and reduce the added salt to ¼ teaspoon. You can also replace up to half the butter with shortening.
• Lemon Juice: This is key to the replacement of the cream of tartar, so please don’t leave it out. If you don’t have lemon juice however, try substituting white vinegar. 
• Flour: These cookies use a classic all-purpose flour. I have not tested these with any flour substitutes—if you do, please comment below and let me know. 
• Cinnamon: The classic Snickerdoodle recipe calls for the cookie balls to be rolled in a cinnamon sugar mixture. You could add a little cinnamon to the batter as well if you want to double down on the cinnamon flavor. 

🥣 Step-by-Step Instructions

Using a stand mixer with the whisk attachment, beat 1 cup granulated sugar, ½ cup packed brown sugar, and 1 cup softened butter together on medium-high speed. Beat until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes, scraping down the bowl as necessary. 

Then add in 2 eggs, 2 teaspoons lemon juice, and 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla. Beat for 1 more minute, until well-combined. Whisk 2 ¾ cups flour, 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda, and ½ teaspoon salt together in another bowl.

Use a sturdy spatula or wooden spoon to stir the dry ingredients into the batter, just until combined. 

Put batter into the refrigerator for 15 minutes. While batter is chilling, mix ¼ cup sugar and 2 teaspoons cinnamon together in a small bowl.

Scoop batter into tablespoon-sized balls, then roll balls into cinnamon-sugar mixture. A 1.5-inch cookie scoop makes this super easy. 

Place on a small sheet pan or plate, and chill for another 15-30 minutes. While cookie balls are chilling, preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. When cookie balls are chilled, place on the baking sheets, 2 inches apart. 

Bake for 12-14 minutes, switching the baking sheets from top to bottom and front to back halfway through. The snickerdoodles are done when they are no longer raw in the middle, and are golden brown.

Let cool on cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then move onto a cooling wire rack. When one of the baking sheets is cool, line again with parchment paper and bake the last dozen cookies. 

🧐 Recipe FAQs for Snickerdoodles without Cream of Tartar

Storing and Freezing Snickerdoodles

Homemade snickerdoodles will stay fresh for 3-5 days after baking. Just keep at room temperature in an airtight container. 

If you would like to freeze your cookies, you can either freeze them before baking or after. To freeze the snickerdoodle cookie dough balls before baking, chill them on a plate in the freezer first, then move to a freezer bag when they are fully chilled. Then bake directly from the freezer, adding a couple minutes of baking time.

If the cookies are already baked, you can put them in a freezer bag or an airtight container and freeze them. (Wait for them to cool before freezing.) Defrost at room temperature and enjoy! 

👩‍🍳 Expert Tips

For these easy snickerdoodles, you can absolutely use a large mixing bowl and a hand mixer instead of a stand mixer. Set the hand mixer on high, and know that it will take longer to get to the right consistency. Try multiplying the mixing time by 1.5 or 2. 

Don’t overmix your dough if you like a chewy texture for your cookie. The more you beat the mixture, the cakier your cookies will turn out. We are team chewy cookie around here!

Note that when you first add the lemon juice to the batter, the batter may look a little curdled. Don’t worry, it will smooth out as you mix it. 

The more you chill the dough for this recipe, the thicker your cookies will be. For best results, we recommend 30 minutes overall so that the cookies rise a little, but are still chewy. If you want them to rise higher, add more chill time. On the contrary, if you like flat, very chewy cookies, you can skip chilling the dough. 

Note that some recipes call for pressing down the dough balls gently to flatten—this step is unnecessary with this recipe, and will result in very flat cookies. 

Want to take your traditional snickerdoodles to the next level? Add toffee bits and make these Toffee Doodle Cookies! Or, try them in bar form with these easy Snickerdoodle Bars.

Other Delicious Cookie Recipes

If you love these soft snickerdoodles, you may want to check out some of our other delicious cookie recipes. Maybe you're a shortbread cookie fan too? Don't miss our Cacao Nib Hazelnut Cookies, our Strawberry Shortbread Cookies, or our Lemon Shortbread Cookies.

Or try these Homemade Sugar Cookies, that are all kinds of delicious. And of course White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies are always a crowd pleaser!

And of course you can find all sorts of baked goods like these in our Dessert Archive too:

If you try this easy snickerdoodle recipe, I would love to hear from you! Please rate this recipe and leave a comment below—your feedback is invaluable to me.

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