Butter vs. shortening

I use butter rather than shortening in my cookies and most of the time they come out crunchy as opposed to chewy. Is it true that butter raises the temperature of the sugar to a higher level than shortening would, accounting for the difference in the way my cookies turn out?

Thank god the studies have proven it, butter is better.

[m brown]

try baking your cookies for less time for more chew. the butter has a LOWER melting point than shotening but it does have more moisture that evaporates out of the cookie during baking.
Shortening is not the best thing for people to ingest and it does'nt taste as good as butter. Shortening also has a funky mouth feel when used in croissants, danish, butter creams. Best to cut half shortening and half butter if you must use shortening.
(partially hydrogenated shortening has been linked to cancers, heart disease, astma and obesity.)

[mudbug]

Fats - The fats most often used in cookies are butter, margarine, shortening and oil. Fats play a major roll in the spread of your cookie. In other words, they help to determine if your cookie spreads out into a thin mass on the cookie sheet or pretty much keeps its original shape. Shortening, margarine and spreads are fairly stable so they will help cookies keep their original unbaked shape. Butter melts at a much lower temperature than the other solid fats, so cookies made with it will tend to spread out. And oil, since it already is a liquid at room temperature, produces cookies that keep their shape. The amount of fat also affects the cookies, you can basically think of it this way: More fat equals flatter and chewier to crispier cookies. Less fat equals puffier and more cake-like cookies.

From: http://CookieRecipe.com/hints/tips.asp

[cookM]

I made the chocolate chip recipe from Cook's Illustrated, and I had to 1) use melted butter which I've never done before and 2) cool the cookies right on the sheet pan!! They were chewy. I ran a very unscientific test, and everyone liked those cookies better. (not that they *hated* the other ones)

[shroomgirl]

I have a friend that drops his cookie sheet after baking so the cookies will deflate and have a chewery texture....not sure about the whys just know that his white chocolate maccadamia cookies are wonderful.

[shroomgirl]

I have a friend that drops his cookie sheet after baking so the cookies will deflate and have a chewery texture....not sure about the whys just know that his white chocolate maccadamia cookies are wonderful.Oh Yeah butter is the only way!!!