Took me 45 minutes to realize my oven thermometer was off by 50 degrees

I was trying to bake a batch of sugar cookies for a friend's party last weekend. They kept coming out flat and burned on the bottom no matter what I did. I checked the temp, adjusted the time, even swapped baking sheets. After wasting three batches I finally pulled out my old oven thermometer and it was reading 50 degrees higher than my oven dial. Has anyone else had a big baking fail from a tool they just trusted without checking first?

2 comments

2 Comments

olivia_murphy10d ago

Hold up, I kinda see this differently. Honestly, I don't think your oven thermometer is the real problem here. You said the dial was reading 350 but the thermometer was at 400, right? That means your oven runs hot, which is pretty normal for most home ovens. The real fail is not checking your oven's actual temp sooner, especially after the first batch flopped. I've baked a ton of cookies and I always put a thermometer in there from the start because I know my oven lies to me. You trusted your oven dial for three batches before double checking, that's the real mistake here, not the tool.

alex_king10d ago

Three batches? You let it go through three rounds before you checked? That is wild to me. After the first batch came out wrong, my very next step would have been to verify the temperature. I am honestly shocked you kept trusting the dial after it already let you down once.