Homemade Fortune Cookies
Fill these Homemade Fortune Cookies with your own personal fortunes for a fun and delicious crafty treat!
I love when food crosses into the craft category and these cookies certainly do.
That’s what makes fortune cookies so fun to do yourself, even though they are a bit tedious to make.
You can put your own notes inside the fortune cookies, and gift them to friends, family, co-workers, and so on, and also customize them for different events.
As I mentioned briefly above, a fortune cookie is not as easy to make as say, a batch of Peanut Butter Cookies.
These are made and folded individually, and because they have to be crimped while they’re hot, you can only do a few at a time.
My recommendation is to get a few helpers and have fun making them together. It goes a lot quicker that way!
How to Make Fortune Cookies:
Start by whipping egg whites, melted butter, sugar, vanilla extract, and almond extract until frothy:
Add flour, and whip until the flour *just* disappears:
Shape the batter into small circles on a silicone mat, and notice how thin they are:
Bake until the circles are slightly golden on the edges, then quickly fold the circles in half with the fortune inside, and bring the ends down over the lip of a cup (this is an old picture, but I have a fortune cookie tutorial video below where I show you exactly how to do this).
Once the fortune cookie is crimped, place it into a muffin tin to hold its shape, and let the cookies cool while you repeat with the remaining batter.
Here’s the step-by-step video tutorial, and the recipe is below. Enjoy!
Homemade Fortune Cookies
Ingredients
- 3 large egg whites
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup butter melted
- 1/4 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp almond extract
- 3 tbsp water
- 1 cup all purpose flour (5 oz by weight)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper or a silicone mat, and have your fortune strips ready to go.
- In a stand mixer (or large bowl with a hand mixer), whip the egg whites and sugar on high speed for about 2 minutes, until frothy. Whip in the melted butter, vanilla, almond extract, and water until incorporated. Add the flour and mix until the flour *just* disappears.
- With a tablespoon measure, spoon the batter onto the parchment paper and spread it out into an even 3 inch circle. I recommend not doing any more than 2-3 at a time, since they set very quickly and you will not be able to fold more than that.
- Bake the fortune cookies for 7-8 minutes, until the edges brown slightly. If you let them brown too much, they will snap when you shape them. Conversely, if they don’t brown a little bit, they will also break (but tear, rather than snapping).
- When each batch of fortune cookies finishes baking, remove them from the oven and quickly flip the circle over, and fold your fortune cookie in half, into a semicircle. This is when you slip your note into the cookie (quickly) because if you slip it in right at the beginning, the cookie will be too hot and your paper will stick to the cookie. Place your semicircle onto the edge of a cup, and quickly fold the ends down, to crimp into a fortune cookie shape (see above tutorial video if needed).
- Place the cookie in a muffin tin to let it cool and hold its shape.
- Repeat with the remaining batter and enjoy!
Nutrition
Nutrition is estimated using a food database and is only intended to be used as a guideline for informational purposes.
Post updated in January 2019. Originally posted January 2014.
133 Comments on “Homemade Fortune Cookies”
What fun,I thought making these were going to be so hard,move over take out.
Can these be made a few days prior to eating?
it is yummey
I’m about to start making these today for my husband. My husband doesn’t really like fortune cookies but LOVES Chinese food and I’m pregnant so I’m going to use them to announce the pregnancy. I’m so excited to try this out!
Easy and tasty! My husband loves fortune cookies but could care less about the fortune part so I just leave them folded and don’t bother with the bending part when I bake them just for him.
Joanne – The recipe states 36 servings. What is one serving? Only one cookie?
Thanks
Yes 36 cookies, approximately. The nutrition information is calculated automatically with the system I use, so take it with a grain of salt.
Love this site. first time visit extremely easy to follow instructions
These are fantastic! But I admit to struggling with folding and shaping the extremely hot cookie dough. I think I’ll try some thing gloves of some sort the next time.
Any way you recommend to make them crispy again? I made them yesterday and stored them in air tight containers but they’re already soft and flexible 🙁
You can dry them out in a 200F oven, try 20 minutes, then let them cool (they will crisp more as they cool).
Do these freeze well? Or how do I store and how long will they keep?
The actual mix was super tasty but the mixture was way too thick and had to add more water. Still kept on being too thick though and looked more like cakes than cookies! Decided to make madelines with his recipe though, which turned out better than the fortune cookies
I too feel I am a decently accomplished baker (macarons, eclairs, etc) and had a lot of difficulty with this recipe. My batter solidified after the first batch, stuck to slip pat mat (parchment did work), thinning out the batter with water helped but they were still very thick and not crispy. Shaping was difficult due to lots of cracking up of thick parts. I gave 3 stars versus 1 because the taste was great and video for shaping was helpful. However, I will not be using this recipe again.
Hi from Australia! I tested a few batches and this is what worked for me: 190ºC. I preheated the oven tray with the silicone baking mat on it and used exactly the same ingredients as the recipe. I spread the batter quite thin, into disks 6cm in diameter. At the centre of the disk, I spread it slightly thinner and baked it for 6 mins. I did 3 disks at a time, which was recommended. I didn’t bother flipping them and folded them after inserting the fortunes while hot. I shaped them as per instruction and used mini tins to help them keep their shape. My family loves it and I’m using the recipe for party favours for a hens. I know it’ll be amazing now that I’ve done my test batch. Thanks for sharing this with us, Joanne!
I’ve made fortune cookies before, I followed step by step. First batch, didn’t brown stayed soft. Second batch, upped the temp, it browned but still soft. 3rd batch, thinned it out more, again browned but stayed soft. Thank you for the recipe but wasn’t a good fit.
Is the TBS a US measurement of 20ml or UK 15ml?
Thanks
good recipe, however i would recommend for every one part almond extract add two parts vanilla. Other than that they taste close to the ones in restaurants.
These taste awesome and I really enjoyed making them except they were so hot when they came right out of the oven.