When silicone baking mats made their way into the market over a decade ago, I was a bit skeptical to say the least. Would it really revolutionize my baking experience? It took me a few years, but I finally gave in and bought one. The first time I used it, I made chocolate chip cookies. Was the experience life changing? Hardly. Certainly it lived up to its ability to be non-stick, but that’s hardly a problem when making chocolate chip cookies. In addition to the fact that the silpat cannot be washed in the dishwasher, it made my cookies spread. So far two counts against it in my view.

Some time later, I decided to give it another chance. I paid good money for it after all, and I really did want to like it or find some useful purpose for it. This time I made different types of cookies including tuiles. I baked half of each batch of cookies on parchment and half on the silpat. For the drop cookies, parchment ruled. The slick surface of the silpat seemed to encourage spread. The rolled and shaped cookies came out equally well on both mediums. In the tuile cagetory, the silpat’s superiority finally came to light and it was then I realized I could not live without this amazing invention!

The end result is that I don’t use my silpat for making drop cookies, but in order to cut down on the wastefulness (and expense) of using disposable parchment sheets, I opt for the silpat for all other cookies and it is an absolute must when making tuiles.

Silpats run in the neighborhood of $20.00 for one that fits the size of an average cookie sheet, but over time the cost savings is quickly realized if you’re a regular user of parchment.