I use a Danish dough whisk. Compared to trying to cream butter with a spoon it's like a magic wand.

One reason I don't have a stand mixer (aside from price and space factors) is that I can get a workout while baking! I like to think it counteracts the effects of the cookies I will eat later... My only tip is patience, and using room temp butter (I always forget to take my butter out early!). I don't think you can cream the butter and sugar too much by hand. I feel so proud of my accomplishment later too!

leave the butter in the fridge and run it over the cheese grater. it cuts it into tiny pieces for you that are still cold when you start, so you get the "airspace" described above, and working it for a very short time brings it up to room temp. it's even faster than using a mixer once it's all grated.

I've never had any problem creaming butter and sugar by hand for cookies, but I've always started with room temperature butter, which makes the job pretty effortless. I'm filing away this tip though, in case I ever need it.

P.S. LorentzenL: I'd never heard of a Danish dough whisk before, so I looked it up on Google. That thing looks brilliant! I'm totally getting one.

Ditto on onebravegirl. I've never owned a stand mixer. The plus of using softened butter is the wax paper will be quite buttery when you peel it off. Fold and toss it in the freezer for the next time you want to butter a bowl or a pan. You don't need to defrost because the paper's so thin--the heat of your hand melts it instantly.

Use a wooden spoon and a ceramic or stoneware bowl. The rougher surfaces will "catch" on the butter and cream it more quickly than steel or rubber. And of course, the butter should be room temperature.

I do it by hand tons of times, especially for cookies, just because I don't want to wash my mixer bowl (even though I'm still dirtying a regular mixing bowl...weird) but a wooden spoon and elbow grease never killed anybody. If it's streaky you're not doing it enough. A fork seems like it would get old real quick.

I do it by hand! My actual hand to mix and squish it all together. So much easier because your hand heats the butter a bit if it isn't room temperature already!

oooh, I like the idea of grating the butter.

My kitchenaid broke too and I haven't had time to have it fixed. I ordered the raspberry ice kitchenaid [early Xmas gift] and while it gets here I'm doing all my baking by hand, using room temp butter, a whisk, a silicon spatula and lots of patience :)

I grew up without a stand mixer. Never had a problem mixing butter and sugar as long as you left the butter out on the counter for a while. At room temperature butter is reaaally soft.

It helps if you use a handmade pottery bowl as well. Super smooth metal bowls don't seem to "grab" the butter as well, which means you have to work harder. Handmade pots often have a very slight orange-peel like texture under their glaze that makes mixing extremely easy. I also prefer a good wooden spoon - it also grabs the butter much better than a smooth metal one.

The fork is probably a great idea if you didn't have time to plan ahead and have soft butter, though. In my case I tend to just stand the butter on one end and microwave it in five second intervals, rotating the end each time. Quick room temp butter without any melted spots like you can get if you leave the butter on it's side.

This is inspiring. I have reluctantly avoided all recipes that involve creaming for years because my ancient hand mixer does such a pathetic job. I wouldn't mind doing it by hand if I thought I could make snickerdoodles again!

I've never used a stand mixer for creaming butter and sugar... always by hand with a wooden spoon. I put the butter in the microwave for a few seconds so it's soft, and it creams so smoothly.

mmm... butter and brown sugar

OOHh, me too! I am all about the fork and room temperature butter. I can not be bothered to pull out the kitchenaid.

I didn't have a stand mixer until this summer and I still cream butter for cookies by hand like I have for years.

What makes the process easier:
- A good wooden spoon
- A metal or ceramic bowl
- Starting with super soft butter!

Plastic bowls seem to make the process a lot more difficult if you're going for light and fluffy, and when using a mixer you can start with butter that's a little more solid because it's doing the work for you, but it's impossible if you're doing it by hand. It just means you can't cream butter at the last second, particularly if you don't have a microwave.

I want a Danish dough whisk so badly! Might have to buy myself one for Christmas.

I refuse to get a stand mixer. They take up way too much space and I don't do frou-frou-y baking enough to justify one. My little electric hand mixer is just fine for when I really need to beat things or whip cream or egg whites. The rest of the time it lives in a cupboard and my bamboo spoons (or sometimes even table spoons) do the hard work.

I also grew up in a household where all creaming of butter and sugar was done by hand. With a wooden spoon. No one had any troubles and I still do it by hand up at the family cabin. Like everyone has said, the butter just needs to be at room temperature.

BTW, I've had my Danish dough whisk for 6 or 7 years now and I love it. I picked it up at a thriftstore thinking I might use it once or twice. But I find myself reaching for it all the time. It's good for all sorts of batters and doughs. I never thought to use it for creaming though. Maybe it's because I have my trusty stand mixer but I'm filing LorentzenL's excellent tip away for sure.

I love the looks I get from my hubs' parents when they watch me make things 'by hand' or 'from scratch' -my mother-in-law is a dear Lady, but her stand mixer is decades old and tiny, plus she doesn't own a hand mixer; I don't think she's baked cookies that have a creamed butter/sugar element in years SO the first time I did this with a fork at their house, she stood next to me all quiet and amazed... I have a gorgeous Kitchenaid that I've never used (a gift) because of super-limited counter space and I can cream things together while sitting on the couch... *silly smile*

For years, my mother and I made several batches of holiday cookies and cakes each year from scratch without a mixer. Cookies are given as holiday gifts so we'd start in November and by the time New Year came around we'd go through easily 10bs of butter and endless lbs of sugar and flour. Room temperature butter is absolutely necessary - you'll drive yourself nuts if the butter is cold. Use the back of a wooden spoon or a firm spatula to push the sugar into the butter. You're done when you don't see any streaks of butter and the mixture should be fluffy like fresh snow and almost as light when you pick some up in your spoon.

Now to debunk the thought that the butter must be room temp in order to work it into the batter. Read that a scientist decided to try out the "myths" we have about why we do certain things when we bake or cook. Turns out that making sure the butter is room temp in order to bake is a fallacy. The colder the butter the better due to the air factor. The reason everyone jumped on the bandwagon was back in the '50s when the hand mixers came out, they couldn't take the grind of mixing the cold butter while the old stand alones had no problem. So apparently to keep those cookies and other bake goods light and fluffy keep the butter cold!

I've always used a potato masher. Works every time!

@wordnerd28 -- you're a genius.

@wordnerd28 - Omg. Agree with Slow Lorus. That's is genius :3

@Slow Lorus and @IanKhoo: why thank you! <blush>

Pastry cutter all the way! They're called that for a reason. :)