Joanne's Kitchen: Sugar Cookies

This week have a recipe for a really small batch of sugar cookies. Over the last couple of weeks while I have been testing the recipe and doing a few tweaks to it I have very consistently gotten 7 cookies out of just about every batch. That is a a fairly perfect number of cookies for just one or two people to eat over a few days.

I love how quick and easy they are to make and they contain just simple ingredients. They are very similar to a recipe I used to make a lot when my kids were growing up.

When you look over the ingredients you might notice that there is neither baking powder or baking soda in this recipe. That is not an error this recipe relies on the whipped butter, sugar and egg mixture to give it lift. For that reason you do really need to beat it with a mixer (a hand mixer works just fine) for the length of time in the recipe. You need to get a lot of air into that mixture before you mix in the flour.

I do like to use my cookie scoop for most cookies and this is not an exception, I portion the dough out with the scoop first. The after all the dough is in balls I wet the palms of my hands with some water and roll them into nice round balls. By having your hands wet the dough won't stick to your skin. Once the balls are rolled lay them out on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet and use a flat bottomed glass dipped in sugar to flatten each ball into a cookie shape. I do find it is very helpful to wet the bottom of the glass with water before the first cookie then dip it into the sugar. That way you have the sugar on the bottom to both prevent the cookie from sticking to the glass and to add some sparkle to the top of the cookies. Aftr you flatten the first cookie just dip the glass back into the sugar before going on the next cookie. Repeat this for all the cookies being sure to dip in the sugar between each cookie. I like to add a sprinkle of colored decorators sugar to my plain sugar for this, totally optional but it just makes the cookies sparkle a bit more.

I do use some citrus zest in these cookies, I have used lemon, lime and orange and all are just wonderful. I used lime this time because that is what I had. You can skip it if you need to but you will be missing the freshness the zest adds. If you do leave out the zest double the amount of vanilla you use to make up for it.

You can find a downloadable/printable copy of the recipe here,

Sugar Cookies

¼ cup butter, room temperature

3 Tablespoons sugar (plus more to use in shaping the cookies)

1 large egg yolk

½ teaspoon citrus zest

¼ teaspoon vanilla

½ cup flour

Preheat oven to 350°F

Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

Put an additional 1 Tablespoon of sugar into a small dish to use in shaping the cookies. (add some colored decorators sugar if you like)

In a medium bowl beat the butter and 3 Tablespoons sugar until creamy, about 1-2 minutes.

Add the egg yolk, zest, and vanilla and beat at medium speed for 2 minutes.

Carefully mix in the flour. At first the dough is going to look very dry and like it is not going to work. Just keep beating it and it will come together into a nice dough.

Using a cookie scoop portion dough out on lined cookie sheet.

With damp hands roll each cookie into a ball.

Using a flat bottom glass (mine was about 2 ½” in diameter) barely wet the bottom of the glass and dip into the small dish of sugar then use the glass to flatten each cookie, being sure to dip in the sugar between each cookie.