Name: Rosemary Lemon Cookies
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 1 h
Yield: 40 cookies
Ingredients: 240g flour (2 cups); 100g white granulated sugar (1/2 cup); 200g butter (7oz); 1 egg, room temperature; pinch of salt; 3 and 1/2 teaspoons lemon zest (about 2 large lemons); 4 teaspoons fresh minced rosemary

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Buttery and crispy cookies with a delicious lemon and rosemary flavour.

I typically do not like crispy cookies. I prefer the soft melt-in-your-mouth kinda cookies which texture resemble cake rather than cookies. This sugar cookie recipe is my one exception though. I have used this dough for various cookie recipes such as my Valentine’s Day Cookies or my Easter Carrot Cookies. It’s an incredibly versatile recipe and has a wonderful buttery flavour. It also becomes soft the next day but still remains crispy on the outside. Today we are going to use that recipe as our base to make rosemary lemon cookies.

Rosemary

You may think rosemary is a weird ingredient in a cookie. I agree. However, the earthy notes work incredibly well together with the sour notes from the lemon. Trust me! This is a combination you will want to try at least once in your life. I used fresh rosemary from my garden that I chopped into small pieces. You obviously do not need to use homegrown rosemary, fresh however is non-optional. It gives your cookies a wonderful color and taste.

Have you ever baked with herbs? Let me know in the comment section down below!

Lemon

The main flavour in this recipe is lemon. To achieve an intense lemon flavour we are using lemon zest. If you look closely you can actually see the lemon zest specs in the cookies. Now that’s what I call homemade! Do not be tempted to add in a little splash of lemon juice, the lemon aroma is already intense enough plus adding additional liquids alters the texture of your dough. Remember that when making lemon zest it’s incredibly important to work with organic lemons. Non-organic lemons contain a lot of pesticides in the rind which are bad for you. Organic is the way to go!

Dough

What might surprise you is the lack of baking powder or baking soda in this recipe. The reason we are omitting a leavening agent is because we do not want these cookies to rise. These are cut-out cookies, they are not supposed to rise! They are supposed to stay rather thin and have a nice crunch, like a typical sugar cookie. If you like your cookies soft in the center and crispy on the outside do not change the baking time. If you prefer your cookies super crispy you can add 2 minutes to the baking time.

I will say this however, baking times do vary and depend on the strength of your oven. My cookies were perfect at exactly 10 minutes. They are still soft when you take them out, but firm up as they cool. So do take them out when they look slightly undone. If your oven is a bit stronger or has hot spots you may want to take them out a bit earlier or flip the baking sheet in-between. I always recommend to do a small batch, of one or two cookies, and see how they bake before you bake the rest. This way you can easily figure out the exact baking time and have your cookies turn out perfect. #bakinghack

These cookies make a wonderful addition to a cup of tea or coffee. You can easily bake them a few days ahead and have them ready when guests come over. They can be stored at room temperature for up to 3 weeks in an airtight container…though they never have lasted longer than 2 weeks in our house. 😉

If you give these cookies a try, let me know in the comment section down below and don’t forget to tag your creation with #homebakedbliss on Instagram so I can see it!