Diane's Sugar Cookies
Submitted by benitaholzheimer
Buttery rolled sugar cookies with a hint of sour cream and fresh lemon zest, cut into any shape you like and sprinkled with crunchy granulated sugar. A chilled dough that rolls out beautifully every time.
YIELD
4 servingsPREP
5 minCOOK
12 minREADY
25 minThese are the sugar cookies you remember from your grandmother’s kitchen. Buttery, tender, and perfumed with lemon zest, they roll out like a dream and hold whatever shape you cut them into.
The secret weapon here is sour cream. Just two tablespoons mixed into the dough keeps these cookies unbelievably soft and gives them a subtle tang that keeps the sweetness from being one-dimensional.
The dough needs a good three-hour chill in the fridge, so plan ahead. But once it’s cold, it rolls out smooth on a floured surface and cuts cleanly without sticking. A generous sprinkle of granulated sugar on top before baking gives each cookie a sparkly crunch.
Pro Tips
- Chill the dough in the fridge, not the freezer; freezing changes the texture and makes it crack when you try to roll
- Roll to ¼ inch thick for big, satisfying cookies that stay soft in the center with crisp edges
- Work with one half of the dough at a time, keeping the other half cold so it stays easy to handle
- These are gorgeous as-is with just the sugar sprinkle, but they also take royal icing beautifully for decorating
Ingredients
Directions
Sift together flour, baking powder and salt.
Cream butter, sugar, sour cream, lemon peel and beat well.
Add eggs, one at a time, and then milk.
Gradually, add the sifted dry ingredients, scraping the bowl as necesary with a rubber spatula and beating only until thoroughly mixed.
Divide dough into 2 halves.
Wrap each batch with foil or plastic wrap and chill in refirgerator for 3 hours or longer.
Do not place dough in freezer.
Preheat oven to 400℉ (200℃).
Place one batch of dough on lightly floured pastry cloth.
Turn dough to flour all sides and roll out to desired thickness.
For very large cookies, ¼ inch. Cut the cookeis as you wish. Transfer cooies to ungreased cookie sheets. If cookies are large and thick, place at least 2 inches apart. Sprinkle the tops of the cookies generously with granulated sugar. Bake until the cookies are lightly browned. Large, thick cookies will need to bake for 10 to 12 minutes. Transfer cookies to racks for cooling.
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