Cream cheese cookie press cookies with a lemony zest! These Cookie Press Lemon Cookies can be made into festive shapes for any time of the year!
12 DAYS OF HOLIDAY TREATS: DAY 10
Welcome to Day 10 of SugarSpicesLife 12 Days of Holiday Treats – a 12 day recipe series! Today’s recipe is: Cookie Press Lemon Cookies.
Cookie Press Lemon Cookies
Recipe Inspiration
A few years ago my friend Whitney gave me lemon crinkle cookies for Christmas. They were SO good. I didn’t remember previously having a holiday treat that was lemon flavored, and loved the idea.
This year I decided I wanted to include a lemon treat in my holiday treat boxes. I thought that having little lemon cookie press cookies would be just perfect.
Using a Cookie Press
Two years ago I shared a recipe for Cookie Press Cookies (Spritz Cookies). That recipe was my first experimentation with a cookie press. I learned that using a cookie press is a bit of an art form.
Since that time I have used several cookie presses and have learned that each press, and each design disc, works with dough a little bit differently.
Cookie Press Tips (for this recipe)
- Use room temperature butter and room temperature cream cheese. This helps them to meld together easier and smoother.
- Cream the butter, sugar, and cream cheese until very smooth, at least 3-4 minutes. Otherwise it’s more difficult to press the cookies, and you can get some weird clumps in the dough as well.
- Use an ungreased baking sheet. If you grease the baking sheet, the cookies don’t want to stick as they should.
- Play around with the temperature of the dough.
- For my cookie press on this recipe, I found it worked best when I pressed the cookies immediately after making the dough. With other presses and recipes, I have found that chilled dough works best.
- If you find that your cookies are spreading too much in the oven, you can place the pressed cookies on the baking sheet in the refrigerator for 20-30 minutes before baking.
- Keep the cookie press straight up and down. If you tilt it, your cookies will be larger on one side.
- Use a cool baking sheet for each batch. If you use a hot cookie sheet, as you’re pressing cookies, the ones pressed first will spread out more than those pressed last.
- The cookies are small, so watch them closely in the oven and remove them when they’re just turning golden. Even a minute too much can make the edges too brown.
- PRACTICE! Seriously, there is a little bit of an art to these cookies. Play around with it!
Decoration
These cookies are cute on their own, but I can’t resist a little sparkle. PLUS, you can’t tell that they’re lemon just looking at them, so I used yellow sprinkles on top to make the announcement, “hey, I’m a lemon cookie!”
To make the sprinkles stick to the cookies, I used a sugar water glaze, with a little bit of lemon juice to add some more lemony flavor!
These Cookie Press Lemon Cookies are a fun, delicious cookie that are perfect for any time of the year!
Cookie Press Lemon Cookies
Ingredients
Cookies
- 1 cup unsalted butter room temperature
- 3 ounces cream cheese room temperature
- 1 cup sugar
- zest 1 lemon
- 1 teaspoon lemon juice
- 1 egg yolk from 1 large egg
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
Decoration
- 2 tablespoons water
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 3 tablespoons powdered sugar
- yellow sprinkles or yellow sugar
Instructions
Cookies
- Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
- Use mixer fit with paddle attachment to beat butter, cream cheese, and sugar until very smooth and fluffy, about 4 minutes.
- Mix in lemon juice and zest until well combined.
- Add egg yolk and mix until just combined.
- In a small bowl, stir together flour and salt. Gradually beat into butter mixture, about a 1/2 cup at a time, until well incorporated. Scrape down sides as needed.
- Place dough into cookie press and squeeze onto cookie sheet, about 1 inch apart.
- Bake until just golden, about 12-13 minutes. Remove from oven and let cookies cool completely before decorating.
Decoration
- In a small bowl mix together water, lemon juice, and powdered sugar . Work in groups of about 4-6 cookies. Brush a small amount of sugar water over top of cookies and then immediately sprinkle with colored sugar.
Disclaimer: All nutritional information provided on this website is an estimate only and is not guaranteed.
If you enjoyed these Cookie Press Lemon Cookies, you might also enjoy these other SugarSpicesLife recipes:
Lemon Butter Bars
Lemon Zucchini Bread
Orange Chocolate Cookies
Lemon Cranberry Cake
Chocolate Coconut Lime Bars
