Vegan Lemon Sugar Cookies
These Vegan lemon Sugar Cookies are full of zest flavour and really melt in your mouth. They are perfect for serving during spring or at Easter. Get the recipe below.
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Fresh flavours
I love making sugar cookies. They are so buttery and melt in the mouth at the same time as holding their shape so you can make lots of cool designs.
Today I’m taking the classic sugar cookie recipe and adding more fresh, zest flavours by adding a little lemon juice and plenty of lemon zest. They are a real lemon dream.
Zesty lemon always makes me think of Easter and Spring and even more so with these cookies as I’ve decided to decorate them so that they look like daffodils. If you want to do the same, you can find the same cookie cutter that I used on Amazon.
If you like this recipe, why not check out more Easter and Spring recipes on the blog.
Top tips for making sugar cookies
Always use block butter
I think this might be the most important tip, or at least one of the most important.
Never, ever use spreadable vegan butter for this recipe. This is because spreadable vegan butter has a really high water content. This affects the consistency of the dough. The result of this is that the sugar cookies will spread out and expand during the cooking process. You’ll use the beautiful share you cut out using your cookie cutter.
When it comes to purchasing vegan block butter you can’t go wrong with Flora or Naturli.
Never skip putting the cookie dough in the fridge
Another top tip for preventing the cookies spreading out in the oven is to chill the dough.
I do this twice to make sure that the dough stays cool throughout the rolling and cutting that is required.
If you want to speed up the process pop them in the freezer for half the time.
Use caster sugar
If you follow a vegan diet it’s possible you’re also trying to reduce the amount of processed sugar that you eat. But unfortunately caster sugar works best for these sugar cookies.
Whilst it can be tempting to use natural sugars like coconut sugar, maple syrup or even agave it will affect the flavour and the texture of the finished cookie.
Why is caster sugar so good? It will result in a crisp sugar cookie that don’t lose its shape while baking.
Use soy milk
Regardless of the recipe I always recommend using soy milk while you’re baking. This is because it more closely resemble cows milk in terms of it’s fat and protein content. Again this means the texture of the dough and results in a melt in the mouth cookie.
For more tips about substituting dairy for plant based alternatives, check out my big vegan baking guide.
How to decorate sugar cookies (optional)
These lemon sugar cookies taste great on their own but you may want to add a little flair.
There are two ways I like to decorate sugar cookies. The first is with glacé icing and the second is with fondant icing (though you could also use royal icing if you wish)
Glacé icing is made by simply mixing water and icing sugar. You can adjust the thickness by adding more or less water. I like to make it a thick but pipeable consistency to go around the edge of my cookies then making it a little thinner to fill the rest.
Fondant icing on the other hand is a thick paste that can be rolled out and cut into various shapes. I usually use the same cookie cutter I used to cut out the cookie itself, that way you know it will fit perfectly. I also like to use detailed cookie cutters which allow you to emboss the icing.
For this particular recipe I’ve used glacé icing as a glue to stick embossed fondant icing to the top of my cookies. Because it sets hard, glacé icing makes a fantastic glue!
The recipe
Vegan Lemon Sugar Cookies
Equipment
- Rolling Pin
- Cookies cutters
- Baking trays
- Cooling rack
Ingredients
For the cookie dough
- 150 g vegan block butter or margarine
- 100 g caster sugar
- 1 tbsp lemon zest
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
- 275 g plain flour
- 1 pinch salt
- 1 tbsp unsweetened soy milk
For the decoration (optional)
- 200 g yellow fondant icing
- 2 tbsp icing sugar
- 1 tsp water
Instructions
To make the cookies
- In a large bowl, cream together the butter, sugar, lemon zest and lemon juice until light and fluffy (I use an electric mixer but this can be done by hand).
- Add in the flour and salt and stir until combined; to bring it together into a ball of dough, add the plant milk and stir.
- Lightly dust your work surface with flour and tip the dough out (don’t worry if its still crumbly at this stage, there’s no need to add extra milk).
- Knead the dough to bring it together until its one smooth ball of dough. Avoid overworking it.
- Wrap the dough in cling film or place it into a Ziploc bag and place into the fridge to chill for at least 30 minutes. While the dough is cooling, line a couple of baking sheets with baking paper and place to one side.
- Once the dough is chilled, roll it out on to a floured surface. Be sure to move pick up the dough and rotate in between rolling it out to stop it sticking to your work surface. Stop once the dough is roughly 5mm / ¼ inch thick.
- Cut out as many cookies as you can and place them straight on to the lined baking trays. Place these trays into the fridge for 30 minutes.
- Bring together all of the trimmings into a ball, re-roll and cut out more cookies. Keep repeating this until you have used up all of the dough and don’t forget to chill them before baking.
- While the cookies are chilling, preheat the oven to 180 C / 350 F / gas mark 4.
- Bake the cookies for 12-15 minutes until they are just golden brown.
- Once baked, transfer the cookies to a cooling rack and leave to cool completely before decorating
To decorate
- Roll out the fondant to 2mm / 1/8 inch thick.
- Using your cookie dough, cut out your icing shapes.
- Sift the icing sugar into a large bowl and slowly add just 1 tbsp of warm water at a time until the icing is smooth and thick. It should be thick enough to hold its shape when piped.
- Spread just half a tsp of the runny icing on to the top of the cookie then place on the rolled out fondant icing shape.
- Leave the icing to dry for an hour or two before eating.
Nutrition
More vegan cookie recipes
Yes, they’re all vegan!
The cookie and biscuit collection
For the full range of cookie and biscuit recipes on the blog, check out the collection here.
I made these at Easter and my family loved them. So I decided to make them again for our MacMillan fundraiser. Nice and tasty, easy to make and raised money for a very good cause. Thank you