These rich zesty cookies certainly live up to their name and melt in your mouth.
Lemon Melting Moments:
- 200g unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup confectioners sugar
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup cornstarch
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- zest of one lemon
Filling:
- 1 cup confectioners sugar
- 50 grams unsalted butter, room temperature
- juice of one lemon
Preheat oven to 150 degrees Celsius.
In a large bowl cream the butter, salt and sugar until light and fluffy on a medium setting, roughly 3 minutes. Reduce the speed to low and incorporate the vanilla and lemon zest, scraping down the sides as you go. Sift the flower and cornstarch into the mixture and beat on a low setting until just combined.
Take small portions of the mixture and roll into balls, continue until you have 25-30 (I made mine quite large, I ended up with roughly 23) pieces. If you want them to be as even as possible, roll out the mixture until it forms a log then use a clean knife to section into 30 pieces.
Place them on a baking tray lined with wax paper, gently press on each piece with a fork until it has left an imprint. You can also press on them gently with your fingers, if you do not wish to leave an imprint.
Bake for 20 minutes. let them cool completely.
For the filling beat the sugar, butter and lemon juice on a medium setting until incorporated. Use the back of a spoon, or a knife to ice one side of the cookie then sandwich them together. Try to find two which are similar sizes.
Incorporate the vanilla and lemon zest. Sift the flower and cornstarch, beat on a low setting until just combined.
Take small portions of the mixture and roll into balls, continue until you have 25-30 (I made mine quite large, I ended up with roughly 23). If you want them to be as even as possible, roll out the mixture until ti forms a log then use a clean knife to section it into 30 pieces.
Place them on a baking tray lined with wax paper, gently press a fork down until it has left an imprint. You can also use your fingers to press them down gently, if you do not wish to leave an imprint.
Bake for 20 minutes. let them cool completely before icing.
For the filling beat the sugar, butter and lemon juice on a medium setting until incorpotaed. Use the back of a spoon, or a knife to ice one side of the cookie then sandwich them together. Try to find two which are similar sizes.

















Love a good lemon cookie and these look just perfect!
These were tastespotted! I really love lemon AND sugar cookies. They really do look like they will melt in the mouth. : )
Wow, these look delicious! they really do look like they would just melt in your mouth
Love melting moments. I’ve only had cherry. These lemon cookies sound great!
I’ve seen so many recipes lately for lemon desserts! I’m telling you, I really think lemon is becoming the ingredient of the summer this year! So far, I think yours must be the best! The other one I really like is Ina Garten’s Lemon Yogurt Cake. What do you think? Thanks again for sharing this delicious lemon cookie recipe!
these look really yummy!
Lemon is such a great summertime flavor and these look fabulous! Your site is so sweet and pleasant to navigate, too.
The frosting I made is very fluffy, it doesn’t look at all solid like yours. When I sandwich it between two of the cookies it just squishes out. When I first put all of the ingredients together it was very liquidy, so I thought maybe my lemon was too big. I added more butter and sugar. What should I have done to make my frosting turn out like yours?
Hi Molly,
Frosting which is too runny is a result of the icing mixture having a higher ratio of liquids (lemon juice) to solids (butter and icing sugar). Icing (confectioners) sugar is very, very fine sugar. It only needs the tiniest amount of liquid for it to become the consitinacy of a paste.
There are two main reasons as to why your icing is runny, they are:
Refridgerated Butter which has been melted in the microwave to achieve room temperature.
Using too much lemon juice, making the liquids to solids ratio unbalanced.
If you used microwaved butter, place it back into the refridgerator for 5 minutes so it can solidify slightly, before incorporating it into the icing.
If you added too much lemon juice, add an extra 1 – 1/2 cup of icing sugar, 2 tablespoons at a time, until you achieve the consistancy you desire. The extra lemon juice should balance out the sweetness, although you will end up with more icing sugar than what is needed. You don’t need to add extra butter, the current amount in the recipe is more than enough to help solidify the icing and keep the taste.
The frosting should be soft to touch, yet not runny. It will become harder the longer it sits (which is why most frosted cookies only last 3 days).
Hope this helps!
Gemma
This looks delicious! Think I’ll be trying the recipe soon, shall be bookmarking it for now. Thanks for sharing!
Mine ended up being very dry. I increased the sugar to about a cup because I wanted them to be a little sweeter, and still added about 1 3/4 cup of butter. Maybe next time I’ll try adding more butter. Otherwise they tasted great.
I don’t know if it’s because I’m starving or what, but I’m writing this recipe down now and making these ASAP. I don’t normally fall in love with lemon flavored sweets, but I think if there’s an exception this will be it.
Hi, thanks for the recipe!
Can somebody tell me how much a cup is? According to Wikipedia it’s usually 250 ml (at least in Australia). Thanks!