Lavender Cookies

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These lavender cookies are soft and buttery shortbread cookies filled with floral lavender and bright lemon flavor. Enjoy plain or with a sweet and tangy lemon glaze and more lavender. Make these wonderfully refreshing and beautifully fragrant lavender shortbread cookies the next time you need a taste of spring.

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Why Should You Make This Recipe
Ingredients
How To Make
How To Make Ahead, Freeze, Thaw, Store and Serve
M's Expert Tips
FAQs
Other Lemon Recipes To Try
Lavender Cookies Recipe

Why Should You Make This Recipe

Fragrant and floral lavender always lends such a beautifully unexpected flavor to any baked good. My Lemon Lavender Cookie Bars and Lavender Brownies are two of my favorite herb infused recipes on the blog. These buttery lemon lavender cookies are another delicious addition I know you’ll because:

They are quick and easy to make. All you need to do is bring the butter to room temperature, mix everything up in one bowl, chill for 30 minutes, scoop and bake!
Layers of flavor and texture. From the soft, buttery and slightly crumbly lavender infused shortbread cookie, to the sweet and tart key lemon glaze, these lavender lemon cookies are full of light and refreshing flavors and textures.

Ingredients

This recipe for lavender cookies requires only a handful of pantry basics to make. Make sure you have these ingredients ready to go!

Dry ingredients: Gather all purpose flour and salt.

Wet Ingredients: Gather culinary grade lavender buds, granulated sugar, lemons and unsalted butter.

For the Lemon Glaze

Gather fresh lemon juice, powdered sugar and more lavender buds.

Substitutions

Here are my recommended substitutions to make these wonderfully buttery lemon and lavender cookies:

All purpose flour: This recipe hasn’t been tested with an alternative flour. However, if you want to make this recipe gluten free, use a good 1-1 flour and measure by weight rather than cups.
Granulated Sugars:This recipe hasn’t been tested using alternative sugars. However, I love using maple sugar as a refined sugar free option in my other cookie recipes. Maple sugar bakes very similarly to light brown sugar.
Lavender Buds: You’ll need to use culinary grade lavender buds for this recipe. I like to buy mine through a spice company or through amazon. Feel free to use fresh lavender buds if you have them, just increase the amount to 3 teaspoons (15 ml).
Lemons: Feel free to use meyer lemons or any other citrus in place of the lemons.
Unsalted Butter: You can use the same amount of salted butter as written in the recipe, but omit the added salt. To make these lavender biscuits vegan or dairy free, use a plant based butter.

How To Make

Let me show you how to make these quick, easy and wonderfully delicious lavender shortbread.

Pour the sugar and dried lavender buds into a food processor. Process for 10 - 15 seconds. Taste and adjust with more lavender if needed. Add in the lemon zest and process until the texture of the lavender sugar resembles wet sand.
Using a stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment or electric hand mixer with beaters, beat the room temperature butter and lemon lavender sugar until well combined. This takes about 3 - 4 minutes on medium speed. Mix the flour and salt into the wet ingredients until just combined. Cover the dough and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

While the cookies chill, preheat the oven to 350 F (177 C). Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper. Scoop about 1 tablespoon (15 ml) of cookie dough onto the prepared baking sheet. I like to use a small cookie scoop to get perfectly portioned cookies.
Bake the lavender sugar cookies for 12-14 minutes. The bottom of the cookies will be very lightly golden brown. Remove the cookies from the oven onto a cooling rack. After 3 minutes, transfer the cookies off the hot baking sheet and onto the cooling rack to cool to room temperature.
Make the lemon glaze for the lavender cookies by mixing 2 - 3 tablespoons (30 ml) lemon juice with 1 - 1 ½ cups (120 - 180 g) of powdered sugar until well combined. Top each cookie with the lemon glaze. Sprinkle very finely chopped dried lavender on top if you like.

How To Make Ahead, Freeze, Thaw, Store and Serve

Make these lavender cookies ahead of time: Simply prepare the cookies according to the recipe directions through step 2 and store covered in plastic wrap in the fridge for a day or two.
Freeze the cookies: Once the cookies are baked and have full cooled to room temperature, place the baked cookies into an airtight, freezer safe container.
Thaw the cookies: Transfer your desired amount of frozen cookies onto a plate to thaw at room temperature for a few hours.
Store baked cookies: These cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3-4 days.
Serve these refreshing lemon lavender cookies with a cup of coffee, tea or even lavender lemonade!

M's Expert Tips

Taste and adjust: Lavender can be a lovely flavor until you use too much. This is why I prefer to blend the dried lavender buds into the sugar. Then I taste and adjust the lavender or sugar accordingly. Over the years I have noticed that 1 teaspoon lavender is perfect for each cup of sugar. Your tastes may differ, so start with ¾ teaspoon - 1 teaspoon for each cup of sugar. For more tips check out my post on Lavender Sugar.
Bring cold ingredients to room temperature (soft, but cool to the touch). This results in a soft, tender, delicious and slightly crumbly cookie.
Mix the flour until just combined. I like to mix the flour into the sweetened butter just there are a few stray pieces of flour coated butter. Then I mix the rest by hand or with a flexible spatula.
Chill the cookie dough. This helps prevent the cookies from spreading too much while baking.
Fully preheat the oven. Use an oven thermometer to double check the temperature.
Use a cookie scoop to get perfectly round cookies.
Make sure the cookies are completely cooled before glazing them.

FAQs

Can you use fresh lavender for baking?

While I prefer the ease of using dried lavender, you can use fresh lavender in baking. Use the same way you would rosemary.

What does lavender taste like in baking?

Lavender has a lovely floral scent with notes of mint and rosemary. A little goes a long way. Too much lavender can give off a slightly soapy flavor, but when used in the right amounts, lavender can bring a lovely taste of spring to any baked good.

What is the difference between culinary lavender and fresh lavender?

Culinary lavender has been sifted numerous times so all that remains is the lavender buds.

Other Lemon Recipes To Try

If you try this Lavender Cookies recipe please rate the recipe and leave a comment below. Doing so helps other readers decide if this is a great recipe to bake. Don’t forget to tag me on Instagram using @olivesnthyme so I can see what you’re baking! Happy Baking! - M