Lemon Curd Cookies
Last night the baking bug came back, so I went rummaging through the kitchen cabinets. I was all out of chocolate, but I did have a jar of lemon curd, so I decided to whip up some lemony cookies.
The sugar cookie recipe is adapted from the one in Williams-Sonoma's "Cookies" cookbook. I wanted to make them more lemony and less vanilla-y, so I omitted one teaspoon of the vanilla and added the zest of two lemons. This makes a very buttery cookie that doesn't rise very much since there is no baking powder/soda.
1 1/4 cups unsalted butter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg yolk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
zest of 2 lemons
2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
Lemon curd (you will need less than a full jar)
Confectioner's sugar (optional)
In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on high speed, cream the butter until fluffy and pale. Add the sugar in 3 additions, beating on low for 2 minutes after each addition. Beat the egg yolk, vanilla, and zest into the butter mixture until well blended.
Sift the flour and salt together onto a sheet of waxed paper. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix on low speed or stir with a wooden spoon just until blended.
Scrape the dough out onto a work surface and divide into 4 equal portions. Shape into disks, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours (I just stuck them in the freezer for 15 minutes).
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
Remove dough from refrigerator and let stand at room temperature for 15 minutes. Roll dough to 1/8-1/4 inch thickness. Using round cookie cutters (I used a small one of about 2 inches - don't forget the cookies grow when baked) cut out dough and place on cookie sheets. Drop as large of a blob of lemon curd as you can while still being able to cover the bottom cookie with a top cookie, on 1/2 of the cookies. Cover the lemon curd and bottom cookies with the remaining cookies and press to seal. You will have to stretch the top cookie a little bit, just make sure there is a good seal.
Refrigerate unbaked cookies for 5 minutes.
Bake for about 10 minutes or until the edges are just beginning to turn brown.
Dust with confectioner's sugar.