Lemon Sugar Cookies with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting (2024)

A pretty frosted sugar cookie can brighten anyone’s day. It’s even better if the cookie is crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, with a bright burst of fresh lemon flavor. These lemon sugar cookies with lemon cream cheese frosting are perfect for any occasion, like Easter, Mother’s Day, baby showers, or bridal showers. Make them for your family, or make them for a friend just to show you care.

These powdered sugar cookies made with oil and butter have a fine texture and a delicate lemon flavor. They’re drop sugar cookies that don’t require rolling. They’re easy to make and a joy to serve.

These cookies are somewhere between soft and crispy. They remind me of Swig sugar cookies, if you’re familiar with that restaurant chain that sells baked treats and flavored sodas.

Assemble ingredients and equipment

To make lemon sugar cookies, you need the following equipment:

• Stand mixer or electric hand-held mixer
• Large bowl
• Whisk
• Cookie sheets (1 or 2)
• Parchment paper or silicone baking mat
• 2-tablespoon cookie scoop
• Cooling rack

One secret to successful baking is to assemble all your ingredients and equipment ahead of time. That way you’ll be able to get the timing right and remember all the ingredients. If I try to get the ingredients out of the pantry one at a time, I always seem to forget something!

This recipe calls for softened unsalted butter. If you want to substitute salted butter, that also works. See the recipe notes for how to substitute salted butter for unsalted.

If you need to soften butter quickly, I’ve found this method using hot water in the microwave to be the most effective.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F, and line one or two cookie sheets with either parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. If you decide to use only one cookie sheet, you can bake the cookies in two batches.

Mix the wet ingredients and sugar

Start your drop sugar cookie dough by blending together softened butter, vegetable oil, sugar, and powdered sugar. You can use a stand mixer for this, with the cookie paddle, or you can use a hand-held electric mixer and a large mixing bowl.

After the butter, oil, sugar, and powdered sugar are well blended, add the eggs and butter vanilla bakery emulsion, and blend thoroughly.

Bakery emulsions vs. extract

For this recipe, I like to use butter vanilla bakery emulsion and lemon bakery emulsion. If you’re not familiar with bakery emulsion, it’s basically a different type of flavor extract. While typical flavor extracts are flavoring dissolved in alcohol, emulsion is based in water with an emulsifier.

Water is a more neutral carrier than alcohol (so it’s great for frosting or icing), and no alcohol also means that the flavor doesn’t burn off at high heat (so it’s great in baked goods). I buy it at my local gourmet kitchen supply store, and a few people have told me they’ve seen select flavors at their local grocery store. Dozens of flavors are available on Amazon.

One of the reasons I like butter vanilla bakery emulsion for this recipe is that when I tested the recipe with vanilla extract, I thought the cookies should taste more buttery. Butter vanilla bakery emulsion boosts the butter flavor. Lemon bakery emulsion boosts the lemon flavor.

Combine the dry ingredients

After mixing the wet ingredients and sugar, in a separate mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt.

Measure flour correctly

It’s important to measure your flour correctly, to get a cookie dough that is the right consistency. The most accurate way to measure flour is to use a food scale. A cup of flour should weigh 125 grams.

Estimates for the correct weight of a cup of flour range between 120 and 130 grams. I use a measurement of 125 grams, and for reference I usually use Gold Medal all purpose flour.

To measure flour accurately without a scale, spoon the flour into a measuring cup, then level off with a knife. This useful article will help you understand how to measure flour:

The Proper Way to Measure Flour

Blend the batter

Add the dry ingredients, one cup at a time, to the wet ingredients. Blend to combine after each addition. Mix just until well combined, and do not overmix.

This cookie dough might seem a little wet or soft compared to other cookie recipes. Use the measurements in the recipe, and you should be fine. If you make the dough to thick or stiff, the cookies will not spread in the oven.

Scoop and bake the cookies

Using a two-tablespoon cookie scoop, scoop the lemon sugar cookie dough onto prepared baking sheets.

Bake at 375 degrees for 8-12 minutes, or until the cookies are just beginning to brown on the bottom and edges. Mine were perfect after 10 minutes.

Let the cookies cool for 5 minutes on the baking sheet, then transfer to a cooling rack. Let the cookies cool completely before putting on the icing.

Make the lemon cream cheese frosting

To make the lemon cream cheese frosting, first beat the butter and cream cheese, using a hand mixer or the whisk attachment of a stand mixer, until fluffy and well blended.

Add one cup of powdered sugar, and beat until blended. Add one more cup of powdered sugar and beat some more.

Add the lemon juice, lemon zest, and bakery emulsions and blend. Add the rest of the powdered sugar one cup at a time, blending after each.

The recipe calls for 6-8 cups of powdered sugar. Add enough powdered sugar so the frosting is thick, but still smooth enough to handle. If you think the frosting is too thick, add a little more lemon juice, whole milk, or whipping cream.

Optionally, you can use 1 tablespoon cornstarch to thicken the frosting without adding more sugar. Don’t use more than one tablespoon, because larger amounts will affect the taste of your frosting.

Frost cookies and garnish

I like to pipe frosting onto these lemon sugar cookies in a swirl pattern, using a round tip or a star tip. Start on the outside and work toward the middle.

Immediately after frosting each cookie, add whatever decorations you would like. Sprinkles, candy pearls, or sparkling sugar will all look beautiful with this cookie. This step is optional.

I hope you and your loved ones enjoy these lemon sugar cookies! If you make it, be sure to leave a review!

If you like this recipe, be sure to check out some of FoodLove’s other cookie recipes:

Candy cane Amish sugar cookies

Amish sugar cookies with strawberry cream cheese frosting

Cinnamon chip snickerdoodles

Caramel apple pie cookies

Or, check out some of our favorite cupcake recipes:

Fresh strawberry cupcakes with strawberry buttercream

Fresh lemon cupcakes with lemon cream cheese frosting

Raspberry lemon cupcakes

Bakery style cupcakes the easy way

Out of the box chocolate chip cupcakes

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