Lemon Cardamom Crinkles: A Piece of Cake #47
This recipe makes 80 cookies, and you'll be so glad it does.
This is the second of three new cookie recipes. I’ll send the next recipe tomorrow. If you missed yesterday’s Spruce Spritz Cookie recipe, here it is.
We’ve arrived at the next stop on our holiday cookie train: Lemon Cardamom Crinkles. Choo choo. I originally developed this little cookie as an after-dinner treat to enjoy with coffee. But as it turns out, it’s great with breakfast, as an afternoon pick-me-up, or a little midnight snack. Plus, the dough comes together incredibly fast and makes about 80 cookies. Eighty!
Since they are best baked from frozen, the scooped dough can hang out in your freezer until you want to bake off a dozen here and a dozen there. (And you will want to.) I made a double batch and have been baking them off to bring to every party I’ve been invited to thus far this season. Sorry, not sorry, if you’ve enjoyed them at more than one Brooklyn holiday party this year.
The base of this cookie was inspired by my friend Greg’s sprinkle cookie over at Red Gate Bakery. I’m a confirmed sprinkle cookie fan, and Greg’s is the best in the city. I knew I wanted that dense cream cheese-y sugar cookie texture. But instead of traditional vanilla, I loaded my cookie with lemon zest and Burlap and Barrel’s Cloud Forest Cardamom. I love their stuff. (Not an ad, just a fact.) Now, if toasting whole cardamom pods, then picking out the seeds and grinding them to make some cookies does not sound like your kind of fun? Then any good ground cardamom will do. Also, congratulations on being normal.
After you form and freeze them, the cookies get a generous roll in confectioners sugar before baking. You get a great sugary crunch on the outside, but somehow they’re not overly sweet. Plus, they don’t feel cloyingly “festive.” These little cuties are going into my year-round rotation.