This recipe has a sweet lemon flavor and the buttery goodness of a shortbread cookie. Decorate with a touch of luster dust to give the cookies some life and paint on as much or as little lemon glaze as you like. Your guests will adore this tasty perfect addition to an afternoon tea.

Yield: 30 cookies Prep: 50 mins Bake: 8 mins at 375°F per batch Stand: 30 mins

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups butter, softened
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 teaspoon lemon extract
• 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• Lemon Glaze (recipe below)
• Colored sugar (optional)

Directions

1. In a mixing bowl, beat butter with an electric mixer on medium speed for 30 sec. Add granulated sugar and baking powder. Beat the cookie mixture until combined, scraping sides of bowl occasionally. Beat in egg, vanilla, and lemon extract until combined. Beat in as much flour as you can. Stir in any remaining flour with a wooden spoon. Split the dough into 6 balls, wrap in parchment paper, and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

2. Work with one ball of dough at a time leaving the remaining in the refrigerator. We use the green even dough bands and rolled out the dough to 1/4” on a lightly floured surface. Flour the cookie cutter and press the cutter into the dough cutting out the outline of all the shapes. Pull away any remaining dough – leaving the shapes. Now flour the cutter again and lift the dough shapes pressing them into the cutter with your fingers and away from the edges of the cutter. Pat our dough onto your hand or directly on the cookie sheet. Flour the cutter between each cookie to reduce the dough from sticking. You want to limit the amount of flour that gets into the shortbread dough or it becomes brittle and hard to work with.

3. Bake in a 375 degree F oven for 8- 10 min, or until edges of cookies are firm but not brown. Let cool for 5 min on the cookie sheet so they harden a bit. Move to a wire rack and let cool for 1 hr before decorating.

4. Mix up the luster dusts – Canary Yellow and Holly Green with a little bit of plain vodka (alcohol will allow dust to be painted and will disparate when dried). With a fine-tipped artist brush paint on luster dust on leaves and center of the flower as seen in the picture. Pipe with a fine-tipped decorator or brush Lemon Glaze on petals; sprinkle with sugar, if you like. Dry for 30 minutes on waxed paper. Makes about 30 cookies.

Bake and cool cookies completely. In an airtight container, arrange the unglazed cookies in a single layer; cover them with a sheet of waxed paper. Repeat layers, leaving enough air space to close the container easily. Freeze the cookies for up to 1 month. Thaw before decorating with the lemon glaze and sprinkling with sugar.

Lemon Glaze Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 2 teaspoons finely shredded lemon peel
• 1 1/2 teaspoons lemon juice
• Milk

Lemon Glaze Directions

In a small bowl stir together powdered sugar, lemon peel, and lemon juice. Stir in enough milk to make icing drizzling consistency.