These lemon shortbread cookies are tender, buttery, and filled with bright lemon flavor. They're easy to make in one bowl with 7 simple ingredients!
Jump to Recipe
These lemon shortbread cookies have a buttery, zesty lemon flavor and delicious melt-in-your-mouth texture. Just like my classic shortbread cookies, they have a simple dough made from flour, butter, sugar, and salt. Fresh lemon juice and zest give them a lovely citrusy pop.
I love how easy this recipe is. These lemon shortbread cookies come together in one bowl, and most of the time, chilling the dough isn’t necessary.
If you like, you can make a quick lemon glaze to give the cookies an extra burst of lemon flavor, but they’re also perfect plain—tender, bright, and lightly sweet. I hope you love them as much as I do!
Lemon Shortbread Cookies Ingredients
When I was testing this recipe, I made a ton of lemon shortbread cookies. I tried vegan and gluten-free shortbread cookie recipes with different oils and flours, all sorts of things. During the process, I was stressing out. Some cookies were dry, some were burned, and some flattened out like pancakes (not the good kind). I’m just lucky that Jack, being the kind taste tester that he is, made sure not a crumb went to waste.
So what did I end up with? A straightforward, delightful lemon shortbread cookie recipe. Here’s what’s in it:
- All-purpose flour – Sometimes complicated problems demand simple solutions. I tried all sorts of flours in this recipe, but good old all-purpose yielded the best results every time. Spoon and level it to avoid packing too much into your measuring cup.
- Butter – It gives these lemon shortbread cookies a delicious buttery flavor and melt-in-your-mouth texture.
- Sugar – For sweetness. I typically use natural cane sugar, but regular granulated sugar works well too.
- Fresh lemon juice and zest – They fill these cookies with bright lemon flavor. I especially love these cookies with Meyer lemon juice and zest, which add a sweeter, almost floral note to the dough.
- Fresh thyme – My twist. 🙂 I adore the combination of lemon and thyme in these cookies. It’s so surprising and refreshing. I think you’re going to love it too, but you can also skip the thyme if you prefer a classic lemon shortbread.
- And sea salt – To make all the flavors pop!
Find the complete recipe with measurements below.
How to Make Lemon Shortbread Cookies
The recipe is simple and straightforward. Here’s how it goes:
First, make the dough. Cream the butter in the bowl of an electric mixer. Add the sugar and beat until fluffy, followed by the fresh lemon zest, lemon juice, and thyme. Mix again. Then, add the dry ingredients—the flour and salt—and mix until just combined.
Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and flatten it into a 1″ disk. If it’s sticky, wrap it up and chill it for 15 to 30 minutes, or until it’s firm, but still pliable.
Next, roll out the dough and cut out the cookies. My favorite part! Aim for the dough to be about 1/4″ thick. Then, use cookie cutters to cut out any shapes you like. Like in my cut-out Christmas sugar cookie recipe, I recommend starting at the edges of the dough and working inwards, puzzling together the cutters to cut out as many cookies as you can. Transfer the cut-outs to parchment-lined baking sheets, and re-roll the scraps to make more cookies.
Then, bake! Transfer the cookies to a 350°F preheated oven, and bake until the edges are starting to turn light brown. Transfer them to a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
Recipe Tips and Variations
- Soften the butter at room temperature. Creaming the butter gives these cookies a perfect light texture, and it makes it possible to roll out the dough to make cut-outs. In order to cream the butter, it needs to be soft, but not melted. To soften your butter, you’ll need to plan ahead. Remove it from the fridge, set it on the counter, and let it sit for an hour while it comes to room temperature. I don’t recommend softening it in the microwave—it’s easy to accidentally go too far and partially melt it in the process.
- Bake one sheet at a time. Temperatures vary throughout an oven, so baking one sheet at a time is the best way to ensure that your cookies bake evenly. You don’t want ones on the bottom rack to burn before the top rack starts to brown! Pop any cut-outs that don’t make it onto the first sheet in the fridge until you’re ready to bake them.
- Add a lemon glaze, if you like. To give these cookies an extra pop of citrus flavor, top them with my quick lemon glaze once they cool. It’s easy to make with 2 ingredients—lemon juice and powdered sugar. You could even sprinkle a little extra lemon zest on top.
- Use a different citrus. I love the lemon flavor in these shortbread cookies, but they work just as nicely with other citrus too! Try using orange zest and juice (see these orange shortbread cookies) or lime zest and juice instead.
How to Store Lemon Shortbread Cookies
The lemon shortbread cookies keep well in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days.
They also freeze well. Allow them to cool completely, then seal them in an airtight container or bag and freeze for up to 3 months. They thaw in around 30 minutes at room temp!
More Cookie Recipes to Try
If you love these lemon shortbread cookies, try one of these cookies next:
- Easy Sugar Cookies
- Chewy Molasses Cookies
- Mexican Wedding Cookies
- Oatmeal Cookies
- Or any of these 17 Easy Cookie Recipes!
Lemon Shortbread Cookies
Ingredients
- ½ cup unsalted butter, softened
- ⅓ cup cane sugar
- Zest of 1 medium lemon
- 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
- 1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves, chopped (optional)
- 1¼ cups all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
- ¼ teaspoon sea salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Cream the butter in the bowl of an electric mixer. Add the sugar and beat until fluffy, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Next, add the lemon zest, lemon juice, and thyme, if using, and mix again. Finally, add the flour and salt and mix until just combined. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and flatten into a 1” disk. If the dough is sticky, wrap and chill for 15 to 30 minutes until firm but still pliable.
- Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface until about ¼“ thick. If desired, you can roll the dough between two pieces of parchment paper. Use 2” cookie cutters to cut out desired shapes. Transfer to the baking sheet and bake for 10 to 14 minutes or until the edges are lightly browned. Keep any extra cut-out cookies in the fridge until ready to bake.
- Remove from the oven and transfer the cookies to wire racks to cool. Store at room temperature for up to 5 days.
I just made these cookies and they were heavenly??Thank you for sharing this??
I’m so glad you loved them!
Really nice but I rolled them out to 1/4 “ thick which ar the time I thought that seems super thin… I think next time I will try rolling them out maybe 3 times as thick closer to 3/4 “” as when I looked back over the photos where u are placing them on the baking tray your ones definitely look way way thicker than what Ihad at 1/4” haha. Keen to try again and roll them thicker
Made these and they’re AMAZING. I didn’t have a cookie cutter so I used a whiskey glass to cut the circular shape. I even used the design on the outside of the glass to print a subtle design on the cookie. That being said I made 7 cookies.
I’m so glad you loved them!
Can I use regular granulated sugar instead of cane sugar?
yep!
Great cookies! Didn’t have any fresh thyme on hand so I left that out, but they still turned out great. Had to bake them for a bit longer to get that golden colour – about 15-20 minutes. The dough was definitely trickier in the sense that it was a bit crumbly as I was rolling it so you have to be gentle with it. I was worried they would fall apart in the oven but they came out perfect! Definitely recommend giving them a go.
Hello Jeanie,
I just tried your recipe, with fresh lemon thyme from a friends garden. It realy ads a special note and we love it!
Will defnitly add those cookies to my cookie sale this summer!
I’m so glad you loved them!
Can I make a week ahead and freeze them? will they lose their consistency? or How early can I make them if I refrigerate them? Thanks!
Hi Andrea, yes, they freeze well.
Unsalted butter?
yes, unsalted
I made this recipe about six months ago and the cookies were delicious. I just made the recipe today and the first batch of dough was so dry I couldn’t roll it. I refrigerated it and it was better but still somewhat dry. I made the recipe again and the dough was dry again ( I thought I mismeasyred the first time) so I added a little egg white Ann’s then it was too sticky. I ended up up baking both recipes. Flavor’s pretty good but they don’t look as good as when I made them before. Any thoughts as to why the dough consistency was off?
Hi Elizabeth, that’s so strange! I wonder if you packed your flour in the measuring cup differently the 2nd and 3rd time (Here’s our post about measuring flour and how it can be inconsistent: https://www.loveandlemons.com/how-to-measure-flour/)
Or perhaps you used a different brand of flour or a different brand of another ingredient?
This just happened to me :(. It seems it was as if I had added too much flour despite of having followed the instructions
Looking forward to making these! How far ahead can you make the dough and refrigerate? Thank you!
Hi Rebecca, you could probably make them the day ahead – when you go to bake them, leave the dough out at room temp until it’s pliable/rollable since it’ll get too hard in the fridge.
Do you recommend salted or unsalted butter for this recipe please?
Hi Alexis, unsalted butter.
I can bake in a pan and then cut into bars?
Hi Carol, I haven’t tried that but I think it should be fine – you might need to increase the baking time, depending how the middle of the bars are baking.
Would it work to use dried thyme instead of fresh?
Hi Lucy, I think fresh thyme is best here, if you don’t have any, I would just skip it – they’ll still be delicious lemon cookies.
Excited for this recipe! Is it okay to use powdered sugar?
These were really good! If I make them again I think I would add more sugar and a little less thyme but other than that these were great!
Hello,
I would love to give these a try, but I would need to use gluten free flour. I scrolled through the comments and didn’t see anyone who said they tried g.f. flour.
Would it work, do you think? What adjustments would be needed?
Thank you!
Hi Mary, I haven’t tested these with GF flour so I’m not sure it would work. It’s usually pretty different in recipes like this. This is my favorite site for GF baking, you might see if she has a shortbread recipe: https://bojongourmet.com/
Bob’s Red Mill 1-1 Gluten-Free All Purpose Flour (blue bag, not the red one) works perfectly for me.
I absolutely love these. I didn’t know what to expect but these are really great! They are dainty little cookies and have a fresh flavor. Thanks!!
Would love to know if u could use Lime?
you could! I might skip the thyme in that case.
Yup! I tried it and they taste absolutely fab!
Yup! These are winners! Thanks for the recipe.
these were excellent! so easy to make too!