Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap: Meyer Lemon Sables

The package was coming together nicely, but as I almost finished putting them together, I realized that my lovely little chocolate macarons had started to split. Their cajeta middles were oozing everywhere. It was clear that these wouldn't survive shipping without refrigeration. Baking them was a moment of overambition borne out of our recent trip to Paris. I'd wanted to bake a cookie that was undeniably French. The cookies were baked and filled, but the cajeta filling was just a little too soft at room temperature.

It was the day the cookies were to be shipped. Out went couple of panicked emails to Lindsay and Julie notifying them of the delay and then I had to figure out my Plan B. I still wanted to do something French, but it had to be fast and delicious.

One of the most beautiful things about living in California is the produce. In Southern California, there's fresh citrus to be found year-round. Quantity and quality ebb and flow with the seasons, but there's always something. I was astonished to find a bag of gorgeous Meyer lemons at Little Italy Mercato and those lemons saved my butt when it came to formulating a backup cookie recipe for the Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap.

My Plan B was Meyer Lemon Sables, which are crunchy French butter cookies. The awesome folks at Cooks Illustrated discovered that a hard-boiled egg yolk helped with the crumbly and buttery texture unique to these cookies.

Organized by Lindsay of Love and Olive Oil and Julie of The Little Kitchen, food bloggers all over the world came together for the ultimate cookie exchange. Bake three dozen cookies and mail a dozen each to three assigned bloggers. In return, three bloggers were given my details and I received three different cookies.

It's the best idea ever, as I received shipment after yummy shipment. The coconutty caramel chocolate chip cookies from Cake FYI disappeared almost as soon as we opened the box. More coconut came with gorgeous blackberry-strawberry jam thumbprints from Azucar Means Sugar. Delicious Mexican wedding cookies came from Urban Sacred Garden.

Nom. Serious nom. I must do this next year. If you want to do it, too, sign up here for updates.

Meyer Lemon Sables
from CooksIllustrated.com (membership required to view original recipe)

1 large egg
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2 3/4 ounces granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon table salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 teaspoons lemon zest
7 1/2 ounces unbleached all-purpose flour
White sparkling sugar sprinkles (can be found at craft stores like Michael's)

Hard-boil the large egg and remove the shell. Gently remove the egg white with your fingers and reserve the egg yolk. The egg white can be discarded. Push the egg yolk through a strainer into the bowl of a stand mixer. Add butter, sugar, and salt. Beat with paddle attachment until the mixture is light and fluffy. Add lemon zest and vanilla. Stop the mixer, scrape it down, then add flour. Mix gently on low speed until just combined.

Use your hands to press the dough together, then turn it out into a clean board. Cut the dough in half, then gently roll each half into a log. Wrap in parchment paper and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Take logs one-at-a-time out of the refrigerator, then gently slice into 1/4-inch thick slices. The cookies will not spread much, so keep your slices thin.

Optional step: Beat 1 teaspoon of liquid egg white (not the hard-boiled one) with 1 teaspoon of water and use this egg wash to brush the cookies before sprinkling them with sugar crystals.

Sprinkle cookies with sugar crystals. Bake on parchment-lined baking sheets 12-15 minutes until edges are lightly browned. Remove from oven and cool 5 minutes on baking sheets, then transfer to cooling racks.