Lemon Wreath Cookies

I don’t know what your calendar looks like, but on mine instead of "December," it reads "Cookie Month." With parties, a cookie exchange, and several family birthdays, I get to try as many cookie recipes as I want all month long. I’ve been marking pages of holiday cookie recipes since November or pre-cookie month. So, this is the first of a few cookies you’ll be seeing here in the coming days. These delightful, little lemon cookies appeared in the December 2009 issue of Living magazine, and they showed up again in the special issue Holiday Cookies publication last year. I baked these for my sister-in-law for her birthday, but it was a selfish choice. These are very much like my favorite, little ring-shaped cookies that I always bring home from Mandola’s which is a nearby Italian restaurant and market. When I buy them there, they’re called anginetti cookies, but they’re also sometimes called ciambelle. They’re a little crunchy but mostly tender, they last well for days, and the bright, lemon flavor is in both the cookie and the glaze. The cookies I buy from Mandola’s don’t have sprinkles on them, but the magazine version did. I think it dresses them up nicely.

To start, these follow standard cookie procedure. Flour, baking powder, and salt were sifted together into a bowl. Lemon zest and sugar were combined, and that mixture was added to butter and creamed until fluffy. Eggs were added followed by vanilla extract and lemon juice, and then the flour mixture was slowly added while mixing. To form the cookies, one tablespoon of dough at a time was rolled into a short, four-inch rope. The rope was shaped into a ring and placed on a baking sheet, and that was repeated until all the dough was used. The cookies were baked and cooled, and then the lemon glaze was made from confectioners’ sugar and lemon juice. The top side of each cookie was dipped into the glaze, and they were topped with sprinkles.

Once the glaze is dry, these cookies store very well, or they would have if I could’ve stopped eating them. These could easily become a regular player in my annual Cookie Month, but from now on, I’ll also be baking them throughout the year.