Orange Sun Cookies

With the arrival of summer-esque weather, I was inspired to attempt a cookie more in tune with this time of year. Summer for me is a bright and sunshine-filled, and what better representation of this than the flavor of orange?

Orange-you glad to have this recipe?

These cookie orbs are reminiscent of the sun, and pair well with fruity drinks. I found whipped cream or some powdered sugar worked well to offset the flavor as well.

Below is the recipe, which I found online and then adapted to the ingredients around me. My cookies came out wonderfully, perfectly golden and puffed - read more to create these little rays of sunshine yourself!


Orange Sun Cookies Kanipshin time.
Ingredients:

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 2 cups sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 large orange (for 1 tbsp zest and 1/4 cup juice)
• 2 tbsp orange extract (if have none, use 1/3 cup orange juice)
• 4 cups all purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Take orange and zest off the entire peel. This should amount 1 tbsp; set aside. Once the peel is completely zest-ed off, squeeze the orange into a cup - should yield 1/4 cup to 1/3 cup. Set aside.

Next beat softened butter and sugar together. Once completely beaten, mix in eggs, orange peel, and zest.

In separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder and soda together. Gradually add to sweet butter and orange mixture, stirring well. Grease a cookie sheet, and put on tray. Drop about 2 tbsp of cookie dough balls onto tray about 2 inches apart. Bake for 12-14 minutes or until golden brown on edges.

The Kanipshin:

For me, I found this recipe to be low-stress, and very aromatic. My main kanipshin came when I had to zest and squeeze the orange - not having an orange juicer, I found the orange to be slimy and soft from being zest-ed. It took quite a bit of arm strength to fully juice this by squeezing it, and it fell short of what the recipe recommended. So, having orange extract on hand, I added 2 tbsps. This actually seemed to work well aromatically, and probably gave my cookies a lighter color.

Overall, this was a great recipe, and the cookies came out super moist and soft. I would recommend playing with the amounts of orange zest in the recipe - some of my tasters have said the cookies were too orangey, while just as many said they wish they were more orange flavored! The orange zest is the easiest way to control that flavor without throwing off the entire cookies integrity.

Orange-colored and smile-worthy