Ingredients
- 1 and 1/4 cups white (granulated) sugar
- 1 cup (2 sticks, 8 ounces, 1/2 pound) salted butter, softened
- 3 large eggs
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 and 1/2 cups lemon pie filling (I used Comstock -- my can was 15.5 ounces net weight, and it was exactly 1 and 1/2 cups)
- 1 Tablespoon lemon juice
- the zest of one lemon (that's only the yellow part of the lemon rind, finely grated)
- 3 and 1/4 cups all-purpose flour (pack it down in the cup when you measure it)
- 1 cup crushed corn flakes (it takes about 2 cups corn flakes to make 1 cup of crushed corn flakes)
- 30 red maraschino cherries OR 30 pecan or walnut halves to garnish your cookies
Preparation
Step 1
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F., rack in middle position.
Hannah's 1st Note: Unless you have a very strong stirring arm, use an electric mixer to make this cookie dough.
Place sugar in bowl of an electric mixer.
Place butter, which must be softened to room temperature, on top of sugar.
Turn mixer to LOW and mix for one minute. Gradually increase speed of mixer, scraping down sides of bowl frequently and beating for one minute at each level, until you arrive at highest speed.
Beat at highest speed for at least 2 minutes or until resulting mixture is very light and fluffy.
Turn mixer down to LOW and add the eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition.
Continue to mix on LOW speed while you add salt and baking soda. Mix until they are thoroughly incorporated.
Measure out a cup and a half of lemon pie filling. With mixer on LOW speed, add pie filling to your bowl and mix it in. Then add lemon juice and mix that in.
Mix in flour, one cup at a time, mixing after each addition. (You don't have to be exact -- just add flour in 4 increments)
Shut off mixer and scrape down sides of bowl. Then give mixture a final stir by hand. The resulting cookie dough should be fluffy, but not at all stiff like sugar cookie or chocolate chip cookie dough. Let the bowl sit on counter while you..
Line your cookie sheets with parchment paper. It's easiest way to bake these cookies. If you don't have parchment paper and you really don't want to go out to get any, grease your cookie sheets heavily, or spray them thoroughly with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray.
If you haven't already done so, crush corn flakes and measure out one cup. Place the finely crushed corn flakes in a shallow bowl. This is what you'll use to coat outside of your Lemon Softie dough balls.
Using a teaspoon (not the measuring kind, but one from your silverware drawer), drop a rounded teaspoon of cookie dough into the crushed corn flakes. Use your fingers and light touch to form it into ball. Lift ball gently and place it on your baking sheet. Continue to form dough balls covered with crushed corn flakes, 12 to a standard-size cookie sheet. Top each dough ball with a maraschino cherry half (rounded side up) or a walnut or pecan half, and press it down gently.
Bake your Lemon Softies at 375 degrees F., for 12 minutes. Take them out of oven and slide cookie-laden parchment paper onto a wire rack to cool. If you used greased cookie sheets, you're going to have to let cookies sit on the cookie sheets for 2 minutes and then remove them to a wire rack with metal spatula. Let cookies cool completely before you attempt to remove them from wire rack.
Yield: approximately 4 to 5 dozen soft and moist cookies, depending on cookie size.