World's Best Butter Cookies

By Addie

"I tested 8 different butter cookie recipes, looking for the "perfect" butter cookie. It had to be buttery, a little crumbly (like shortbread), and not too sweet. This is the winner. I think these are the Worlds Best Butter Cookie, courtesy of Chef Alice Medrich."

Ingredients

• 8 ounces unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 1 large egg yolks
• 2 cups all-purpose flour

Preparation

Step 1

Beat the butter, sugar, salt and vanilla together until smooth and creamy.

Mix in the egg yolk until well incorporated, scraping down the sides of the bowl at least once.

Add the flour and mix just until incorporated.

Scrape onto a lightly floured board and knead a few times, just until the dough smooths out.

Turn onto a sheet of plastic wrap and roll into a log, wrap up and refrigerate for several hours or freeze.

Before baking, preheat the oven to 325°F. Line your baking sheets with parchment.

Slice the dough into slices about 1/8" thick and place them on the sheets about an inch apart (they won't be spreading very much, but they need air room around each cookie).

Bake until JUST beginning to turn golden around the edges, about 16-18 minutes.

Note: you can do many things with these cookies. You could roll the dough out and cut shapes. You could slice them even thinner and sandwich them with chocolate or jam or lemon curd. You could make them and then dip them half into chocolate.

You could just make them and eat them, which is my favorite. Whatever you do, they will be delicious.
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REVIEWS: (130)


Well, ta-da! I thought I recognized this recipe. I agree, this is the best butter cookie. I make them with a hand held beater, and they are always wonderful. It's that one egg yolk which turns them from ordinary to special. One of my kids always like a whole blanched almond planted in the middle.
11 people found this review Helpful. Was this review helpful to you? Yes | No

By Terri F.

on March 08, 2003

I have been looking for a butter cookie that tastes like the ones Gramma used to bake. This is the recipe. Thanks, PetitFour, these are the best butter cookies ever!
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By beckas

on February 09, 2003

Wonderful buttery cookies with a flakey texture that were not too sweet (just like PetitFour described them). The flavor of these cookies reminds me of those Danish butter cookies that come in a round tin and are sold mostly during the holidays. My kids loved these cookies.

Very nice, crispy, buttery cookies. I love the texture and the sweetness is just right. I overbaked the first batch but they still taste pretty yummy. I added 1 tablespoon of cocoa powder to 1/4 of the dough and made chocolate butter cookies. And I sprinkle some sugar on top. The dough is pretty sticky, so have to work fast; while the dough is still cold. Very easy to make too.

Perfect taste, texture, appearance...everything!! I nearly wrote a review while they were in the oven because the sweet smell of them baking was unbelievable! These will definitely replace the holiday butter cookies I've previously made.

This recipe made the perfect cookies. I made two half batches. In the first, I substituted lemon extract for vanilla and added the zest of half a lemon and 1 tablespoon of poppyseeds. In the second half batch, I added the same amount of poppyseeds, and did 1/2 teaspoon anise extract and 1/4 teaspoon of almond extract.....The taste, texture and color made these the best cookies I have ever made. Thank you!

Well! These are the butter cookies you WANT to make!!Perfect texture, sweet buttery taste . After tasting them I closed my eyes and thought I was in heaven!!I think its the the addition of the egg yolk and extra vanilla , but whatever it is ....TRY THESE!

These really are the world's best butter cookies! They have a wonderful buttery flavor and their texture is perfect. I sprinkled a little granulated sugar on the tops before baking. I'll be making these again and again.

Just tried these with 3/4 cup of virgin coconut oil vs the butter. OMG yummy:)

I didn't refrigerate or roll the batter, but instead put it in a cookie press and baked them afterwards. They turned out great! Not too sweet which is great for my kids! I have uploaded photos. this is my very first butter cookies I'm glad I followed your recipe. thanks so much! was able to to make about 6 dozens and my kids love them! My 5 yr old son even asked for more but my 2 yr old daughter already finished them.

I'll not rate this because the cookies were just not to our taste. I ended up filling them with chocolate so they would not be wasted. I made the dough into a roll and sliced it for the cookies. Sorry! It was not what I anticipated.

Great recipe! Very delicate taste and texture. I reduced the vanilla extract and added lemon extract instead. So good!

The perfect simple and tasty cook recipe.

It's no joke, these are the best. I'm extremely particular about my butter cookies, and I've been looking for the perfect recipe for ages - here it is! These are amazing with and without icing, as all of my friends who gobbled them up agree. I will be returning to this page!

Yummy!!! I just made these for Valentine's day. I slightly under baked them and I loved them. I must confess, I think I have almost eaten them all so I must make another batch for the weekend. I added a spritz of old fashioned butter cream frosting and tinted bright pink and finished off with some white non-perils. Next time I will be rolling them out a little thinner to get them more crisp. They a very delicate in their flavor and I actually liked less frosting on them because the cookie was so delicious. Thank you so much for this recipe. The only problem I have is I don't want to share my cookies :)

Like many, I have been in search of the PERFECT butter cookie. I was kind of disappointed in this- as that I'm sure there's a better one out there. I followed recipe- and it was "okay" ... but no the world's best. I whipped up a chocolate frosting (melted 1/2 cup chocolate chips with 2 tbs butter, powdered sugar, almond flavoring and a touch of half/ half) and spread onto the cookies to try to liven them up. Won't make again- and if anyone wants to reply with another recipe link, please do. I love butter cookies!!!

Okay, I have to say this is the best butter cookie recipe ever. I had the High School Butter Cookie recipe everyone loves, but it fell short. I got it online. The cookie was not quite exactly like the butter cookie I remember from school. This recipe is it. My other recipe did not have the egg yolk. What a difference it makes! The cookies came out buttery, flakey, with still a crisp to them, exactly as I remember them from High School. They just melt in your mouth. I highly, highly recommend this recipe. Hurry and make them you will not regret it!

These were good. The flavor was delicate, the texture was just right between crisp and soft. I had a hard time making my roll round, so the cookies came out a little funny, but I'm not picky.
I have made these for several years, I dip them in chocolate for gift giving.

I really liked this recipe. It's not overly sweet and easy to work with. I chose to make cutouts. I have problems making sugar cookies but this dough worked really easy. My husband ate about a dozen right out of the oven so I guess he agrees that its a great recipe.

I love this recipe and the cookies really turn out very good and delicious!
Not too sweet and I also added some almond flakes and it is super crunchy and very nice! Thanks for sharing this recipe, this is the best I ever found! Love it!

This is a great cookie recipe. It not only tastes yummy, but is easy to make and has a nice light brown appearance. This is one of those cookies that everyone asks for the recipe!

These are great and incredibly easy. I substituted a 1/4 c of cocoa for a 1/4 c of flour. They tasted like chocolate shortbread. I'd actually put in a little more if I were to do it again. I also used soy margarine because my son is allergic to dairy - and they were still great. I only cooked them for about 12 minutes, though - and was glad I checked them then because they were quite crispy. Don't know if that was the result of the cocoa or margarine, perhaps?

They are the world's best. I made them exactly according to the recipe. I am not known for my culinary skills. So my brother-in-law had no clue that I was the one that made them. I heard him tell my mother-in-law that these cookies are as good as Mom Mom's. Great compliment even if they don't know it was me. Thank you.

I made these cookies at Christmas and they were really great. I cut them out into snowflake shapes. They are really tasty and will be added to my special list.

Nice, but not what I expected.

These are quite tasty and I think the dough would be easy to work with for cutouts. I'm lazy though and wanted the flavor of a thin cut-out cookie with no fuss. So I rolled the dough into a log and chilled it then sliced it thin and cooked the rounds. Not nearly as pretty, but tasty, easy and pretty fast! Inspires me to try this method with my grandmas sugar cookie recipe.

This recipe is truly perfect just the way it is!!!!!! It is so easy!!!

It's all true! Wonderful butter cookies. We used these as one of the fillers for our Christmas hampers that we gave to family as gifts.

I liked these very much. It is hard to believe that such a "plain" cookie could taste so good. The flavor was really nice as was the texture. I deliberately underbaked mine a bit because I like a softish center with a crispy/sandy exterior. This will go into cookie rotation at our house.

After refridgerating the log, I cut wider slices (1/3 inch), rolled each slice into a ball, and rolled the ball in cinnamon sugar. Baked for 15 minutes at 325. These came out soft in the middle and delicious, almost like a snickerdoodle.

These cookies turned out dry, flat, and flavorless - I've made much better butter cookies.

I wasn't sure how this woudl turn out. It just looked too simple. But when I took them out of hte oven I was in heaven!! So light and crispy and buttery. Pure heaven! Thanks!!

The absolute BEST butter cookie I have ever made. I just finished a batch and I can't stop eating them. Thanks for sharing this great recipe!

This recipe honestly lives up to it's name. I had just about given up on butter cookies. I am so glad I found this recipe and decided to give it one more try. I rolled the dough into a log and cut them. Next time I will try to roll them out. P4 is right, they are not too sweet and they are much like shortbread. All I did was sprinkle with red and green sugar since I made them for Christmas. This recipe is a keeper, in the box with all of my other favorite recipes.

Delicious and easy to make. That's a 5-star recipe in my mind! I iced these with My Favorite Cookie Icing/Frosting (My Favorite Cookie Icing/Frosting) and they turned out beautifully!

These are delicious - buttery and not too sweet - and oh so easy to make. I followed another reviewer's tip and made some of them into sandwich cookies with Nutella, and thought I'd died and gone to heaven!

Really good cookies! Dough was very sticky, had to put it in the freezer in between batches so I could cut it again. Had a hard time getting it cut due to the stickiness, so I ended up ripping hunks off and squishing them in between plastic wrap, which worked pretty well.

These are yummy and delicious. Very easy if you just cut and bake. I am too lazy to rollout and decorate. Thank you.