Lemon White Chocolate Chip Cookies

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The zesty bright flavor of lemon pairs perfectly with white chocolate in this lemon white chocolate chip cookies recipe. These thin and chewy cookies are packed with fresh lemon flavor!

Have you ever bought an extra bag of lemons at the store, totally forgetting you had one at home? If you’re super organized, probably not. But if you’re like me, it’s okay, let’s just bake some cookies. These lemon white chocolate cookies are a great place to start using those lemons! It’s like we planned it.

I will give you a quick little breakdown of the ingredients with some tips for the recipe and swaps I’ve made. But if you’re an experienced baker and just want to get to the nuts and bolts, don’t forget about the “jump to recipe” button at the top. It’s a personal favorite feature.

Lemon White Chocolate Chip Cookie Ingredients

The ingredient list is pretty simple. I have a couple of base cookie dough recipes that I rotate through depending on the cookie I’d like to make. These cookies are very similar to my key lime white chocolate macadamia nut cookies. I like how this particular cookie base tastes with citrus flavors.

You will need:

• Flour
• Sugar
• Butter
• Eggs – I’ve substituted the egg with both applesauce (1/4 cup per egg) and flax eggs (1 TBSP ground flax to 3 TBSP of water, let sit 5ish minutes before using). The flax eggs are my preference because they result in a sturdier cookie, but either works in a pinch. Don’t use something like pumpkin here, it’ll mess with the lemon flavor.
• Lemon Zest – You can find dried lemon zest in the spice section, but it’s easier and cheaper to zest the lemon you plan to juice. It takes just a few seconds and the flavor is much better than anything dried.
• Lemon juice – A little adds an extra lemon boost to the cookie flavor. I prefer to use this over lemon extract for a more natural flavor. If you use lemon extract, it’s not a 1:1 substitution. Start with 1/2 a teaspoon and then decide if you want to adjust.
• White chocolate chips

Lemon Cookie Baking Tips:

I’m not walking you through the recipe, but if you’re a newer baker, you might have some questions as you bake. If I don’t address it here, please send me an email.

First, you can prepare drop cookie dough in advance. It can sit in the fridge up to 2 days before baking with no adverse effects. In fact, the lemon flavor will deepen in these cookies because of the zest. You want to avoid having the dough dry out, so make sure that you store it wrapped tightly in plastic (touching the top of the batter, not just over the bowl), and/or in an airtight container.

You can freeze the unbaked cookies after shaping and bake the dough from frozen. Depending on your oven, it’ll add about 3-5 minutes to the bake time. This is good if you’re preparing cookies in advance, or if you’re baking for 1-2 people and want to have fresh cookies (almost) on demand.

You can freeze baked cookies. Don’t freeze cookies until they’re completely cool (trust me), and then keep them in an airtight container with parchment separating each layer. The flavor of baked cookies deteriorates quickly when frozen. In theory, both baked and unbaked cookies can be frozen for a few months.

If you don’t have fresh lemons, only have lemon extract, and really want to bake these cookies. That’s fine. See my suggestion in the previous section for substituting lemon extract for lemon juice (and zest too). We are not stressing over cookies.

You can substitute the chocolate chips if you’d like. White chocolate chips are the hands-down favorite for this recipe in my house. Buuuuuuuut, if I swap in dark chocolate chips to make a “fancy” lemon dark chocolate cookie, and it’s well received. The dough is also good without chips. It’s similar to my lemon coconut cookie recipe.

Finally, if you didn’t take out your butter to soften 30 minutes ago, that’s okay. I didn’t either. You can soften butter in the microwave in 30-second intervals at 50% power. Or, slice your butter thinly into your mixing bowl and wait about 10 minutes. It should be soft enough to cream by then.

I think that’s it. Happy baking, darlings!