A lil' Cornmeal in your Cookie

This is a very, very good cookie to have around in spring..

My windows are open, I spent all day Saturday potting geraniums and herbs on my front porch, the birds are nonstop raucous out there, the squirrels are clicking and clacking and it makes me want to help you fill your freezer with a kind of cookie dough that you can bake off in just a few minutes and serve with a sweet strawberries and cream, a spring time lemon curd, some poached peaches, roasted rhubarb, buttermilk ice cream or, really, any damn thing that you have hanging around during this most abundant and hospitable season of fruit.

Enjoy this weather, each other and be nice. Love, L

A gift box I made for a chef’s conference some years ago. I adore this cookie. Big time.

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A Yellow Cookie Story

This recipe came to me by way of the lovely John Fleer. He asked me to make these for a dinner he was cooking with Tandy Wilson at City House in Nashville, where I was the pastry chef for a few years. It was the first recipe I took from a savory chef and found the gumption (which would seemingly not be a problem in the future) to ask permission to alter. I changed some things around, made it my own, and John Fleer, in all of his buoyant generosity, took one bite and declared he had never tasted something so perfect as this little yellow cookie and that it was no longer his, but mine. That was a good day.

Lisa Donovan’s John Fleer Cornmeal Cookie

1#        Unsalted Butter

2c        Sugar

3t.        Lemon Zest

4          Egg Yolks

3c        All Purpose Flour

2c        Anson Mills Sweet Appalachian Cornmeal

2t.        Kosher Salt

In the bowl of a *stand mixer, add sugar and lemon zest. Rub lemon and sugar together to make an aromatic lemon sugar. Add butter, cubed. Cream butter and lemon sugar together with paddle attachment until a bit aerated and fluffy. Add egg yolks one at a time, scraping sides of bowl after each addition. When the final yolk is added, beat for several minutes until fully incorporated, scraping sides and bottom as you go.

In a separate bowl, combine remaining dry ingredients together. Add in thirds to the butter until well combined.

You can do two things here: you can roll the dough flat between two piece of parchment and freeze and cut with cookie cutters or you can roll into logs, freeze and slice. Whatever your preference, you will start your baking process by preheating oven to 325. Prepare a sheet pan with a silpat or parchment paper.

Place cut or sliced cookies 1” apart on cookies sheet, sprinkle with sugar (if you’re include, make more lemon sugar) and bake for 7-8 minutes, watching carefully. They should stay fairly light in color with just slightly browned edges. Remove immediately from hot baking sheet and let cool on cooling rack.

*You can also use a hand held mixer, or if you’re a herculean badass, a wooden spoon.

To learn more about John Fleer, check out his incredible restaurant in Asheville, Rhubarb. I meet and cook with a lot of chefs in my life. John Fleer is a class act, a true professional and sincerely one of the most inspiring people I’ve ever been able to share a kitchen with. You will never cook with him without learning something revelatory and new. He is truly one of our greats.