So, I’m guessing no one noticed, but I stayed up late Friday night to update the links to all of my old recipes on the “Recipes” tab at the top of the page. Being a blogger is so exciting! Aside from being a little tedious, it was surprisingly fun to go back through every single post on this blog, to read old intros I wrote, to review old recipes I posted, and to look at the very first photos I took. And to see just how bad some of those photos were! Yikes! While all of the recipes are stellar (would I admit if they weren’t?), not all of the old photos measure up. These orange juice cookies are an oldie but a goodie, some of my absolute favorites. My mom made these a lot for us when I was growing up, and all of us still love them and request them often. They are just sweet enough, and deliciously light and tender. And now they have new and improved photos that make them look as good as they taste!
for the cookies:
1 1/2 sticks salted butter, softened
1/3 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup orange juice
3 cups flour, plus more for sprinkling
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
for the glaze:
1/2 cup orange juice
2 cups powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
colored sprinkles for topping
Combine butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, and orange juice in a blender. Blend until smooth (as smooth as you can get it). In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Add wet ingredients, and stir with a wooden spoon until mixed. Turn dough out onto a clean, well-floured surface, and knead until smooth and no longer sticky. It is very important that the dough not be sticky. It might take a lot of extra flour to get to that point!! Preheat the oven to 350°F and get out two baking sheets. Divide the dough into 24 equal pieces. Roll each piece into a strip about 6″ long, then swirl like a cinnamon roll or tie gently in a knot. Place 12 cookies on each baking sheet, and allow the cookies to sit at room temperature for 10 minutes before baking. Bake for 15 minutes.
While the cookies are baking, whisk the glaze ingredients (except for the sprinkles) in a medium bowl until smooth. When cookies come out of the oven, allow them to cool until you can touch them. Then dip the top of each cookie in glaze, and place on a cooling rack with wax paper underneath. When the glaze is dry, dip each cookie in glaze again, and sprinkle immediately with colored sprinkles. Allow cookies to cool and glaze to dry before serving.
The color and decorations are superb. If simple rolls are made and added on top of it it would look even better and would be a good recipe with best taste.
I was looking for recipes that I could make with sprinkles. These sound divine — and I actually have OJ right now (I usually don’t), so I’ll have to make some before it expires. Thanks for another scrumptious recipe!
You’re Welcome, Joy! They are one of my favorite cookies. They’re kind of like little scones. So good!
Did I miss a step that says to soften or melt the butter?? I attempted to combine the necessary ingredients in my (I’ll admit lame) Magic Bullet blender and ended up with an orangey sludgy mess. After several minutes of frustration I attempted to transfer the mess to my small food processor to see if I could make any more headway there (spilling what was left of the unblended OJ in the process), and had an even worse time there. Now my butter was not rock solid cold, but it was about room temp, maybe a little firmer, and there is no way this would have mixed. I’m incredibly frustrated right now – I hate wasting stuff, but after I’ve washed a bunch of the dishes dirtied in the process, I’m going to attempt again after softening the butter a LOT first, then I’ll attempt to blend. My daughter was so excited to try these cookies I don’t have the heart to say that I give up – yet.
Hi Nikki. I’ve edited the post to say softened butter. Thanks for the heads up. Because the eggs and OJ will presumably be cold, the mixture won’t ever be perfectly smooth. Mine is always a little chunky looking. But when you combine it with the dry ingredients and knead it, it smooths out and turns into a regular dough.
Take 2 was much better – I used much-softened butter. I’m sure if I had a normal powered blender and not a sad little Magic Bullet that would have helped too. I have to say these cookies were far more work than I anticipated, I’m more of a ‘mix and scoop’ kind of cookie baker. But I was pleasantly surprised at how well they baked after I wrestled with the dough – and yes you do have to add a LOT of flour before the dough loses all that stickiness. My four-year old was happy to keep throwing more flour at the dough every time I said ‘hit me!’ The end result reminded me a bit of those Mexican wedding cookies, only orange flavored which was a nice change. My dough-wrapping skills need a little work though, as my husband said (jokingly) that they looked like confetti covered little turds. *LOL*