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These cottage cheese cookies are lightly sweet, crisp and crumbly. They are just right with a piping hot cup of tea (or coffee). They are also excellent with milk.
I took them to my sisters house tonight and we spread raspberry honey creme
I love discovering new blogs. I especially love finding European-type blogs because it’s very likely that we have foods in common. Last week, I came across One Turkmen Kitchen and that is where I found the original cottage cheese cookies recipe.
My only changes: I converted everything to US measurements and added lemon zest (because I have like a gazillion lemons from our trip to California).
Ingredients for Cottage Cheese Cookies:
2 sticks or 16 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened
8 oz small-curd cottage cheese
zest of 1 lemon
2 1/4 cups all purpose unbleached flour *measured correctly
1/4 tsp baking powder
5 Tbsp granulated sugar
How to Make Cottage Cheese Cookies:
Preheat your Oven to 350˚F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
1. In the bowl of your stand mixer with the paddle attachment, cream together your softened butter, 8 oz small-curd cottage cheese and the zest of one lemon. Mix on Medium/high speed for about 5 minutes until the mixture is smooth and fluffy.
2. Sift in the 2 1/4 cups flour and 1/4 tsp baking powder (or whisk together flour and baking powder instead of sifting) and knead it together with your dough hook or by hand until your dough is soft and not sticking to your fingers. If you find it is still sticking to your fingers, add another Tbsp of flour.
3. Roll the dough into a ball and then roll it out on a smooth, non-stick surface until it is 1/4″ thick.
4. Use a round cookie cutter to cut out your cookies, cutting as many as you can out of your dough.
5. Pour your sugar into a flat plate. Dip one side of your cookie into the sugar and gently pat it down to coat generously with sugar. Fold it in half with the sugar on the inside. Dip one of the folded sides of your cookie in the sugar again and fold it in half with the sugar on the inside. When you fold, the sugar will always be on the inside.
If you accidentally dip both sides of your cookie in sugar (I did a couple times) don’t panic, it will still be edible. Place the finished cookies on the baking sheet, fairly close together, since they don’t expand very much. Make a ball of dough out of the remaining scraps and roll it out again and again until you’ve used up all of your dough.
6. Bake at 350˚F for 32-35 minutes or until the edges and tops are golden brown.
Are you making any any new cookies for the holidays?
Cottage Cheese Cookies Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 sticks or 16 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened
- 8 oz small-curd cottage cheese
- zest of 1 lemon
- 2 1/4 cups all purpose unbleached flour
- 1/4 tsp baking powder
- 5 Tbsp granulated sugar
Instructions
- Preheat your Oven to 350˚F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- In the bowl of your mixer with the paddle attachment, cream together your softened butter, 8 oz small-curd cottage cheese and the zest of one lemon. Mix on Medium/high speed for about 5 minutes until the mixture is smooth and fluffy.
- Sift in the flour and baking powder (or whisk together flour and baking powder instead of sifting) and knead it together with your dough hook or by hand until your dough is soft and not sticking to your fingers. If you find it is still sticking to your fingers, add another Tbsp of flour.
- Roll the dough into a ball and then roll it out on a smooth, non-stick surface until it is 1/4" thick. Use a round cookie cutter to cut out your cookies, cutting as many as you can out of your dough.
- Pour your sugar into a flat plate. Dip one side of your cookie into the sugar and gently pat it down to coat generously with sugar. Fold it in half with the sugar on the inside. Dip one of the folded sides of your cookie in the sugar again and fold it in half with the sugar on the inside. When you fold, the sugar will always be on the inside. If you accidentally dip both sides of your cookie in sugar (I did a couple times) don't panic, it will still be edible. Place the finished cookies on the baking sheet, fairly close together, since they don't expand very much. Make a ball of dough out of the remaining scraps and roll it out again and again until you've used up all of your dough.
- Bake at 350˚F for 32-35 minutes or until the edges and tops are golden brown.
This little cookie is just delicious and surprisingly delicate…and flaky! Thank you for yet another wonderful recipe, Natasha.
Before I made these, I read many of the comments and so I decided to experiment…following the recipe as is, right at the end I baked some like that, a few I pressed the top side in granulated sugar, a few I pressed the top side into turbinado (coarse) sugar, and a few once cooled I dusted with powdered sugar. For what it’s worth, after tasting each option, I think they are the best just as your recipe presents them with no changes at all. That’s the way I’ll bake them going forward. 🙂
Love it! So glad that it was a success, thank you for sharing your comments and feedback!
Natasha, two thumbs up 👍 👍
My husband accidentally bought two packs of cottage cheese instead of sour cream. I immediately went to your site to see what I can use them for besides lasagna and I found these delicious cookies and I had all ingredients listed 😀. I followed the recipe exactly. They were not overly sweet which we like and crunchy a bit. I also added some vanilla sugar to the sugar. I baked them for 30 minutes and I think I could have pulled them 1 or 2 minutes earlier but I guess it depends on the size of the cookie, my cutter was about 2,5 inches, not sure what size of the cutter you used. Next time I will try to make them a bit bigger even though I liked the size I had. The only thing is we cannot stop eating them. Thank you for all your recipes.
Hi Alla! I’m so glad you tried and loved this recipe. Thank you for sharing.
Loved the taste, mother in-law used to make a cottage cheese pie, that had the same taste, mine came to kind of big, and may not have cooked all the way through. Maybe I will roll them out of ore next time
Thanks for sharing that, Natasha. I hope it becomes perfect on your next try!
Hi Natasha,
I’m a big fan of your recipes and this cookie is absolutely a winner.. it’s crisp and yummy! I’ve tried a lot of your recipes and it didn’t disappoint me❤️. Thank you! Your recipes are always use every week😀. Sorry I didn’t think of putting the pictures – all I wanted was to eat right away and forgot about posting them.. I’ll do better next time.
Hello Anie, that is so wonderful! I’m happy to hear that you really enjoyed this recipe. No worries about the pics, you can take them next time and share them on our Facebook page or group!
Hi, Natasha
You have big fans in Europe !
It would be nice to have normal international measurements for all your recipes
Thank you!
Hi Maria! Thank you so much for sharing that with me! We do include metric conversion in our printable recipe card with every new recipe! We have been doing that for some time. Simply scroll down to the printable recipe card and press the red metric wording. Some of our older recipes don’t have the conversion but as you can imagine it is a time consuming process as they have to be added one at a time. Thank you for being patient!
Hi, Natasha,
I’ve been making these cookies for ages. Winner every time I’ve made them. My sister shared that recipe long time ago. Now I know where it came from, at that time she had friends from Turkmenistan.
The other day I made ‘rakushki’, but we call them ‘rozochki’ – roses. I add 250gm of cottage cheese to that recipe. But my son said he wants now ‘cheese triangles’, that’s how we call your cottage cheese cookies.
Thank you very much for being a blogger. I’m enjoying every time I watch or read your posts and my family enjoys every time I cook something new from your posts.
Very easy to follow and entertaining at the same time.
You’re welcome! I’m so happy you enjoyed it, Irina!
Great recipe as always! Had a lot of fun making these with kids. It sure was a mess though!
Question: I’m not sure where I went wrong, but after the baking time ended, they looked great in the outside, but inside they where raw. I put them back for another 30 min, and they became hard and well done, but still had that raw look inside. What could be the issue? I used Traderjoes organic cottage cheese and Costco organic eggs….
Hi Ale, it should be soft but not raw like. Was anything changed or omitted in the recipe?
This was an interesting experiment. First I halved the recipe – I do this with new ones so I don’t use too many ingredients in case it doesn’t work out. I only had large curd cottage cheese, and when I was done mixing in all the ingredients I could still see the curds, so I was starting to think it was going to work. Plus the dough was very sticky, even after I added an extra tbsp of flour. But I soldiered on. I didn’t trust rolling out the sticky dough on my counter, so I improvised. I rolled a small amount into a ball in the palm of my hand, and flattened it out still in my palm, like a very small pizza. Then I layed the “pizza” down in the sugar, pressed it down some, then folded it as described in the recipe. Some I only folded once, some twice. I found the dough to be more fragile the thinner it got. I sprinkled extra sugar on top of just 3 of them, just to try it. I baked them for 32 minutes until golden brown on the edges, and found that the curds turned into an orange-rose color.
So the verdict is…delicious! The folded cookie is perfectly crispy, almost like philo dough. The ones I folded twice in the sugar taste better and look more interesting, but if you don’t have a big sweet tooth then folding once is also good. I did not have issues with raw or wet dough. Next time I will try to very carefully flatten them more, as they do puff up in the oven. Also I think the smaller ones are cuter too. Wish I could upload a photo here! Thank you Natasha! These cookies are a nice change from my usual baked goods!
Thank you so much for sharing that with us CK!! I’m so so glad you enjoyed this!
Forgot to add my star rating – 5 stars! Also there’s a typo in my review – when I saw the large curds and sticky dough, I thought it was NOT going to work, but it finally did work!
Hi Natasha, thanks so much for the recipe! My family loved them so much. What is the inside supposed to be like? My insides are kind of wet, like a raw dough consistency (visually, not to touch) even after baking forty minutes at 350. The outside is perfectly crumbly though! Is that how yours are? How can I get them to be crumbly but not dry? Thanks in advance!
Hi Maria, it should be soft but not raw like. Was anything changed or omitted in the recipe?
I had same problem. They baked for almost an hour until they got really dry on top and bottom, and inside, still looked like a raw dough and wet. I’ve added a little bit of sugar to the dough. Could that be the issue?
Other than that, great recipe and taste really good.
Hi Natasha,
Do you think I can use this dough to make the merengue cookie recipe (the ones you roll)? We used to make the merengue cookies and I lost the recipe but I remember that the dough had tvorog as one of the ingredients. Also, has anybody tried it with Ricotta instead of cottage cheese? Should have less curds…
And yes, thank you for all your wonderful recipes and videos!
Hi Marianna, I honestly haven’t tried this dough for the Finnish Meringue cookies so I’m not sure how that would work. I can’t make that recommendation without trying it first. If you experiment, let me know how it goes 🙂