Test cook Dan Souza makes Julia a festive recipe for Easy Holiday Sugar Cookies. Equipment expert Adam Ried reveals his top pick for parchment paper, and gadget critic Lisa McManus reviews silicone baking mats. Test cook Lan Lam then makes Bridget the Best Lemon Bars.
Get the recipe for Easy Holiday Sugar Cookies:
Get the recipe for our Best Lemon Bars:
Buy our winning silicone baking mats:
ABOUT US: Located in Boston’s Seaport District in the historic Innovation and Design Building, America’s Test Kitchen features 15,000 square feet of kitchen space including multiple photography and video studios. It is the home of Cook’s Illustrated magazine and Cook’s Country magazine and is the workday destination for more than 60 test cooks, editors, and cookware specialists. Our mission is to test recipes over and over again until we understand how and why they work and until we arrive at the best version.
If you like us, follow us:
Related posts
42 Comments
Leave a Reply Cancel reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Love the sugar cookies! Adding a lil corn starch will also help them from not spreading.
I have to try this for the lemon bars. I can't find any that taste good and this recipe looks like a winner. Thanks for sharing!!!
I was provided three bags of lemons and decided to make this, and they are right. The bars were full of lemon and the crust was crunchy and tasty. It lived up to the hype. Will make again and again and give out as Christmas treats.
This guy is in love with himself, tell me some more things that you're not going to do
This recipe is not the greatest. Cookies were not very flavorful and the texture was off–just a bland, ordinary sugar cookie.
Lan is fabulous but really this recipe is off…it’s too tiny. Lemon bars need volume and height. Citric acid and lemon extract go a long way in creating the punch. I found this too petite and the topping a bit too wet and thin. The sugar cookies are gorgeous and the flooding with Royal icing is always a showstopper.
I have a poderosa lemon tree. These are my go-to lemon bars. Everyone loves them.
i always avoid using raw egg whites in icings because who loves throwing up your guts into a toilet that is not fun at all.
so use instead meringue powder or pasteurized egg whites
XD i am so risk averse in everything i do
Ewww dragée.
When people rely on the safety switch to turn a food processor on and off, I get so anxious.
I would call those lemon tarts….not bars, as such, as I know them, in a 9×13, dusted with powdered sugar…but my mouth is watering 👌
Could I double the lemon bar recipe in a 13×9 pan?
Every time I asked somebody for a lemon bar recipe, they told me to buy a mix like they do.
Never again.
Also buy pre-cut rounds of parchment for cake pans, they're nice to have.
But those for baking sheets will be great.
I love you guys to death, and I have been buying your books and watching your show and subscribing to your website for nearly 25 years now. I don't intend to stop anytime soon. Let there be no doubt how much faith and trust I have invested in all you folks at atk.
But! I have made your lemon bars, and good as they are, they are not the best out there. The best lemon bars I have ever made or eaten in my life, came from a cookbook published by a baker in boston, the title momentarily escapes me. But these lemon bars are baked in a rectangular baking pan, have a shortbread crust that includes half a pound of butter, and enough lemon curd that you need 14 lemons to get enough juice, and either 10 or 12 egg yolks. The crust is par-baked, during which time the curd is made on the stove top. Then the current is poured over the shortbread crust, and finished in the oven. The layer of lemon curd is nearly as thick as the shortbread layer itself. Perhaps a little more so. The lemon curd includes lemon zest in addition to the lemon juice, plus another stick of butter, and a quarter cup of heavy cream. It is perhaps the most decadent lemon dessert I have ever attempted in my life, and that is saying a great deal, because I have done cheesecakes, and all kinds of other lemon desserts over the years.
I say this, not to knock down your pride and accomplishment, because it is well deserved. I'm telling you this, because I want you guys to know that it is possible to do even better. I would love to see you folks create something even more over the top than what I have described above. If anybody can do it, you guys can.
Required to subscribe to view the recipe. ☹️
Give me lemon, dangit! "mmm, it's not too tart". Females, you literally cannot make up your minds.
There was a lemon bar or lemon square that ATK made with olive oil. I wanted that recipe, but I can’t find it.
Is there an alternate recipe that does not involve hen period and mammary excretion?
Superb cookies love the lemon bars and the gorgeous sugar cookies with dragees.
I love all the recipes I watched.
This is amazing to watch on slow motion.
I miss Kimball. He was more interesting to watch. This person looks like she doesn't give a f. You can totally see her read the teleprompter.
Love the main cast of ATK and love to see Lan on too she’s amazing
18:34 … i need to write down this filling recipe. with the holidays coming up, wish ATK would have included the written recipe in their description of the show.
Love lemon bars!
I love the pre-cooking the lemon bar curd and then straining out the zest! I love lemon but hate the feeling of zest in my mouth and teeth.
STOP WITH THE SUGAR ALL READY!! This 2021 going on healthier.
Dan demonstrates how to do MS Paint by hand.
Those lemon bars are clean. Very beautiful. Very good.
Me too, lemon anything!
💗💗💗 Dan
Both cookies and lemon bars look absolutely delicious. Thank you.
I think the first step to start baking is to have a good kitchen electronic scale. I recommend a small and exquisite digital electronic scale for my own household.
Recommend it to someone who needs this
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08HZ4TGC6
Hello!
Is there a way learn what ovens are used in the test kitchen? they look super convenient and well conceived.
IExcellent tutorials, superb recipes. LOVE this channel!
Sugar cookie ingredients
Wet:
1 lg egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
¾ tsp salt
¼ tsp almond extract
Dry:
2 ½ c all purpose flour
¼ tsp baking powder
¼ tsp baking soda
Plasticized butter:
1 c granulated sugar, processed into superfine sugar
16 Tbsp cold unsalted butter, cut in ½ inch pieces
Royal icing:
2 ⅔ c confectioners sugar
2 lg egg whites
½ tsp vanilla extract
⅛ tsp salt
The cookies look great! But why do they always insist on baking just 1 sheet at a time? Are their uber expensive Wolf ovens that uneven that they can't make 2 sheets at a time? Or is it because they are electric? I've never had a problem with a gas oven.
Dan gives me "Ryan from The Office" vibes
My favourite recipe
I LOVE LEMON BARS
I usually just use kitchen shears to cut it but the edges come off a tad bit uneven