Lovely Florentine Lace Cookies – these delicate, crisp lace cookies are easy to make and incredibly delicious! These thin cookies are a holiday favorite and this small batch cookie recipe yields 4-5 cookies.
I love baking during the holidays. It’s fun to step out of a “cookie comfort zone” and bake cookies I normally don’t bake other times of the year. Each year these pretty lace cookies are at the top of my Christmas cookie baking list and with good reason. They’re incredibly delicious and so very easy to make.
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What Are Lace Cookies?
Lace cookies are very thin, delicate-looking cookies are also known as Florentines.
These crisp cookies are made with sugar, cream, corn syrup, butter, vanilla, flour or sometimes finely chopped almonds, and oats.
They are said to have originated in Italy sometime around the Renaissance period.
When researching the origin of oatmeal lace cookies, I discovered that Ireland also claims a lace cookie recipe too. Irish Lace Cookies are made with basically the same list of ingredients.
Looking a little further, I learned that the French also make a similar cookie. I guess that shows that these beautiful cookies are popular all over the world.
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Small Batch Lace Cookies
When scaling down my large batch lace cookies recipe, I ran into a few challenges.
Scaling down recipes isn’t always easy and that’s especially the case with cookies and other baked goods. I spent two days perfecting this recipe and ended up with a lot of very tasty but not very pretty lace type cookies.
Just okay is never good enough so I kept at it and finally decided on a small batch recipe that was just as perfect as my large batch lace cookie recipe.
These lace cookies are wonderful!
They’re very thin and the longer they bake, the crisper they become.
I love the buttery taste and think they’re almost too pretty to eat.
Tips For Making Lace Cookies
- Only bake a few cookies at a time on a baking sheet. Lace cookies spread out quite a bit so leaving 2 to 3 inches between each cookie is a good idea.
- Use a nonstick baking liner, such as Silpat. It makes it so easy to remove the cookies from the baking tray. Since lace cookies are very delicate, they break easily.
- After the cookies have cooled on the baking sheet for 1 minute, use a wide spatula to transfer them to a cooling tray. If the cookie bunches or tears when you try to remove it, leave the cookies on the cookie tray and let them continue to cool for another minute.
This small batch lace cookies recipe will give you approximately 4 large cookies.
Other Small Batch Cookie Recipes
If you like this florentine lace cookies recipe, you might also like to try these small batch cookie recipes:
Flourless Chocolate Pecan Cookies
Tropical White Chocolate Chip Cookies
Shortbread Cookies Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
DoubleTree Chocolate Chip Cookies
Other Oatmeal Desserts
You might also like to try these small batch and single serving oatmeal desserts:
Mini Orange Oat Breakfast Cake
For this lace cookies recipe, I use a 1-quart saucepan, a large cookie sheet and a medium cookie scoop.
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Lace Cookies Recipe
Ingredients
- 4 tablespoons rolled oats
- 2 tablespoons all purpose flour
- 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 2 tablespoons heavy cream
- 2 tablespoons light corn syrup
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1/8 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
- Heat oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C). Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper or a silicon baking mat. Set aside.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the oats and flour. Set bowl aside.
- Heat the sugar, cream, corn syrup, and butter in a 1-quart saucepan over medium heat, stirring frequently until butter has melted and the mixture comes to a gentle boil.
- Reduce heat to low and cook, stirring occasionally for 1 minute.
- Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla.
- Stir in the oats and flour.
- Let the batter rest for 10 minutes.
- Using a medium cookie scoop which holds approximately 1.5 tablespoons of dough, drop the cookie batter onto the prepared cookie sheet, leaving at least 2 inches between each cookie to allow them to spread.
- Bake for 6-8 minutes, watching closely to prevent the cookies from over baking. Cookies should be a light brown color.
- Allow the cookies to cool on the cookie sheet for 1 minute, then remove them very carefully with a spatula and place them on a baking rack to cool completely.
Notes
Nutrition
The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionists’ advice.
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First off – thank you very much for your scaled down recipes, it is so appreciated from this empty nester. My question about lace cookies is : at what point would I roll them so that I can fill them with a brandy cream – a cookie I tasted one time while on a holiday. Thank you
Thank you. I’m so happy you are enjoying the recipes.
To roll the cookies, bake them and leave the cookies on the baking sheet for about a minute or two, carefully tuck the edge of a spatula under the edge of the cookie and roll the cookies around a spoon or other mold.
Enjoy!
I love lace cookies. I am delighted with this recipe. As I only have a toaster oven, I bake 2 at a time on my small cookie sheet. Perfect. If I feel really decadent, when I take them out of the oven, I place a few chocolate chips on one edge to melt. so good.
I love the idea of adding a few chocolate chips – such a great idea!!
Your cookies seems yummy and from above comment I also come to know its cosmopolitan recipe. Will surely try this recipe.
Your cookies had their origins in Italy. They traveled through the Catholic Europe, hence the recipes to be found in France and Ireland which are indeed similar. They have a Christmas origin although it is said it is more todo with the First Communion that they young people take hence the reference to lace.
Jonathan, thank you so much for letting me know. I find the history of foods we eat today so interesting. In fact, now that you mention it the cookies do remind me of a Communion wafer.
Have a great week!
Joanie