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Pink Grapefruit Sugar Cookies

3.9

(26)

Pink Grapefruit Sugar Cookies recipe
Photograph by Emma Fishman. Food styling by Pearl Jones.

Soft grocery-store-style cookies get a makeover in food stylist and recipe developer Jesse Szewczyk’s book Cookies: The New Classics. “These sugar cookies are everything you love about the nostalgic lunchbox treat,” he writes, but “reimagined with the unexpected addition of pink grapefruit zest.” Citrus keeps the cookies zippy and offsets the sweetness of the fluffy frosting. Use a little gel food coloring (or a lot!) in the frosting to customize your shade.

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What you’ll need

Recipe information

  • Yield

    Makes about 24

Ingredients

Cookies

2¾

cups (344 g) all-purpose flour

¼

cup (30 g) cornstarch

¾

tsp. baking powder

¾

tsp. baking soda

½

tsp. Diamond Crystal or ¼ tsp. Morton kosher salt

2

tsp. finely grated pink grapefruit zest

1

cup (200 g) granulated sugar

½

cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature

1

large egg

⅓

cup sour cream, room temperature

1

Tbsp. vanilla extract

Frosting and Assembly

4

cups (440 g) powdered sugar, sifted

½

cup heavy cream

½

cup (1 stick) unsalted butter,room temperature

1

tsp. finely grated pink grapefruit zest

1

tsp. vanilla extract

½

tsp. Diamond Crystal or ¼ tsp. Morton kosher salt

Red (or any color) gel food coloring and sprinkles (for decorating)

Preparation

  1. Cookies

    Step 1

    Place racks in upper and lower thirds of oven; preheat to 350°. Whisk together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl.

    Step 2

    Using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat grapefruit zest, sugar, and butter in a large bowl until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add egg, sour cream, and vanilla and beat to incorporate, about 2 minutes (the mixture might look curdled, and that’s okay). Reduce speed to low and beat in dry ingredients until just combined.

    Step 3

    Using a #30 cookie scoop (about 2 Tbsp.) and working one at a time, scoop out portions of dough and roll into balls (you should have about 24). Divide between 2 parchment-lined baking sheets, spacing at least 3" apart. Gently flatten cookies to about 1½" in diameter.

    Step 4

    Bake cookies, rotating baking sheets top to bottom and front to back halfway though, until edges are light golden but tops are still pale, 11–13 minutes. Let cookies cool 5 minutes on baking sheets, then transfer to a wire rack and let cool completely.

    Do Ahead: Cookies can be baked 5 days ahead; store airtight at room temperature.

  2. Frosting and Assembly

    Step 5

    Using an electric mixer on low speed, beat powdered sugar, cream, butter, grapefruit zest, vanilla, and salt in a large bowl until combined. Increase speed to high and beat until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Using a toothpick or skewer, add a small drop of food coloring to frosting, then beat to combine.

    Step 6

    Spoon 1 heaping Tbsp. frosting onto each cookie; use a spoon or offset spatula to create swirls. Decorate cookies with sprinkles.

    Do aAhead: Cookies can be frosted and decorated 2 days ahead. Store airtight at room temperature.

cookie book.jpeg
Recipe Excerpted From ‘Cookies: The New Classics’, by Jesse Szewczyk (Clarkson Potter). Copyright © 2021.

Buy it on Amazon or Bookshop.org
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Reviews (26)

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  • The result is delicious but the directions for the final assembly need some tweaking. As others mentioned, these cookies don’t spread, so make sure to press them to the size and shape you want. The directions for the frosting mention to beat it for 3 minutes until light and fluffy. If you do this the frosting will never harden. I would recommend beating until just incorporated. I did that last year and the frosting was much more like a traditional sugar cookie and I able to handle them without destroying them.

    • Elise

    • 12/24/2023

  • Really tasty but very sweet. Also, I thought that the amount of icing sugar seemed aggressive so I made 2/3s of what the recipe recommended. Even that left me with a ton leftover. I would half or even 1/4 it next time

    • Miss Charlotte

    • Victoria BC

    • 12/13/2022

  • One of the BEST cookies I've ever made! The cookie was fluffy and flavorful, and the buttercream is divine! The salt really makes it. I'm going to use this buttercream for cakes and macarons too! Absolutely a keeper. I made them exactly as written.

    • Sarah

    • Baltimore, MD

    • 1/20/2022

  • I made these exactly as described, and they looked perfect. The texture of both the cookies and frosting were amazing. BUT I was super disappointed with the flavor of the grapefruit. It was just...off. It tasted grape-fruitlike, and I love grapefruit, but it just did not do it for me in this cookie combination. I would like to try them again and sub pulverized freeze-dried berries for the grapefruit zest. But the structure of these cookies is really excellent.

    • Libby

    • Atlanta, GA

    • 1/19/2022

  • We loved these cookies! I’m not sure why some had the unfortunate experience of no flavor; ours were very flavorful. We are blessed with a yellow grapefruit tree in our front yard, which is what I used here (although I still used red gel in the frosting for the pretty pink color). While the juice from our yellow grapefruits is very bitter, both it and the zest of the fruit is incredibly flavorful— I love using them for baking! Perhaps try the yellow variety instead of pink if you can find them?

    • Grace S

    • San Diego, CA

    • 1/3/2022

  • I normally am not a huge grapefruit fan but made these to use up some sour cream in the fridge. I love them! I had great grapefruit flavor in mine, not sure why some people had issues. My cookies also didn't spread that much but I don't mind. Lovely!

    • Sarah

    • Saskatoon, SK

    • 12/18/2021

  • For those who want the sprinkles: Wilton has a "Rose Pink Pearl Mix", that's what seems to be used on the picture.

    • Anonymous

    • Philadelphia

    • 12/17/2021