Palets de Dames, Lille Style

This week marks the first week that Tuesdays with Dorie is baking from Dorie’s new book Baking Chez Moi. I adored Dorie’s Baking from My Home to Yours, and I am just as excited about this new book. So far, all of the recipes I’ve read through sound terrific. I was also thrilled that Dorie now includes weight measurements in the recipe in addition to volume measurements. I prefer weighing ingredients, since I think it is a lot more accurate. Such a good addition!

The first recipe is for these cookies, Palets de Dames. My friend asked me what that translated to. Dorie mentions that “palets” means “pucks,” but I would probably translate these to ladies cookies, in the style of Lille, France. They are a beautifully simple sugar cookie topped with a lemon glaze. I didn’t change anything in the recipe at all; I find that Dorie’s recipes are written in a way that I don’t often have to change much.

I made these early in the morning and let the dough refrigerate while I made some other cookies. The dough would be impossibly soft to work with without refrigeration! It was still soft after an hour in the refrigerator, but cool enough to shape. My cookies were a little more domed than Dorie’s; the cookies in her photo are flatter than mine. One batch I baked about 30 seconds too long and it made a difference: too browned on the bottom. These are the perfect tea cookie, light and flaky, with the softest lemon flavor. I really liked these and I am so excited to start working my way through this book! Don't forget to check out how all the TWD bakers did with this week's recipe, by visiting the Tuesdays with Dorie website.

Recipe from Baking Chez Moi by Dorie Greenspan, pages 272-274