Making lemon sugar to have on hand is a great trick for so many uses! Perfect for using in homemade lemonade, on the rim of a glass, or in baking.
I love the sweet and tart flavor combination that this lemon sugar gives whatever you add it to. It’s really a simple trick that my Mama would do in the summer to the rim of lemonade glasses for parties or make a larger portion to sweeten her lemonade even. It takes all of a few seconds to mix together, but creates such an impressive little touch!
It’s great to make ahead for parties or just to elevate a bit of the everyday. I remember one particular Saturday when I was supposed to have a friend over to play and spend the night. I’d looked forward to that Saturday all week long. I’d cleaned my room, which in itself was a major event, I’d planned all the games we would play, and had even pulled out my favorite cassettes for us to listen to over and over and over and over. Unfortunately, that was the same week that my friend came down with strep throat and I felt like my whole life was ruined. Yes, it was definitely a dramatic period in my life. It was also the same time frame of endlessly begging to begin wearing makeup and being able to talk to my friends on the phone during the week.
Speaking of which, Little Buddy and I just had a conversation this past weekend ourselves over how little communication my friends and I had outside of church, school, and extra-curricular activities. I could earn up to 30 minutes a week to talk on the phone on the weekend, but only on the phone that was in the kitchen.
Thankfully, that was the phone with the longest cord – I’m not sure if it originally was the longest or if it had just grown that way since my sister was three years older than me and had already stretched it way past any respectable length during her 30 minutes a week gab-fest! Anyway, Little Buddy loved hearing about long phone cords, time allotments and the names of my pet dinosaurs. Ha!
But, back to the Saturday when my life seemed to take a dramatic nose-dive since my friend wasn’t able to come over and listen to Rick Springfield croon to us and drool over my sister’s poster of Tom Selleck. On that particular Saturday, Mama surprised me with glasses of lemonade in her fanciest glasses for the two of us.
On the rim of those glasses, she’d added her special touch of lemon sugar and had even pulled out our swirly straws that she swore every time we used them she was going to throw them away because they were such a chore to wash!
I’ll never forget that afternoon as we sipped on our fancy lemonade and listened to Rick Springfield together. We even played with makeup a little bit and she showed me that blue eyeshadow really wasn’t for me after all.
Here’s how Mama made her Lemon Sugar recipe.
Lemon Sugar Recipe
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup (99 g) granulated sugar
- 2 tablespoons (12 g) lemon zest, 1 large lemon
Instructions
- Stir together granulated sugar and lemon zest. Store in an airtight container for later use.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Enjoy!
Robyn xo
Could I use raw sugar to make the lemon sugar?
i did the zest and then put it in my artificial granulated sweetener into a small jar and two days later when i opened it
it like had crystallized.( i dug the chunks out and it was tasty)
so next i did more zest and stuck it in unlit oven to maybe dry..it lay dead and desiccated the next day.
what am i doing wrong?
Hi Pym,
I’ve never had this happen when I’ve made this, but I’ve not made with artificial sugar. I’m thinking that may be what is causing it. I hope this helps! Thanks so much!
Saw these cookies and HAD to try the recipe. The only thing I would change is the size of them. I got 36 cookies from this batch, and believe there could have been another dozen. My smaller baking sheets were not expecting the GIANT cookies!
They were none the less, DELICIOUS !!!
Happy summertime!
Hi, thank you for this. What is the storage and length of freshness. Thank you
I meant for the lemon cookies. Thanks!
Hi Jane,
Normally, I’ll use 1 overripe banana or 1/4 cup of applesauce when replacing an egg in a recipe, but I’ve not tried it in this recipe so I can’t tell you which one would properly replace the egg as the binder in this recipe. I wish I could be of more help! xo
any idea what could I use to replace egg on this recipe? Thanks!
How long will this store? I’m thinking this would be such a pretty gift in a glass jar…..
What a wonderful mother you had – great memories – you never realize the simple things can be so memorable. Love anything lemon!! CJ
My favorite lemon cookie recipe uses this lemon sugar process to flavor the cookie and it is delicious. Whenever I make them I get lots of requests for the recipe and I admit that I am reluctant to share! They are that special.
This is awesome! I will definitely be making some of this. And some with lime.
I hope you enjoy it, Christina! Yes, lime is also amazing.