I adore the smell of fresh lemons. I am generally captivated by lemon trees, and always wanted my own one, but living in the UK without a conservatory or a very large greenhouse makes that fairly improbable. In these cookies I used a lemon olive oil, plus extra zest, to get that zing that I love. Plus grating lemons makes me happy.

These are quite tender cookies, they do spread on the baking tray. If you don’t want them to spread out, only add in one egg.

No photo this time as they didn’t last long enough…but the video is up on YouTube.

Handy cups/grams conversion chart here.

1 cup caster (granulated) sugar
1/3 cup high quality lemon olive oil OR plain olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
Grated zest of one lemon
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 drops of lemon oil NOT ESSENTIAL it just adds more lemon zing
2 eggs
50g finely chopped marzipan
A good handful of dark chocolate chips
2 cups self raising flour

Preheat oven to 350 degrees/160C fan and line a baking tray with a non stick liner.

Zest your lemon into a medium bowl, then whisk in your sugar and olive oil together until smooth.

Mix in the vanilla extract and lemon oil if using. You can add extra lemon zest if you like, and leave the lemon oil out.

Add the eggs, whisking well so that they are properly incorporated.

Now add your flour, and work at it, because it will fight back. You can add a little extra oil if it helps, or even a touch of milk, just to help it mix.

Then add in your chopped marzipan and your dark chocolate chips and mix that all together. A large metal spoon may help!

Scoop dough onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper using an ice cream scoop or rounded spoonfuls. They do spread, so space them about 2” apart.

Baking for 15-18 minutes or until the cookies are lightly golden.

Cool for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack and cool completely.