Lemon Cool Whip Cookies

Yes, you do. There is no substitute. I have only tried the recipe with brand-name, Cool Whip (rather than generic or store brands). If you live in an area where Cool Whip isn’t sold or isn’t common, this may not be the lemon cookie recipe for you. See the Tip box above for other lemon cookie recipes.

You can either regular Cool Whip, Lite, or Fat Free. Although, I think the results in terms of taste and texture are a bit better with regular or Lite. If you’re trying to make a compromise to make them a little healthier, I would use Lite over Fat Free Cool Whip, but Fat Free still works.

I do not recommend it because it doesn’t have the stabilizes that store bought whipped topping has and your cookies may not rise properly and they may turn out like deflated blobs.

Again, yes, this is a critical ingredient and I don’t know what to suggest in place of it. See my Tips box above for other lemon cookie recipes that are from scratch.

I use Duncan Hines Perfectly Moist Lemon Supreme Cake Mix. Note that Duncan Hines cake mix is 15.25 ounces per box (there is also another older version of Duncan Hines Lemon Cake Mix that’s 16.5 ounces per box) whereas Betty Crocker is only 13.25 ounces.

Since this dough is already very sticky, if you use 2 ounces less of cake mix, the dough will be even stickier. Therefore, try to purchase a brand that’s closer to the 15.25 ounces called for.

If you would like to add a small packet of instant pudding mix such as lemon or vanilla, or a partial packet (half of a packet from a 3-ounce box), you can. It will make the cookies softer. Make sure it’s instant pudding mix and not cook-and-serve.

This is VERY sticky dough. Make sure you use a 15.25 ounce box of cake mix (not smaller sized boxes such as 13 ounces), refrigerate the dough for 1 hour, use a cookie scoop not your hands to form dough balls, drop them directly into the powdered sugar.

However, if your dough is still too sticky to work with (although it shouldn’t be if you follow the instructions), I suggest adding a bit more cake mix (from another box) or if you have a box of instant pudding on hand (such as lemon, vanilla, French vanilla) – add that to help absorb some of the moisture and reduce the stickiness.

If you want to boost the lemon flavor, feel free to add 1 teaspoon of lemon extract to this recipe. For other flavors of cookies, such as if you’re using chocolate cake mix, I would add a teaspoon of vanilla extract. If I were making strawberry cookies, I’d use an extract like almond extract or coconut extract. You can even add some lemon zest for more intense lemon flavor in this lemon version.