Punchy orange and spicy ginger all in one bite! These orange and ginger cookies are great with a cuppa tea! I was pondering what to bake a few days ago and I knew I wanted something with a bit of warmth but I still wanted it to be fresh and summery - and so these orange and ginger cookies were born!

Orange and ginger cookies with a bite taken out it, leaning on a stack of other cookies, all sprinkled with lemon zest.

These cookies sound and taste sophisticated and complicated, but in reality they are deceptively simple. I actually used my Basic Sugar Cookie recipe, split the batch in half and made funfetti cookies with half of it and then used the second half to make the orange and ginger cookies - so there were two types of cookie from one batch of dough! So you can make something the kids will love and something for the grown-ups, all from one recipe.

A hand holding an orange and ginger cookie above a pile of other orange and ginger cookies, with an orange in the background.

Ingredients in Orange and Ginger Cookies

Butter - You can use whatever kind of butter you prefer. I actually used salted here but you can use unsalted too - just add a pinch of salt to the dough at the same time as the flour

Sugar - As this was adapted from my basic sugar cookie recipe, I just used white sugar - but you could also substitute for golden or brown sugar for more of a molasses taste

Flour - All purpose flour is great for these orange and ginger cookies, no need to add any raising agents

Orange - Medium sized oranges are best for this recipe (so not the baby satsumas and not the giant baseball oranges)

Ground Ginger - Make sure your ground ginger is not too old! If you have some left over from making gingerbread men at Christmas, it may have lost its flavour by now - give it sniff and see if it's still potent. Just don't sniff too hard, I learned that the hard way 🙁

orange and ginger cookies in a pile with zester and orange

close up of fresh orange, sliced in half

Tips for making Orange and Ginger Cookies

This recipe really couldn't be much simpler, so it's kind of foolproof - but here are some tips for best results:

Taste your dough - everyone has different tastes, so try a bit of dough to see if the balance of orange and ginger is where you want it - add more or less of each accordingly. If you add a lot more ginger but don't want extra orange, add a splash of water or milk to balance out the consistency of the dough without adding more orange juice. There are no raw eggs or any unsafe ingredients in these orange and ginger cookies so the dough is safe to eat.

Flour your surface well - make sure your surface and your rolling pin are both well floured to avoid sticking and breaking the dough. If you are using a press-down cookie cutter as I did, then make sure you flour that too!

Use a cookie lifter - this is definitely not 'necessary' but I started using a cookie lifter recently and it has made my life so much easier! You can get them in most grocery stores, it doesn't have to say 'cookie lifter' on it but any kind of flat spatula with a hard edge will do. lt's so much easier to transfer the cookies from the work surface to the cookie sheet without damaging them or leaving big finger marks in them.

Keep an eye on the bake - Depending on how thick you rolled your dough, the cookies will bake slower or faster. Keep an eye on them and take them out just as the edges begin to turn golden brown. As they are orange and ginger cookies, it may be slightly harder to tell when the colour is turning, so keep a close eye on them. The centre will still feel soft but they will harden slightly as they cool

Recipe