Vegan lemon vanilla cookies with raspberries

I made these cookies the other day with success.  The recipe yielded about 25 small cookies and they were gobbled up immediately.  I'm pretty sure I ate about half of these cookies in the first day.  The key ingredient in this recipe was definitely the lemon zest; without it, they definitely wouldn't taste as good.  It has also been gloomy these past few days and I've been feeling under the weather.  Eating these cookies with warm tea or coffee for breakfast and as a light snack have made days a bit brighter.

Ingredients

•     1 1/2 cups + 2/3 cup unbleached all-purpose flour 
•     1 teaspoon baking soda
•     1/4 teaspoon salt
•     1 cup sugar or vanilla sugar
•     1/2 cup canola oil
•     1/4 cup liquid sweetener (agave or maple syrup is best)
•     1 teaspoon vanilla extract
•     1 1/2 teaspoons lemon extract 
•     3 tablespoons nondairy milk 
•     1 medium lemon, zested 
•     1/4 teaspoon turmeric, for color
•     1/4 to 1/3 cup raspberry preserves

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, and line baking sheet with parchment paper.  In a medium to large bowl, combine all the flour, baking soda and salt.  Whisk to get everything incorporated nicely. In a separate bowl, whisk together oil and sugar until thoroughly mixed.  Stir in liquid sweetener, vanilla and lemon extracts, nondairy milk, lemon zest, and turmeric. 
2. Mix these ingredients together, then slowly shift/stir in the dry ingredients.  Use your hands to get a dough to form.  Avoid overworking the dough.  Next take small portions of the dough and roll into walnut sized balls.  You can make them bigger if you so choose, but this size usually yields about 20 cookies. 
3. Gently press cookie between your palms and fingers to form little disks.  Push a small dimple in the center and add 1/2 teaspoon or so of raspberry or blueberry preserves.
4. Place on prepared cookie sheets and bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until the edges turn a faint golden brown.  For a softer cookie with a chewy edge, bake for about 10 minutes.  Allow a few minutes for cookies to cool before removing from sheet pan, then transfer to wire cooling rack and allow to completely cool.

(Recipe Source)


P.S.  I'm not vegan and these cookies really tastes like regular non-vegan cookies! So don't let the word "vegan" deter you from making these ;-)