Easy 4 Ingredient Butter Cookies

Delicately flavored and melt-in-your-mouth delicious, these 4 ingredient butter cookies can’t help but become a total hit in your household. Well, they’re a hit in my household, I can tell you that.

With simple ingredients and a simple cooking process, these cookies come together in minutes with pantry staples. They’re similar to the Shortbread Cookies that I make at Christmas time, but these cookies have an egg included in the recipe.

Enjoy them with your cup of tea or coffee, grab a few while you watch a movie or read a book on the couch, or pack them as a homemade gift for your friends (which is super cute)!

Easy 4 Ingredient Butter Cookies Recipe

Ingredients And Substitutions

The ingredients for this cookie recipe are minimal and are probably sitting in your pantry right now.

Butter: Start off with some softened butter. Get it out of the refrigerator a couple of hours before you start making these cookies, and you should be good. If you’re not keen on using butter, margarine is fine. I just want to say though, the flavor of pure butter is what these cookies are about, so if you don’t use butter, please use a butter-flavored margarine.

Sugar: Sugar (castor sugar) will lend the cookies that delicate sweetness and help with a nice color. I like to use sugar for the sweetness in the recipe along with coarse sugar if I have it on hand to add some texture on the sides. The coarse sugar is optional and regular sugar will do the job nicely. You can also substitute the castor sugar in this recipe with confectioner’s sugar for a more delicate texture.

All-purpose Flour: Use plain, all-purpose flour. Bleached or unbleached flour is perfectly fine.

Egg yolk: Egg yolk lends a beautiful rich flavor and light golden color to the cookies as well as becomes the binder to help hold the ingredients together.

How to Make 4 Ingredient Butter Cookies

Step One: Mix Sugar and Butter – Start by combining the egg yolk, butter, and sugar in a bowl. Mix until the sugar has completely dissolved.
Step Two: Add the Flour – Add the flour and combine until you get a soft, pliable dough.
Step Three: Chill – Roll the dough into cylinder shapes, cover, and chill in the refrigerator.
Step Four: Form the Cookies – Uncover the dough and roll the outsides in sugar. With a sharp knife, cut into rounds.
Step Five: Bake – Bake in a preheated oven until lightly toasted and crispy. Allow to cool down and serve.

NOTE: All the exact ingredient amounts and more detailed instructions along with recipe notes will be included in the printable recipe card at the bottom of this post.

Tips & Variations for this French Butter Cookies Recipe

• Remember that the cookies might seem soft when you get them out of the oven, but they’ll eventually crisp up as they cool down.
• Chilling the dough is IMPERATIVE to these cookies holding their shape when you cut them. Please don’t skip that step.
• Powdered sugar (confectioner’s sugar) can be used to make the mixing process easier.
• Try not to overwork (overmix) the dough as it could make the cookies tough.
• Try rolling the cookie edges in crushed nuts for a bit of flavor variation.
• Check the cookies around the 8-minute mark to see if they’re starting to firm up. The cookies should take no more than 10 minutes to bake.
• If you like subtle vanilla flavors, adding a teaspoon of vanilla bean paste is lovely in these cookies.
• Another nice idea is to sprinkle a small amount of flaky sea salt on the top of each cookie just before they go into the oven to help intensify the sweet flavors of the cookies.

How To Serve These Easy Butter Cookies

I love serving these French butter cookies with a cup of coffee (a latte is fantastic!), tea, or the ultimate bedtime snack – a big glass of milk. Try warming the milk before you have it with the cookies at night time – it’s a surefire way that helps me sleep like a baby!

They’re rich, buttery, and incredibly delicious.

You can also team these up with some of my other favorite easy cookie recipes like my 4 ingredient lemon cranberry cookies, 4 ingredient oatmeal raisin cookies, 2 ingredient chocolate banana muffin top cookies or another favorite, these 2 ingredient peanut butter cookies.

This can be a nice cookie platter you can serve at your next brunch get-together or feature on your snack board. And as I mentioned earlier, stack a few on top of each other, wrap them in some pretty ribbon, and gift them to anyone who loves cookies! (So that’s pretty much anyone).

Storage Ideas & Suggestions

Your leftover cookies can be stored for up to a week in an airtight container. You don’t need to refrigerate them- they can stay fresh at room temperature too, just be sure that they’re covered nicely so they don’t get hard sitting out.

Freezing the cookies is another way to extend their storage life. Keep them stored in a single layer, in a freezer-friendly container for up to 3 months. You can take out as many as you’d like at a time, and leave them at room temperature for a few minutes – they’ll thaw quickly.

Did you make this easy 4 ingredient butter cookie recipe? Please leave a ***** star rating in the recipe card below and leave a comment giving me your thoughts about it!

Thank you for stopping by The Salty Pot today and I hope you have a wonderful day!

~Joanne