Why I Love Julia Child’s Sugar Cookies

• Julia Child’s sablées are buttery, crispy cookies perfect for pastry lovers.
• The fraisage method ensures a delicate texture without overworking the dough.
• These cookies freeze beautifully and can be customized with endless variations.

There are certain recipes that feel like they’ve always been a part of my life, and Julia Child’s Galettes Sablées, crisp-edged, tender, buttery little sugar cookies, fall squarely into this category. My aunt used to make a version of these when I was growing up, and because I am a lifelong pastry fiend—the person who will always choose birthday pie over birthday cake—this cookie hits every nostalgic, buttery note for me. One of my favorite travel experiences was when I spent a week in Paris, waking up each morning, going for a run and then walking to a quaint cafe in the Marais district for a café au lait and whatever simple but perfectly executed pastry spoke to me that day.

Even now, one of my greatest joys when traveling is popping into bakeries to try whatever laminated, sugared or pastry-adjacent treat they’ve perfected. So when I bake Julia’s sablées, it scratches that same itch. These cookies are what I imagine Julia always had tucked into her Paris apartment kitchen. They’re simple, unpretentious, deeply Parisian and ready to make an ordinary afternoon coffee feel a little luxurious.

Julia has always been a culinary inspiration to me. Although I’m not necessarily a French food lover, I learned to cook in culinary school with French technique as a guide. Julia changed the landscape of American cooking and baking by teaching the “why,” not just the “how,” and these sablées are a great example. 

In her book, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume 1, she shares how to make the short-crust pastry both by hand and in the food processor, but she’s clear about where the real learning happens. “A necessary part of learning how to cook,” she writes, “is to get the feel of the dough in your fingers,” which she punctuates with her signature encouragement: “Il faut mettre la main à la pâte!” (You must put your hand in the dough.) With Julia’s teaching, baking becomes a skill. If you want a cookie that feels perfectly Parisian, Julia Child’s Galettes Sablées are it. And don’t worry, you can use a food processor if you want to. I do, and I’ll show you how!

How to Make Julia Child’s Galettes Sablées

These cookies are essentially a cookie version of pâte sablée, a rich, sandy, tender French pastry dough that Julia makes with leftover pastry dough. I, on the other hand, make the pastry dough just to make these. Start by combining the flour (1⅓ cups), sugar (3 to 7 tablespoons—I use 4, but see the notes below), baking powder (⅛ teaspoon), chilled butter (5 tablespoons) and vegetable shortening (2 tablespoons), then rapidly rub the fat and dry ingredients together with your fingertips until the fat breaks into bits the size of small oatmeal flakes. This coats the flour in fat, limiting gluten formation and creating tenderness. Since Julia doesn’t specify what kind of butter to use, I use unsalted and add a pinch of salt. Then I add in an egg and ½ teaspoon of vanilla extract and knead the dough into a ball.

Photographer: Abbey Littlejohn.

​Next comes the fraisage method, which I learned in culinary school. It’s such a great technique to learn because it’s a consistently reliable way to make pastry dough. Take small portions of the dough, a couple of spoonfuls at a time, and use the heel of your hand (not the palm) to rapidly smear them across your clean work surface in a firm, quick motion. This creates thin layers of fat, blended with flour, ensuring even distribution without overworking the gluten. It’s the secret to that sandy, short, delicate crumb that makes sablées so special. If your dough feels dry after mixing—and sometimes it does—don’t panic. Continue to fraisage. The smearing motion will mechanically encourage those last dry bits to absorb the fat. Alternatively, you can add a bit of ice water, a teaspoon at a time, gently squeezing (not kneading) the dough to bring it together.

Photographer: Abbey Littlejohn.

​Despite the great technique, I personally prefer to make this dough in a food processor for speed (I have small kids, so time is of the essence). If you opt to go that route, pulse all your dry ingredients in a food processor until combined. Add ½-inch pieces of the chilled butter and shortening to the processor along with the vanilla, and pulse again until you have small, oatmeal-like flakes. Then pulse in the egg. Next, transfer the dough to a clean surface and continue the fraisage to pull it together, or continue to pulse it in the food processor, adding ice water a teaspoon at a time, just until the dough starts to come together. It should stay together when you squeeze it. Then, transfer it to a clean surface and form it into a rectangular disc.

​While Julia’s traditional technique involves forming the dough into a ball, wrapping it in wax paper and chilling it, at this point, I’m going to share a life-changing pie dough hack that I learned from food scientist and creator Jennifer Pallian. Instead of chilling the dough and wrestling with it later, she advises resting it at room temperature for 30 minutes first to let the flour fully hydrate, then rolling it out before the long chill. This is so counterintuitive to what we’ve always been taught, but rolling warm-ish dough is so much easier. When the gluten is relaxed, you get fewer cracks and it takes way less physical effort. Then you chill the rolled dough to firm up the fat, which leads to cleaner cuts and a better texture when baked. Pallian’s method changed how I now approach all pastry dough, and it works beautifully with Julia’s sablées.

​If you use this method, your dough will already be rolled out and chilled when it comes time to make the cookies. If you are sticking with Julia’s OG approach, you’ll want to roll the chilled dough into a ¼-inch thickness. Next, cut it into individual pieces. Julia recommends 1¼-inch rounds, but I often just cut them into 1½-inch rectangles with my dough scraper for ease. It’s much quicker and leaves very few scraps, if any. 

Photographer: Abbey Littlejohn.

Either way, at this point, sprinkle a generous dusting of sugar onto your work surface, place the individual pieces on top, then sprinkle them with more sugar to coat.  Julia then opts to roll the individual cookies in the sugar again into ovals (if you’ve started with circles). This thins the dough out even more and makes the sugar a more cohesive part of the cookies’ texture. 

Photographer: Abbey Littlejohn.

Call me lazy and impatient, but I don’t follow this step. Instead, I move the cookies right onto the baking sheet, sprinkle them with cinnamon (or something else; see below) and brush them with the egg wash (a mixture of a whole egg beaten with 1 teaspoon of water). I don’t mean to argue with Julia. She’s the boss, after all. I just don’t find it necessary for my needs, and the cookies always turn out beautifully without the extra roll. 

Photographer: Abbey Littlejohn.

To bake the cookies simply pop them into a 375°F oven for 10 to 15 minutes, or until golden brown. Before diving in, let the cookies cool on a wire rack. They’ll crisp up perfectly while they rest.

Photographer: Abbey Littlejohn.

I make these crispy, lightly sweet treats when I’m in the mood for pastry because they make a lot and I can enjoy them over the course of a week—or longer if I freeze them. They tend to stay fresh for up to a week if I store them in an airtight container at a cool room temperature or in the fridge, and they freeze beautifully (if stored properly) for up to two months. Freeze them individually, then transfer them to freezer-safe bags and thaw them on a plate at room temperature before serving. You can also re-crisp them in the oven (300°F) for 3 to 5 minutes to restore their delicate crunch.

I’ve always made the dough with all butter (my aunt’s version) until recently. I tried Julia’s blend with vegetable shortening and didn’t expect to prefer it, but I do. The shortening helps control the spread, enhances tenderness and creates exceptionally crisp edges. And the deep buttery flavor still remains front and center.

Troubleshooting: What to Do If Your Dough Fights Back

High-fat doughs like this can be temperamental, but they’re also forgiving once you know the tricks. Here are some top tips.

• If the dough is still crumbly after mixing, traditionalists will tell you to resist the urge to add water. You have two options. First, you can continue the fraisage to encourage the last bits of dry flour to absorb. You can also add tiny amounts of cold water and use the fraisage method or a pulse in the food processor to bring it together without developing gluten. I don’t find that the water impacts the texture much, so I tend to use it in the food processor.
• If your dough is too sticky, you either used too much sugar or it got too warm. Re-form it into a flat disc, wrap it tightly and chill it for 30 minutes to firm up the fat. Then work with small sections of the dough when rolling to prevent the rest from warming up. Julia suggests using 3 to 7 tablespoons of sugar in the dough, citing that more sugar makes the dough better for cookies but also harder to work with. I find 4 tablespoons to be the perfect level of sweetness, but play around with it to determine what you like.
• If your dough cracks when you roll it, it’s too cold. Use Pallian’s method or let it sit at room temperature for a few minutes before trying again.
• If your cookies spread too much in the oven, your dough probably wasn’t chilled long enough before baking.

Little Variations That Make These Your Own

The base recipe is perfect as-is, but these cookies are also a baker’s canvas. Here are some of my favorite riffs.

• Coat them with turbinado sugar instead of granulated for a craggier, bakery-style crunch. For a more festive look, try coating them in red or green sanding sugar, or use gold or pearl sugar for sparkle. For more topping inspiration, mix a teaspoon of instant espresso powder into the coating sugar if you’re a coffee lover, or after brushing the tops with egg wash, lightly press on some sesame or poppy seeds.  
• Flavor the dough with a teaspoon of finely grated lemon or orange zest for a subtle brightness. Swap the vanilla for almond or hazelnut extract, or use vanilla bean paste for deeper flavor. Make Earl Grey or chai sablées by pulsing a bit of loose-leaf tea with the sugar before mixing it into the dough. Or try an herb-infused version by adding 1 to 2 teaspoons of finely chopped rosemary, thyme or food-grade lavender to the dough.
• Go all out and sandwich two cookies together with a thin layer of jam or lemon curd for an elevated cookie experience, or serve them as a topping to, or alongside, sautéed apples or other cooked fruit for a deconstructed pie effect. If you add ice cream, you’re living the dream!

Galettes Sablées are the cookies that remind me of my family, of Paris and of the incredible, joyful kitchen wisdom Julia Child shared with the world. Once you make a batch, you’ll understand exactly why I can’t stop making them.