Monday, February 27, 2012

Secret Recipe Club: Hamantaschen

As with my tradition of switching between meals and sweets, this month I picked a sweet. It was hard though because there were three very good looking sweets on "Oh! You Cook!", the blog that I was given this month. Dena is a very funny lady and her recipes look so great!

My husband has been getting on my case about making too many sweets, so I figured I could hook him in with something that contains fruit (: So between the Almond Cake, Tapioca Pudding, and Emergency Crostatas, it was decided that I would make the Dena's Emergency Crostatas aka Hamantaschen. Say that 10 times fast!

{If you really are attempting to do that, it's pronounced HAH-mahn-tah-shen}

Hamantaschen is a three-cornered pastry with filling that is eaten during the Jewish holiday of Purim. I am not Jewish, but I did enjoy these anyways. They are a perfect cookie to eat with a cup of coffee in the morning. Cookies for breakfast, if nothing caught you before, that has you sold, right?

{Side note: Hamantaschen is traditionally served with a meat dish and thus is usually made dairy-free}


(Print)
Recipe from Oh! You Cook!

What you need:
  • 1 pt. blueberries or 1 cup fruit preserves
  • 1 tbsp. each sugar and flour, if you use frozen blueberries
  • 3 eggs
  • 1 1/4 cup sugar
  • 1/2 cup butter, room temp
  • 1/4 cup vegetable oil
  • 2 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
  • 1/2 cup orange juice
  • 5 1/2 cups flour, plus 1/2 cup
  • 3/4 tbsp. baking powder
Directions:
Beat butter and sugar until smooth. 
Add eggs, oil, vanilla, and orange juice. Beat until just combined.

Combine flour and baking powder in a separate bowl.

Add flour mixture to butter mixture, mix just until combined. DO NOT OVERMIX.

Divide dough in half and wrap.
Refrigerate for at least an hour; overnight is alright too.

Preheat oven to 350* and line 2 cookie sheets with parchment paper.
Roll out half the dough to 1/4-inch thickness. DO NOT OVERROLL.

Using a circular glass or round cookie cutter that is 2 1/2 to 3 inches in diameter, cut out as many circles as possible.

Place them close together on prepared cookie sheets.

Spoon 6 berries or 2 tsp. preserves on each circle.

Pinch the corners to form a triangle. 

**You'll want to do this quickly because if the dough warms up, it'll be difficult to work with. If it does get this way, place your dough in the refrigerator to firm up.
Bake for 12 to 15 minutes. Let cool for 1 minute before removing to a wire rack.
    Make sure to visit the other members of Group D and see what recipe they revealed :)

    10 comments :

    Jenni said...

    Oh, these look great! I have seen these little cookies before, and always been intrigued by them, but now I really want to make them! :)

    Oh! You Cook! said...
    This comment has been removed by the author.
    amy (fearless homemaker) said...

    these sound wonderful! i've seen them in bakeries before, but never knew what they were. i'll definitely have to pick some up next time i see them because they look amazing!

    Lisa~~ said...

    I remember eating hamantashen from a local bakery when I was growing up and they're wonderful, great to see a recipe for them.

    If you haven't already, I'd love for you to check out my Group 'A' SRC entry: Crunchy Fudgy Heart Bites and my Group 'D' entry: Health(ier) Peanut Brittle

    Lisa~~
    Cook Lisa Cook

    Oh! You Cook! said...

    Thanks! You're a sweetie!

    Georgia | The Comfort of Cooking said...

    Sarah, these cookies are so cute and I bet delicious too! They look wonderful. Thanks for sharing! You have a beautiful blog and I'm glad to have found you.

    Unknown said...

    What cute cookies, and I bet they are amazing with coffee. You did a great job on them.

    Erin Stomber said...

    These look so cute! I love mini versions of sweets :)

    Unknown said...

    huh.

    a of all: thank you for the pronunciation clarification

    b of all: i have some blueberry butter preserved from last spring that would go wonderfully in this! not too sweet but still berry-licious.

    happy src day!

    Anonymous said...

    these are such adorable cookies