Monday, March 5, 2012

Tuesdays With Julia and Dorie: Rugelach

DELICIOUS ADDITION TO OUR  "SAYING GOOD-BYE TO OUR FRIENDS" DINNER
How much fun is this!!!  Rugelach, made with a buttery, cream cheese dough and “abundantly stuffed” with a homemade apricot lekvar, finely chopped pecans, and lots of cinnamon-sugar... YUM!

I needed cookies for a few occasions this week so I decided to make LOTS of Rugelach for all my needs.  Friends who are moving out of state came for dinner, I always take homemade treats to my adult Sunday school class where I plan on 75 attenders, the usual weekend crowd stopping by looking for food,......     One can never have too many good cookies.

It’s a very busy week, so these cookies took some planning, especially since I decided to 5 X the recipe (about 250 cookies).  Wednesday night I made all the dough, in my food processor.  The by-hand method sounded lovely, but I needed to get this dough finished and into the fridge.  It all came together nicely with my modern machine.

Friday evening I had time to make my fillings.  I actually made several types and flavors of fillings, but when it came time to actually roll out and fill my cookies, I chose to use only the apricot version just to keep things moving along.  I was really wanting chocolate and berries and a variety of nuts, but those can wait for another time.  After making my initial apricot batch, and trying them, and trying them again, and again...well...they were really good. 

Saturday afternoon I made all the cookies...took about 3 hours, but it was nice to have my kitchen time after a yard work and house cleaning morning.

UPDATED CENTURY'S OLD JEWISH COOKIE
My Sunday school class lesson was on the writings of the ancient Old Testament Hebrew prophet, Isaiah.  I knew these cookies would add a little more inspiration.  While baking I decided to tell my class (after doing some internet research) that this Rugelach recipe is an updated version of a century’s old Eastern European Jewish recipe and with the dried fruits and nuts it could have been something similar to what was eaten in ancient Jerusalem.  (But I’m sure my cookies had lots of extra sugar.) My class agreed and loved the idea of eating a Jewish food with a long history.  I may be totally wrong, but I did read several comments where this cookie is served during Jewish holidays.  And I have seen them in bakeries during Jewish holidays, and at Christmas time, and whatever their heritage, they are delicious.

After my dough chilled for a couple of days (much longer than necessary), I rolled it out into long rectangle shapes about 1/4" thick, slathered them with my apricot lekvar, added the nuts, and sprinkled their tops with lots of cinnamon sugar.  Then  I cut the topped dough rectangles in half lengthwise, and rolled each half like I would cinnamon rolls.  After pinching the seams together, I added an egg wash and sprinkled the long, cookie rolls with more cinnamon sugar.  Last, each roll was sliced with a pizza cutter into 1 ½" pieces, placed on doubled, lined baking sheets and baked for 22 minutes, until golden brown.

YUM!  FRUIT, NUTS, BUTTER, CREAM CHEESE....SOME OF THE WORLD'S BEST FOODS
Wow!  After cooling for just a few minutes, these were delicious.  Not too sweet; just little 2 or 3 bites each of puffed up goodness.  These cookies are dangerous.  I gave myself all the ends, that’s 2 on each of the 10 rolls I made (already I’m up to 20 cookies) and I had to taste several more to make sure each batch was worthy of my friends...Yup, they were.  I must have eaten pounds of butter and cream cheese and sugar and....it was all good...had to keep myself going for those 3 hours, especially after all my morning work.

Next time, I’ll roll my cookies into crescent shapes which I think are prettier, and I’ll use other fillings just for fun.  I’ve already added  Rugulach to my Christmas cookie baking list. 

See you all in a couple of weeks after St. Paddy's day baking...up next with this group, Irish Soda Bread.

18 comments:

  1. Beautiful sight...abundance of Rugelach!

    ~Carmen
    http://bakingismyzen.wordpress.com

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  2. You are such a wonderfully generous person! I'm sure everyone loved these. Your rugelach look more traditional than the fully-loaded version. I reserved half of the dough to make them the way we like like them - with chocolate, cinnamon & nuts rolled into little crescents. But, it's always fun to try something new. It's amazing how huge this group is!

    We're trying to decide what to have with our onion biscuits this week.

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  3. Five times - wow. You are the cookie queen.
    It's nice how you tied the recipe back to the lesson.
    I haved usually made rugelach rolled like a croissant - this was a nice shortcut.

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  4. You made FIVE times the recipe?! Wow. Great job!

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  5. Five times! Kudos! And, I too love the crescent-shaped rugelach better.

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  6. I'm so jealous of the perfect rolls you got!!! Beautiful end result! :)

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  7. OMG - I salute you! I have to say, that bowl of rugelach in the top photo, well, I wish I had that right here to snack on. Very lovely presentation!

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  8. Your rugelach look perfect! Gorgeous!

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  9. Wow, 250! That is impressive given how labor intensive these are.

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  10. 5 batches???? I'm SO impressed! I'm sure all the recipients were thrilled, too :)

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  11. Sounds like you turned your kitchen into a bakery for the day! Your rugelach look just perfect, I wish I had one right now, too bad I gave mine away because they were too dangerous to keep in my kitchen;-)

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  12. wow, I made half a batch and complained about it the whole time - you're my hero! lol

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  13. My word! 5 times the recipe, Kris! You are ambitious. I just don't know how you do it all. They look super! I love your thicker slices.

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  14. i made my dough in the kitchen aid and never had to touch it with my hands until i rolled it out. maybe you can make a bigger batch of dough in your new kitchen aid rather than the food processor ... easier clean up too. if you want to try chocolate, chips aren't enough chocolate flavor. spread a nice layer of nutella or melted chocolate. i saw one with figs & chocolate that looked good.

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  15. They look amazing! I am sure everyone loves to be on your good side and on the receiving end of such decliciousness! :)

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  16. Your rugelach looks absolutely perfect! I can't believe you made five time the recipe. I'm sure your family and friends love your baking skills!

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  17. Wow you are ambitious! How many sticks of butter was that?! It's great you were able to share them all, I can bet they were a big hit!

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  18. Kris, I so covet that big plate of rugelach! They look amazing, and I know they taste delicious.

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