Food
Triangular Morsels
Purim provides a sweet recipe for celebrating.
dough corners well to prevent them
from opening during baking. As always,
it's a good idea to bake a test cookie to
avoid surprises.
If your test "taschen" opens up, pinch
better or make a "glue" by brushing a
small amount of beaten egg around the
edge of your pastry circles before pinch-
ing them into triangles.
For those not wishing to take the
nearly effortless route of premade dough
and filling, try the simple recipes below
— one for sugar dough and the other
for chocolate dough, as well as the
homemade stuffings.
The mitzvot of Purim include reading
the megillah (the story of Purim), giving
monetary gifts to the poor, sending food
packages (at least two) to other Jews and
eating a celebratory meal.
In my opinion, there's no more festive
a way to finish that seudab (meal) than
with noshing on tender hamantashen
brimming with your favorite fillings.
Hamantashen
ANNABEL COHEN
Special to the Jewish News
ic
very Purim, I wonder why
we don't eat hamantashen
more often. They're no more
complicated to prepare than
many other pastries and there's certainly
no restriction regarding their consump-
tion throughout the year.
Indeed, many Jewish bakeries make
hamantashen year round. For some rea-
son, I usually pass them up, but not dur-
ing Purimseason. Though they're not
the only sweets eaten for Purim
(Sephardim, for example, eat small,
syrup-soaked, deep-fried dough rings
called orejas de aman or Haman's ears),
the lure of hamantashen is incontrovert-
ible — they must be eaten!
Though there are various yeast-dough
recipes that result in soft, crumbly, cakey
cookies, most cooks prefer the quicker-
to-make cookie-style filled hamantashen
made with sweeter sugar-cookie dough.
In fact, most bakeries make the cookie-
style treats.
What's more, doing it yourself means
you can make your hamantashen any
size you wish — I like them small so I
can eat various types of fillings without
filling up.
For those not wishing to bake from
scratch, cheat! Use ready-made sugar
cookie dough or powdered cookie
dough mix, add more flour as needed to
make rolling feasible.
Fillings can be purchased canned or
jarred. Solo brand makes some that are
ideal. Even your favorite jam or pre-
serves can be pumped-up with ground
nuts to hamantashen-perfect consistency.
During assembly, be sure to pinch the
HAMANTASHEN
4 cups of flour
1 T. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1 cup margarine
1 1/4 cups sugar
3 large eggs
1 t. vanilla extract
1-2 T. grated orange peel
1/4 cup orange juice
Egg wash:
1 egg
2 T. water
Combine flour, baking powder and
salt in a medium bowl and whisk well.
Set aside.
Use an electric mixer to cream togeth-
er margarine and sugar in another large
bowl on medium-speed. Mix in eggs,
vanilla, grated orange peel and juice.
Add the flour mixture and mix until a
soft dough is formed.
Remove the dough from the bowl and
form into a ball. Wrap the ball in plastic
wrap and chill for 10 minutes.
Make egg wash: Combine egg and
water in a small bowl and mix with a
fork. Set aside.
Preheat oven to 350F. and spray 2
baking sheets with non-stick cooking
spray, or line with parchment paper. Cut
the ball of dough into 3 pieces. On a
lightly floured surface, roll one piece of
the dough into a sheet, about 1/8-inch
thick.
Use a cookie cutter (or any round cut-
ter — a jar lid, glass, etc.) to cut circles
from the dough (the bigger the circle the
larger the hamantashen).
Place about 1 teaspoonful (or more) of
your favorite filling in the center of the
circle (more for large circle, less for a
smaller one). Fold the circle over the fill-
ing in a triangle, or pinch around the
filling in a triangle, leaving the center of
the hamantashen filling exposed.
Arrange the hamantashen on the pre-
pared baking sheet. Brush with the ecri bo ,
wash and bake for 15-20 minutes until
the pastry is golden. Remove from oven
and cool completely. Makes 3-4 dozen
hamantashen, depending on size.
CHOCOLA1E HAMANTASHEN
4 cups flour
1/2 cup_ cocoa powder (not Dutch
process)
1 T. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1 cup butter or margarine
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup water
2 t. vanilla extract
Egg wash:
1 egg
2 T. water
Combine flour, cocoa powder, baking
powder and salt in a medium bowl and
whisk well. Set aside.
Use an electric mixer to cream togeth-
er margarine and both sugars in another
large bowl on medium-speed. Mix in
s water and vanilla. Add the flour
eggs,
mixture and mix until a soft dough is
formed.
Remove the dough from the bowl and
form into a ball. Wrap the ball in plastic
wrap and chill for 10 minutes.
Make egg wash: Combine egg and
water in a small bowl and mix with a
fork. Set aside.
Preheat oven to 350E and spray 2
baking sheets with nonstick cooking
spray, or line with parchment paper. Cut
the ball of dough into 3 pieces. On a
lightly floured surface, roll one piece of
TRIANGULAR MORSELS on page 96
3/14
2003
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