Tuesday, March 22, 2005

Noshin’ Tashen

On a rainy day when I’ve felt a bit under the weather myself, it’s a good time to talk about cookies.  This past weekend I was rolling out esthertashen while Kel was talking to her family on the phone.  Kel mentioned what I was doing and her sister Karen honed right in: I’d apparently mentioned these cookies on the family website (yeah we’re a cyber-family) and she’d kept them in mind, wanted to make sure I didn’t try to weasel her out of the recipe.  Well, they came out beautifully this year, although I made fewer than I have in years - and even so, it took many hours, over two days.  No matter.  It is always worth it to make really good cookies.

And instead of making them generally available, which I’m sorry I can’t this year, recipients are already in place and better luck next year, I’m making these delectations infinitely available - by posting the recipe.  Just follow these simple instructions, and you can have more delicious cookies than you would ever care to eat at a sitting, by a margin of several pounds.

First, esthertashen are my version of the classic traditional hamentashen, a cookie baked in jewish communities to celebrate the festival of Purim, which is coming up on Saturday.  I’ve written enough about Purim before, I won’t overburden you here with more of that.  The point is, we make these cookies, traditionally, to demonstrate mastery over our enemies.  I prefer, however, to think of these sweet triangles of delicate pastry to be symbolic, somehow, of the heroine of the story, Esther (you may have read her book, I don’t know if a movie is in the works).  I’ve made these cookies all my life and I’d like to think I’ve got them down to both a science and an art. 

The easy part is on day one: fillings and dough.  I didn’t think to photograph this stuff because it’s so boring:

Filling: traditionally, you just use a can of Solo.  Solo: jewish for “whupass.” Open a can whenever you need to.  You do this, you’ll be fine; may your house be blessed and yadda yadda.  I grew up on Solo and it’s nothing to be ashamed of.  I just don’t use it anymore. 

Instead, I like going out and getting about 16 to 20 ounces total of dried fruit per batch, and I usually make two batches with two different mixes. This year I stuck with mango-apricot and raisin-prune, both of which came out unusually well.  I just put the dried fruit (or fruits) in a heavy skillet with water covering them, and if I’m using apricots or something else tart (cherries, sometimes) I add a few tablespoons of sugar.  Then I simmer it, stirring occasionally, till the water is mostly reabsorbed into the fruit or evaporated off; I top it off with more water (or maybe fruit juice if I’m feeling wild) and let it simmer down again till the juice that’s left is turning into a thick syrup.  Run this all through a food processor and turn it into a puree; try not to miss any of the liquid.  Sometimes I’ve gotten all artsy and tried to gussy up the fruit goo with spices and wine, but it’s not worth the effort.  All it takes is a little sugar, or better, a sweet fruit with a tart one.  Once it’s cooked, pureed, and cooled, spoon it into a ziptop bag and let it rest in the fridge.  If there’s any left over after you’ve baked yer cookies, it makes a great addition to rich gravies, compotes, salad dressings, and it spreads very well on bread.  Or whatever you like to spread stuff on. 

Dough: again, a boring set of visuals, not worth even taking.  Start with the butter at room temperature - much easier that way.  Take one cup of unsalted butter and two cups of sugar and blend them into a creamy paste.  Then add two eggs, a teaspoon of vanilla, and about two tablespoons of orangeblossom essense (my secret ingredient), and blend again.  Add two tablespoons of milk and blend yet again.  In a separate bowl, combine 3-3/4 cups of flour, two teaspoons of baking powder, and 1/2 a teaspoon of salt; mix these together well and then blend into the wet ingredients.  Blend till it starts getting nice and dense, and then use your hands to knead it down a little more.  Once it’s fully combined, wrap it up and put it away for a few hours at least.  It’s better to let the dough rest and cool overnight if you can bear to.  (That is, it’s better for baking.  For eating raw, it’s good right away.)

So by now, you have your
basics.  It’s time to make some cookies, dude!

Cookies: Roll out the dough to about 1/4 inch thick, or less if you can.  This demands a very well-floured work surface and a well-floured rolling-pin; even so, you’ll need to be delicate. 

Press out as many rounds from the rolled-out dough as you can, using a glass with a thin rim.  I use a cheap wine glass; it has a fairly conservative 2.5-inch diameter, which means that I get a lot of cookies out of each batch. 

Once you’ve pressed out as many rounds as you can, roll up the remaining dough into a ball, re-wrap it and put it back in the fridge.  Make sure each round can be manipulated - run a thin spatula under them gently and loosen any that have stuck to the surface, using flour liberally. 

Ready rounds, stripped of interstitial doughage.

Trim a small (tiny!) bit off the corner of a zip-top bag full of fruit goo.  Squeeze the bag gently toward the corner and
extrude the goo out the hole into the center of a round - how much depends on the size of the cookie you’re making, but I use about a teaspoon-and-a-half for a two-and-a-half-inch diameter round. 

Much goo has been extruded, my child.

Now,
fold up the round with your fingers at about 10 o’clock and two o’clock, so that it creases at 12 o’clock; pinch this crease closed and then
fold up the bottom to make two more corners at about 8 o’clock and 4 o’clock.  Pinch these closed too and you’ve got a triangular, fruitgoorific, raw cookie.  If the dough is thick they’ll spread when they cook; otherwise you can put them fairly close together on a cookie sheet.  I like using
parchment paper under them; it helps them release and they don’t burn. 

Once you’ve got your cookies on a sheet, roll out the “extra” dough that you gathered up from between the rounds and punch out more cookies; keep re-gathering the excess and re-rolling it till you’re down to scraps.  Waste not, want more cookies. 

They bake at 375 for about 15 minutes; I switch the pans after ten minutes so the ones on the bottom go on top; that way they brown more evenly.  Let them cool for a few minutes
on the trays, and then transfer to cooling racks if you have them; the bottoms need to dry out a little for maximum structual integrity.  These cookies are very tasty the day they’re made, but seem to get better over time.  They also microwave very well. 

Okay?  That should make it pretty easy for you.  Go out and make somebody happy.  Cookies are only the beginning.