Kolachkes

16th cookie in my series of Christmas Cookies.

These are a cookie I remember from my childhood. There is a great amount of European influence on the Cleveland, Ohio area. I believe these cookies are originally a Polish pastry. They are a bit more effort to make than drop cookies. They are totally addictive and memorable.

1 cup butter

2/3 cup sugar

1 egg

1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 pinches of salt

1 Tablespoon grated orange or lemon rind

3 cups flour

fruit, nut and poppy seed fillings

or dried fruit (apricots, prunes)

1 to 1/12 cans will be plenty for one recipe.

Makes about 4 dozen cookies

**********************************

Directions: 

Cream butter and sugar. Add egg and vanilla. When smooth, add baking powder, salt, citrus rind, and finally flour.

This is a stiff dough. Add your flour slowly.

Divide dough in half, wrap in plastic and chill.

Heat oven to 350*F.

Work with one dough ball at a time. Roll out on a floured surface to 1/8- 1/16 inch thick. Thinner is better. Thicker dough will crack. Cut into diamond shapes, about 1 1/2 inches wide, and put a scant teaspoon of filling on each diamond. Less is better than more. Fold two opposing sides of the dough into center to close the "blanket" around the baby. Lift gently with a spatula and place on a parchment lined cookie sheet. Leave room between the cookies, they do spread a little bit.

Bake 12-15 minutes. Let them cool before you try to lift them. Sliding the parchment onto the counter after a couple minutes will speed cooling.

Enjoy... this is one of my absolute favorite cookies. It wouldn't be Christmas without them. :D

*********************************************************************

Step By Step: 

There are many SOLO fillings. Choose the ones you like. My favorites are almond, prune, apricot and poppy seed.

I doubled the recipe and broke it into 4 dough balls. I was hoping to use all four different flavors of fillings. I used only three though.

Rolled out, cut into diamonds and put filling onto them. This is the apricot.

Fold edges over, wrapping baby in the blanket.

Here's how I cut them straight. The ruler is about one inch wide. So, I cut a bit wider than the ruler. It's not rocket science... :) Continue to gather up extra pieces of dough and re-roll out and cut again. Remember to dust the rolling pin with flour so the dough doesn't just stick all over it. And keep cookies on the small side. Thicker dough cracks. Too much filling runs all over the cookie sheet and too large cookies mean you just don't get much from your recipe.

Poppy seed, apricot and almond. Where's the hot tea? :) Merry Christmas Everyone!

Sparkling Ginger Snaps

3rd cookie in the series. We've done all the basics, so you should be able to follow this with less hand holding. :)

6 Tablespoons butter

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1/4 cup molasses

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

2 cups flour

Extra sugar for dipping

Makes 4-4.5 dozen

*********************************

Directions:

Cream the butter and sugars. Whipping air in well.

Add eggs, vanilla and molasses. Scrape all the molasses. I know it wants to stick in the cup, but try your best! Blend well after these ingredients.

Add spices and baking soda. Mix well.

Add flour slowly so it incorporates nicely without throwing it out of the bowl at you.

Wrap dough ball in plastic and refrigerate at least an hour.

Heat oven to 325*F

After chilling, Shape into small balls. I use my small scoop and it's about 1.25 inches wide. Roll balls into sugar before placing on parchment lined cookie sheet. If you have large grain sugar (see below), it's nice and sparkly on the cookies, if not, standard sugar works perfectly well! They WILL spread, leave at least an inch and a half between them.

Bake 12-15 minutes. My oven, it's 14 minutes. Remove from oven, allow to cool on the tray for a few minutes. Then slide parchment off the cookie sheet and allow to cool on the counter until cool.

Crunchy and chewy! ALWAYS a Christmas favorite! 

YUM! The outside is crisp and crunchy with the sugar. The inside is chewy and scrumptious! A favorite for Santa's plate of cookies!