Sometime during the first year of my marriage, I visited my mother-in-law in her kitchen. There she was, listening to the radio, whistling (she is a formidable whistler), and rolling cream-cheese dough around raisins and nuts to form the crescent-shaped cookies known as rugelach. I was spellbound — I’d had no idea that rugelach could be made at home. As far as I knew, rugelach, like ketchup or ships-in-bottles, were made only in laboratories. But here was my mother-in-law shaping the cookies with ease. And a short time later, there I was, eating them with ease. These cookies weren’t like the rugelach my mother bought every week at the local German bakery — they were much better. I was so excited I asked for the recipe.
My mother-in-law wrote it out in her precise hand on a 3-by-5 index card. And, as she wrote, she told me that this recipe was not exactly the same as the one her mother used, that it had come from Mrs. Strauss, her next-door neighbor, and that she was sure I’d have no problem making the cookies as long as I didn’t overmix the dough. She was right. I was a newcomer to the world of baking, but I had no problem with the dough, the only potentially tricky part of the process.
Since then, I’ve made rugelach countless times, but nowadays my dough is even more foolproof because I make it in a food processor. I’ve also made a few other changes to the recipe. While my mother-in-law’s rugelach were filled with cinnamon-sugared nuts, mine also include a slick of jam, some currants, and a handful of chopped chocolate. This is a very old recipe, and I have no doubt that everyone who has made it has added or subtracted a little bit to make it her own — and my mom-in-law, Mrs. Strauss, and I expect you to do the same.–Dorie Greenspan
Rugelach Recipe
Ingredients
- For the dough
- 4 ounces cold cream cheese, cut into 4 pieces
- 8 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into 4 pieces
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- For the filling
- 2/3 cup raspberry jam, apricot jam, or marmalade
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 2/3 cup chopped nuts (I prefer pecans, but you can use walnuts or almonds)
- 1/4 cup plump, moist dried currants
- 4 ounces bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped, or 2/3 cup store-bought mini chocolate chips
- For the glaze
- 1 large egg
- 1 teaspoon cold water
- 2 tablespoons sugar, preferably decorating (coarse) sugar
Directions
- Make the dough
- 1. Let the cream cheese and butter rest on the counter for 10 minutes — you want them to be slightly softened but still cool. Put the flour and salt in a food processor, scatter over the chunks of cream cheese and butter, and pulse the machine 6 to 10 times. Then process, scraping down the sides of the bowl often, just until the dough forms large curds — don’t work it so long that it forms a ball on the blade.
- 2. Turn the dough out, gather it into a ball, and divide it in half. Shape each half into a disk, wrap the disks in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, or up to 1 day. (Wrapped airtight, the dough can be frozen for up to 2 months.)
- Make the filling
- 3. Heat the jam in a saucepan over low heat, or do this in a microwave, until it liquefies. Mix the sugar and cinnamon together.
- 4. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats. (Silicone baking mats are great for rugelach.)
- Make the cookies
- 5. Pull one packet of dough from the refrigerator. If it is too firm to roll easily, either leave it on the counter for about 10 minutes or give it a few bashes with your rolling pin.
- 6. On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough into an 11-to-12-inch circle. Spoon (or brush) a thin gloss of jam over the dough and sprinkle with half of the cinnamon sugar. Scatter half of the nuts, half of the currants, and half of the chopped chocolate over the dough. Cover the filling with a piece of wax paper and gently press the filling into the dough, then remove the paper and save it for the next batch.
- 7. Using a pizza wheel or a sharp knife, cut the dough into 16 wedges, or triangles. (The easiest way to do this is to cut the dough into quarters, then to cut each quarter into 4 triangles.) Starting at the base of each triangle, roll the dough up so that each cookie becomes a little crescent. Arrange the roll-ups on one baking sheet, making sure the points are tucked under the cookies, and refrigerate. Repeat with the second packet of dough, and refrigerate the cookies for at least 30 minutes before baking. (The cookies can be covered and refrigerated overnight or frozen for up to 2 months; don’t defrost before baking, just add a couple of minutes to the baking time.)
- 8. Position the racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
- Make the glaze
- 9. Stir the egg and water together, and brush a bit of this glaze over each rugelach. Sprinkle the cookies with the sugar.
- 10. Bake the cookies for 20 to 25 minutes, rotating the sheets from top to bottom and front to back at the midway point, until they are puffed and golden. Transfer the cookies to racks to cool to just warm or to room temperature.
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Judy O.
Mar 03, 2006
Have you ever tried a Dorie Greenspan recipe that wasn’t delicious? The dough was super easy to work with and her suggestions on what to fill the rugelach with allowed a lot of flexibility. I tended to veer away from her suggested jams (I used apple butter) and fillings (I used raisins), based on what I had in my cupboard. The results were yummy, to say the least.