Hamantaschen

Hello everyone!

First of all, I want to apologize for the lack of updates. I work a seasonal job in a tax preparation office and it's incredibly stressful and tiring, and this year is worse than last because now I work during the day. Which means I wake up at six thirty in the morning. And I am not a morning person.

I'm determined to get some stuff done this weekend though!

Before I go any further, I may or may not have also cut my hair this week.

And given myself bangs again.

I still don't know how I feel about them. Usually I love it when I have bangs but this time, I dunno. They feel messy to me? (To be fair I DID rush them, so we'll see.)

Now, onto food!

I wanna start this off by saying I'm not a "real" Jewish person? It's really hard to explain but I've found that the easiest way is by saying I'm like Woody Allen. But better. Because I'm awesome. My dad is Jewish but only by birth I think. I dunno. Either way, we appreciate Jewish food and humour and culture in my house. Not speaking for anyone else, but I'm a hardcore Atheist. I appreciate and acknowledge other points of view though and I like trying new things, so I like eating foods from every culture! As long as they contain no meat or dairy products, heh.

So today, in honour of those of you who may be celebrating Purim tonight, I share this new recipe I've made!

(I'd like to point out that I think it's annoying that eggs, milk, cheese, etc. aren't ALL considered dairy anymore? Meh, whatever.)

I'm a part of some vegan groups on Facebook and someone put up a recipe for hamantaschen the other day. I was exhausted from work but I just... I had a mighty NEED for these cookies. I call them "old people food" because I feel like no one under the age of 80 really LIKES them. But thankfully I'm a fan of "old people food". (Speaking of, I'm craving rice pudding. So uh, that may be coming up soon.)

ingredients:

• 2 Ener-G eggs (see previous entries in regards to this)
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 2 Tablespoons orange juice (or, if you want a stronger orange flavour, consider using a teaspoon or two of orange extract)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 2 1/4 cup flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4-1/2 cup water (add as necessary)
• your filling* (see note)

My mise en place pictures aren't going to be super pretty for a while - all of my favourite bowls keep mysteriously breaking (hmmm), so I'm running out of places to put my ingredients. Sigh. 

instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahreinheit. 
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the Ener-G eggs, canola oil, orange juice, and vanilla extract.
3. In a smaller bowl, mix the sugar, flour, baking powder, and salt.
4. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, mixing with a wooden spoon. 
5. Soon the dough will start to form. Go ahead and get your hands in to knead it around. If it's too dry, start adding in some of the water, a little bit at a time. You want this to be a tacky consistency. (Kind of like when you're using white glue and it starts sticking to your fingers?)
6. Flour your counter! Lightly coat the counter with flour and spread it around a big area.
7. Put the dough on the floured surface and roll it out with a rolling pin until it's about 1/4" thick, although a little thinner works too.
8. Use a cookie cutter or a glass to cut out circular shapes from the dough.
9. Place about a teaspoon of your filling in the center of the dough circle.
10. Fold that cookie! (See following photo tutorial.)
11. Place the cookies on a cookie sheet that has parchment paper on it.
12. Bake for about 20 minutes.

All of the whisked wet ingredients.

All of the mixed dry ingredients.

This is what the dough will start to look like. I added some water after this, though.

Roll it out!

I'm a cash-strapped college kid, so rather than go out and buy a cookie cutter, I was like "I'm not gonna follow your rules, USE A CUP."

And I mean, look at that lil' cutie.

Sometimes, though, those lil' cuties can get stuck to the counter. Even when you flour it. So I recommend having a baby spatula on hand. Look at my lil' baby! (Also kinda laughing a little cause um, Jewish dessert and it's a pig.)

*Note: I used this as my filling. Traditionally you fill hamantaschen with fruit fillings, specifically poppyseed or prune or apricot. I had none of those things in my house. So goooooo chocolate hazelnut butter! (After making them, though, I REALLY recommend the fruit filling. While these were tasty, they were a little dry. Usually nut butters are kind of high in oils which I thought would help this problem, but the chocolate one is apparently on the dry side. If you make these, let me know what kind of results you get!)

Onto the folding tutorial.

Step one: Put your filling in the middle.

Step two: Fold that.

Step three: Now, fold THAT. (See how helpful I am?)

Step four: Fold the bottom. 

Step five: Pinch the corners closed.

And that's the folding tutorial!

Now, with hamantaschen, you don't really need to worry about overcrowding the cookie sheet. The dough for these isn't mean to expand that much as you cook it, so you really could fill the cookie sheet more than this. However, I'm just so in the habit of being careful about that and this was my test batch so I just, I didn't care hahaha.

Some of them kind of, um, exploded. And by exploded, I mean I overfilled them and they expanded more than they normally would. Whoops. But hey, I never claim to be a pro, ha!

Like I said earlier, I really recommend a fruit filling. Or, if you use a nut butter, something other than this one. It was just a little too dry for my taste. 

Happy Purim, lovely Jewish people! And happy cookie day to anyone else!

If you have any food requests, feel free to email me or leave a comment!

xo, Kate