Hamantaschen Cookies

Directions

• 1Slice room temperature butter into quarter inch chunks and place butter and sugar in the bowl of your stand mixer, or in a large mixing bowl.
• 2 Beat the sugar and butter together at medium-high speed until light and fluffy.
• 3 Add the whole egg, vanilla, and orange zest to the bowl. Beat again until everything is mixed in.
• 4 Slowly add flour and salt into the bowl and mix at medium-low speed until a crumbly dough forms.
• 5 The dough won't be fully holding together, but remove it from the mixing bowl and knead with your hands until a smooth ball forms. If dough is too crumbly, add water one teaspoon at a time until it has a tacky consistency. Do not overwork the dough, as overworking will make it tough.
• 6 Form the dough into a disk and wrap in plastic wrap. Chill in a refrigerator for 2-4 hours.
• 7 Prepare the filling. We used fig and apricot preservatives. Use thick jams or preservatives, as runny jellies will spill out of the cookie while baking. Also prepare your egg wash--beat the reserved egg yolk with 1 tablespoon of water.
• 8 Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit
• 9 Place one sheet of Ann Clark's French Parchment Paper on a smooth, clean surface. Use a rolling pin (we used our Ann Clark 1/4" cookie rolling pin) to roll the dough out to 1/4 inch thick. When it is cold, it will be hard to roll out--just keep rolling until you get a consistent thickness.
• 10 When dough is one quarter inch thick, you can stop rolling. If you want thinner, flakier cookies, the dough can be rolled until it is one eighth inch thick.
• 11 Use the Ann Clark 3 inch biscuit cookie cutter or the Ann Clark 3" hexagon cookie cutter to cut the shapes into your dough and place on a cool cookie sheet. Pro tip: The hexagon cookie cutter makes it easy to shape the cookies--you just have to pin the corners together!
• 12 Continue gathering and rolling out the scraps until all of the dough is on cookie sheets.
• 13 Place one teaspoon of filling in the center of each shape.
• 14 Brush the edges of each cookie with the egg wash. The egg wash acts as a glue, and helps to keep the seams from separating in the baking process.
• 15 Place one teaspoon of filling in the center of each shape.
• 16 If you used our 3 inch hexagon cutter shape, your work is easy. Starting at the top, bring the top point and the point to its right together until a seam forms. Gently seal the seam using pressure from your fingers. Working clockwise, bring the next two corners together, and then the last two corners together. Make sure the seams are tight to prevent them from leaking while baking. This will naturally form a triangle with an open center where the filling is visible.
• 17 If you used our 3 inch biscuit round cookie cutter, determine the three points of your triangle and pinch the dough in those three points so that it forms a triangle, in the center of which is the filling.
• 18 Bake on a parchment-lined baking sheet at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 10-18 minutes, until the dough is lightly golden brown.
• 19 Cool on a wire rack and then serve!
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