C is for cookie, K is for kill me now
Well, Hannukah is over and if your calendar wasn’t evidence enough of that, below is a forlorn dreidl I saw under a subway seat the other day. Hot pink, no less. Sad, just sad. If you were wondering why I didn’t post any Hannukah related entries, it’s because I spent so long thinking about which spelling I wanted to use that the holiday was over by the time I made up my mind.
(click to enlarge)
But I do bake this time of year, mostly to solve the dilemma of what to get my co-workers for Generic Wintertime Holiday (they are of several different faiths). So I make something complicated, use fine ingredients, and package them all fancee. Voila! I last made rugelach five years ago and I’ve been recovering ever since. But, you know, I had a new mixer so it was time. By the way, really cold butter and cream cheese are vastly irritating to mix because at any speed they will stick in one large mass to the paddle attachment and just spin and spin. Whee!
So what are rugelach? They are a sort of filled Jewish pastry. Let’s make some, shall we?
OK! Let’s get started. Here’s the dough all rolled out (I needed both hands to do that, thus no picture). I made it the previous night. The night I kept having to poke chunks of butter and cream cheese through the paddle attachment.
I combined two steps into one picture. First you spread with raspberry jam, then brown sugar combined with white sugar. Kind of like that Michael Jackson song.
Then chocolate chips get sprinkled on. There’s no song about that. Then you start rolling. Rolling. Rolling on the river. I was actually listening to Radiohead while I was doing this, though.
Oh look, here I’ve combined three steps into one photo. Crazy! So then you brush the rolled up log with milk, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar, and cut into small pieces.
Then repeat about 30 more times. Narf.
But finally you get this! Pretty striped waxed paper courtesy of The Container Store.
Alas, The Container Store only had Christmas (red & green, Santa, Jesus, you get it) and white tins left when I got there. And naturally, you remember I said my co-workers were not all Christmas celebrators. But that’s OK! I like to decorate things myself. Nice, right? And don’t forget! There are rugelach inside.
My, that was exhausting. This morning my co-worker’s daughter called to ask if I would be their full-time baker. Thank goodness I have a job all set up for when the music industry inevitably tanks.
