Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Try it Tuesday

My attempt, with Try it Tuesday, will be to post a recipe every Tuesday.

This week's recipe is for cream cheese cookies. It's my Mom's recipe, and it is excellent. The hubs swears it the best cookie he's ever had and he's not fond of sharing them with anyone else. Unfortunately for him, I only make them once per year. For no reason in particular, these cookies only get made at Christmas time.

Dough
1 Block Cream Cheese, softened
2 Sticks Butter, softened
2 Cups Flour

Beat the cream cheese and butter until smooth. Beat in the flour, slowly. Beat until combined and smooth. Remove dough from mixing bowl and form into disc. Wrap disc in wax paper and refrigerate at least 3 hours.

Filling
1 Cup Chopped Walnuts
1 Cup Granulated Sugar
3 Tablespoons Milk
Cinnamon

Combine all ingredients with a fork or spoon. This filling recipe makes enough for 2 batches of cookies. I have also substituted (for my allergic son) raisins for the nuts, and it worked just as well. The hubs liked both versions.

Putting the Cookies Together
1) Remove dough from the refrigerator and cut into quarters. Roll 1/4 of the dough in granulated sugar into a large, thin circle. Turn the dough as your roll, to keep the sugar evenly spread on crust. Once you have rolled the dough, turn it over one last time. Upon turning it over, wipe away some of the excess sugar from the pastry mat (trust me this will help when the cookies are baking).

2) Cut the dough into 16 triangles. I use a pizza cutter for this - works really well and makes a long smooth cut.

3) Place a small amount of filling at the wide end of each triangle.

4) Roll, beginning with the wide end, each triangle to the center of the circle.

5) Place on lined cookie sheet. If you don't have a silpat, use parchment paper. It is essential that you line your cookie sheet, as the sugar on the outside of the cookie caramelizes. All 16 cookies will fit on one cookie sheet; they don't spread much.

6) Bake in a pre-heated 375 degree oven for 15-17 minutes. The cookies will be slightly golden when done. Start checking them at 15 minutes.

7) Remove the cookies from the pan right away. The caramelized sugar will cause the cookies to stick if you do not remove them right away. Scrap sugar from silpat (or discard parchment paper) and repeat the process.



Enjoy the cookies - so tasty! I wish I had taken a nicer picture of the cookies - perhaps on a nice dish - but the cookies were gone before I could think to do that!

3 comments:

Kate said...

These sound amazing. A friend is coming over Friday evening to make several dozen Christmas cookies (she's just using me for my Kitchenaid, but I can't blame her)... we may just have to make a run out for cream cheese before we start.

Cassie - Homeschooling Four said...

Those look great! Can't wait to try 'em.

Anonymous said...

The perfect cookie! I just made my batches for Christmas as usual. I have to hide a few so there will be some on Christmas day or those that come then will be upset.
Merry Christmas, Your Mother