Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Mom and Grammie's filled cookies


These are my trial run so they are much too large. You get the idea though, right?






Filling:

In a saucepan: 1 cup of raisins(chopped figs, dates or other dried fruit works.)
1/2 cup of sugar
1 tablespoon flour
1/2 cup of warm water.

Stir together till the flour does not have lumps and bring to a boil. reduce the heat and cook stirring regularly till the raisins are cooked, plump and the syrup has thickened.
Cool in the pan.

When just warm, add:

a bit of Vanilla
and beat in:
2 tablespoons of butter

Set aside to cool and thicken.



Dough:

in a bowl mix together:

2 cups sugar
1/3 cup melted but cool shortening
2/3 cup milk


In a separate bowl combine:

1 teaspoon of baking soda
1 teaspoon of cream of tartar
2 cups of flour.

Combine the wet and dry ingredients and mix till smooth.

Add:
2 cups +- of flour a bit at a time

Stir or knead in a bit at a time till a very soft dough forms.
This should not be sticky, but not in any way stiff.

Refrigerate for half an hour or so.

Roll out the dough perhaps a quarter at a time on a floured surface. If you do not attend to the flour on the board, it will stick!
It should be about 1/8 inch thick.

Cut into rounds with a glass or cookie cutter. I think these used to be about 2 1/2 inches across.

Lay half of the rounds on a greased cookie sheet.
Put a rounded teaspoonful of the fruit filling in the middle.
Moisten the rim of the other rounds and lay on top of the filling.
Seal the edges gently.
Poke a hole in the top.
Uncle Phil evidently worked in some kind of metal fabricating factory at one time. He made cookie cutters that we had all my life. They disappeared during my divorce. There was one fluted round, and one doughnut cutter. We used to use the doughnut cutter for the top one so it had a pretty big hole in the top layer.

Bake in a 375 degree oven about 10 minutes but only till they just color around the edges and the bottom is light brown.

Place on a rack to cool.

Try with Mincemeat, figs, apricots or raspberry and other jams...Cherry would be wonderful for me when you send samples.

I attended an Aeolian cookie recipe seminar a few days ago. Among the people involved were Carolyn Cusolito Tavares(about a third cousin+-) Maria Taranto, her niece Emily and several other members of the Filicudi associates. They made similar cookies, but the dough was not the same. The finished product was not far off but a very different set of ingredients. I will post that soon, despite it not being family, because it is good to have a comparison. Also Janice Cafarella Crossen will have some filled cookies here. This basic dough was used to make several other cookies with figs, nuts and squash butter, and in very different shapes. I will post directions for those as well. Again, I do not remember them from Grammie, but they were probably made by them as most Aeolian families I know are familiar with them from their homes.

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