Category Archives: Jewish Holidays

Aunt Carol’s Hamentashen

When and what is Purim?

The Jewish holiday of Purim falls on Sunday March 24 this year. The traditional treat to eat on Purim are Hamentashen, a triangular shaped cookie. Created by my Aunt Carol, these are the very best hamentashen. Tender cookie dough encases a sweet golden raisin and prune filling. After baking, dip them in honey and chopped toasted pecans, for crunch.

If you need a primer on Purim, or just a laugh, check out this cute video from Mayim Bialik.

Growing up in Toronto, we celebrated Purim with hamentashen from Open Window Bakery. They were enormous, with a hard, crumbly cookie dough exterior. There were only two flavour options, prune or poppy-seed fillings. Life was simpler back then! My sisters and I fought over the poppy-seed ones. Mom, why did you even bother buying the prune ones?

After marriage, I was introduced to Ottawa-style hamentashen. Homemade! These were little triangles of tender dough filled with a prune and raisin filling, dipped in honey and walnuts. Talk about culture shock. My husband’s aunts, Jenny and Carol, supplied the family with their version of hamentashen. They really are the very best hamentashen. After Aunt Jenny died, Aunt Carol continued the tradition of making hamentashen. She would mail them, near and far, to all her nieces and nephews.

My beloved Aunt Carol died suddenly in 2018. I miss her dearly. She taught me how to bake hamentashen and many other important life skills. When I first moved to Ottawa, she took me under her wing and offered me lots of advice, such as “I know you kept your own name when you got married, but if you use our family name when you order from the kosher butcher, you’ll get better quality meat. “ Turns out she was right. She usually was.

I will do my best to carry on her tradition of sharing her delicious hamentashen with as many as I possibly can!

Aunt Carol’s Hamentashen

Traditional cookie served during the Jewish holiday of Purim. Tender cookie dough filled with a sweet prune and raisin filling. Dipped in honey and pecans for some crunch.
Course Cookies
Servings 30 hamentashen
Calories 212 kcal

Ingredients
  

Dough

  • 3 large eggs
  • 100 grams granulated sugar
  • 125 grams vegetable oil
  • 475 grams all purpose flour
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt or 1/4 teaspoon Morton's Kosher Salt

Filling

  • 340 grams pitted prunes
  • 170 grams golden raisins
  • 125 grams strawberry jam
  • 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons almond extract

For assembly and topping

  • 1 egg white lightly beaten
  • 170 grams honey warmed in microwave for 30 seconds
  • 100 grams pecan halves toasted and finely chopped

Instructions
 

  • Make dough: In an electric mixer, mix eggs and sugar until smooth, about 3-4 minutes.  Pour in oil and mix to combine.  Sift together flour, baking powder and salt and add to mixer. Mix just until dough begins to come together.
  • Dump dough onto the counter and knead for about a minute. Divide dough into 2 pieces and roll each piece, between 2 sheets of parchment paper, to an 1/8 inch thickness. Chill rolled dough in fridge for one hour. (Dough will keep in fridge for 5days or can be frozen for up to a month.
  • Make filling: Combine all ingredients in the food processor and pulse until finely chopped, about 20 –25 pulses.
  • Preheat oven to 350°F. Use a round (2¾ -3 inch) cutter to to stamp out rounds, leaving as little space between them as possible so that you do not have too many scraps. Place rounds on parchment lined baking sheet, setting them 1½ inches apart. Set scraps aside.
  • Brush the edge of the circles with cool water. Spoon about 2 teaspoons of the filling into the center of each circle. Fold up three sides of the dough against the filling, forming a triangular shape. Pinch the edges and corners gently so that the shape holds together. Repeat with remaining filling and dough. Scraps can be rerolled and chilled for at least 30 minutes before cutting and baking more hamentashen.
  • Brush unbaked hamentashen with lightly beaten egg white. Before baking, add a second baking sheet under hamentashen. The double baking sheets will prevent the bottom of the hamentashen from getting too brown, before the tops and sides are done. Bake the hamentashen, rotating baking sheet halfway through, until golden, 15-16 minutes.
  • Once the hamentashen have cooled, dip one edge of them in honey and then into the chopped pecans. Hamentashen will keep well in an airtight container, for about a week. For longer storage, they can be frozen for up to 2 months.
     
     
     

Nutrition

Serving: -1hamentashenCalories: 212kcalCarbohydrates: 35gProtein: 3gFat: 7gSaturated Fat: 1gPolyunsaturated Fat: 3gMonounsaturated Fat: 3gTrans Fat: 0.03gCholesterol: 19mgSodium: 68mgPotassium: 171mgFiber: 2gSugar: 18gVitamin A: 117IUVitamin C: 1mgCalcium: 27mgIron: 1mg
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

More Hamentashen Recipes

Looking for other hamentashen flavour options? Check out Malted Milk Chocolate Hamentashen, Poppyseed Fig and Walnut Hamentashen, Strawberry Rhubarb Hamentashen, Maple Pecan Hamentashen, Cinnamon Bun Hamentashen with Almond Shortbread Dough, Salted Caramel Apple Hamentashen, and Dried Cherry and Pecan Hamentashen

Aunt Carol’s Hamentashen

Traditional cookie served during the Jewish holiday of Purim. Tender cookie dough filled with a sweet prune and raisin filling. Dipped in honey and pecans for some crunch.
Course Cookies
Servings 30 hamentashen
Calories 212 kcal

Ingredients
  

Dough

  • 3 large eggs
  • 100 grams granulated sugar
  • 125 grams vegetable oil
  • 475 grams all purpose flour
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt or 1/4 teaspoon Morton's Kosher Salt

Filling

  • 340 grams pitted prunes
  • 170 grams golden raisins
  • 125 grams strawberry jam
  • 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons almond extract

For assembly and topping

  • 1 egg white lightly beaten
  • 170 grams honey warmed in microwave for 30 seconds
  • 100 grams pecan halves toasted and finely chopped

Instructions
 

  • Make dough: In an electric mixer, mix eggs and sugar until smooth, about 3-4 minutes.  Pour in oil and mix to combine.  Sift together flour, baking powder and salt and add to mixer. Mix just until dough begins to come together.
  • Dump dough onto the counter and knead for about a minute. Divide dough into 2 pieces and roll each piece, between 2 sheets of parchment paper, to an 1/8 inch thickness. Chill rolled dough in fridge for one hour. (Dough will keep in fridge for 5days or can be frozen for up to a month.
  • Make filling: Combine all ingredients in the food processor and pulse until finely chopped, about 20 –25 pulses.
  • Preheat oven to 350°F. Use a round (2¾ -3 inch) cutter to to stamp out rounds, leaving as little space between them as possible so that you do not have too many scraps. Place rounds on parchment lined baking sheet, setting them 1½ inches apart. Set scraps aside.
  • Brush the edge of the circles with cool water. Spoon about 2 teaspoons of the filling into the center of each circle. Fold up three sides of the dough against the filling, forming a triangular shape. Pinch the edges and corners gently so that the shape holds together. Repeat with remaining filling and dough. Scraps can be rerolled and chilled for at least 30 minutes before cutting and baking more hamentashen.
  • Brush unbaked hamentashen with lightly beaten egg white. Before baking, add a second baking sheet under hamentashen. The double baking sheets will prevent the bottom of the hamentashen from getting too brown, before the tops and sides are done. Bake the hamentashen, rotating baking sheet halfway through, until golden, 15-16 minutes.
  • Once the hamentashen have cooled, dip one edge of them in honey and then into the chopped pecans. Hamentashen will keep well in an airtight container, for about a week. For longer storage, they can be frozen for up to 2 months.
     
     
     

Nutrition

Serving: -1hamentashenCalories: 212kcalCarbohydrates: 35gProtein: 3gFat: 7gSaturated Fat: 1gPolyunsaturated Fat: 3gMonounsaturated Fat: 3gTrans Fat: 0.03gCholesterol: 19mgSodium: 68mgPotassium: 171mgFiber: 2gSugar: 18gVitamin A: 117IUVitamin C: 1mgCalcium: 27mgIron: 1mg
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

Pistachio, Freeze Dried Raspberry and Dried Cherry Matzoh Crunch

Another flavour of matzoh crunch coming at you today. We were gifted a box of round matzoh, and I wanted to create something special with them.

After the caramel coating, I topped these with a layer of bittersweet chocolate and a swirl of white chocolate.

I topped that with these gorgeous slivered green pistachios, crumbled freeze dried raspberries and tart dried cherries. A sprinkling of flaky sea salt balanced out all the flavours. This is a beautiful and sophisticated flavour profile sure to please.

Click here to print recipe for Pistachio, Freeze Dried Raspberry, Dried Cherry Matzoh Crunch.

Sweet & Salty Matzoh Crunch

This sweet & salty matzoh crunch is delicious and utterly addictive, as my husband and chief recipe taster discovered this week.

Montreal baker and cookbook author Marcy Goldman is the originator of Matzoh Crunch. The recipe is published in her first cookbook, “A Treasury of Jewish Holiday Baking”. Matzoh crunch is essentially a layer of matzoh covered in brown sugar-butter caramel and topped with a blanket of melted dark chocolate.

This is my adaptation of her recipe. I have elevated matzoh crunch to the next level, by sprinkling on salted toasted almonds, Passover pretzel thins and toasted coconut flakes. I used a total of 4 different kinds of chocolate for this over the top confection. A base of milk chocolate, and then decorative swirls of white, blonde and bittersweet chocolate. It’s fancy AF.

Watch the video to see how it all comes together.

As with anything you bake, if you start with top quality ingredients, you will yield a better outcome. Most recipes I have seen for matzoh crunch call for melted chocolate chips as the top layer. The problem is that chocolate chips are not formulated to melt smoothly. They contain less cocoa butter so that they hold their shape. This is great for chocolate chip cookies, but not so great when you want a velvety smooth coating. So start with a good quality chocolate that is meant for melting. I love Valrhona. I order it online from Vanilla Food Company.

Blonde chocolate, is a more recent addition to the chocolate family. It is essentially caramelized white chocolate. You could make your own, or buy Valrhona’s which is marketed under “Dulcey“. This is not a Valrhona sponsored post, I just really love their chocolate!

Click here to print recipe for Sweet & Salty Matzoh Crunch.

Malted Milk Chocolate Hamentashen

The Jewish holiday of Purim begins next week at sundown on Monday March 6. The traditional Purim treat are triangular shaped filled cookies known as Hamentashen. For those not familiar with this Jewish holiday, I present to you a basic primer, my version of Purim 101. Essentially, the Festival of Purim commemorates a time when the Jewish people living in ancient Persia were saved from extermination. As in every good story, you have your heroes and your villans.

The heroes of the story are Esther, a beautiful young Jewish woman living in Persia, and her cousin Mordecai, who raised her as if she were his daughter. Esther was taken to the house of Achashveirosh, King of Persia, to become part of his harem. King Achashveirosh loved Esther more than his other concubines, and made Esther his queen. Like all intelligent wives, she kept a thing or two about herself hidden from her husband. Upon advice from her cousin Mordecai, she kept her Jewish identity a secret from the King.

Our story’s villan is Haman, a rather arrogant, egotistical advisor to the King. The King appointed Haman as his Prime Minister. Haman despised Mordecai because Mordecai refused to bow down before Haman every time he passed by.  Rather than seeking to destroy Mordecai alone for this slight, Haman decided to take revenge on the entire Jewish population living in the Persian empire. The King gave Haman permission to do as he pleased. Haman’s plan was to exterminate all of the Jews. 

Nothing got past Queen Esther. She had her finger on the pulse on the kingdom. Somehow she overheard this plot to annihilate all the Jews. She consulted her cousin Mordecai and he persuaded Esther to speak to the king on behalf of the Jewish people. She told her husband, the king, of Haman’s plot against her people and somehow convinced him to save the Jewish people. We’re never told exactly how she convinced him, but there are rumours! The Jewish people were saved, and Haman and his ten sons were hung.

The holiday of Purim focuses on the pleasures of food and drink, more than any other Jewish holiday. It is a time for celebrating and letting go. The shape of hamentashen symbolically represent Haman’s three-cornered hat. Typically, hamentashen are filled with jam or a poppyseed filling.

I’m bucking tradition here and flavouring my hamentashen with Malted Milk Chocolate. Check out the video to see how they come together.

If you are not baking with malted milk powder, you’re missing out on a ton of flavour. Stella Parks called malted milk powder the umami bomb of the baking world. It adds a toasted creamy richness to your baked goods. Ovaltine is one brand readily available at the supermarket. It contains the addition of chocolate. For a more concentrated hit of malted flavour, without the chocolate, I love Hoosier Hills Farms malted milk powder.

These Malted Milk Chocolate hamentashen have a triple hit of malted milk. There is malted milk powder in both the dough and the filling and then I chopped up some malted milk balls to coat the dipped hamentashen in.

Milk chocolate really allows the malted flavour to shine through. Jesse Szewczyk inspired the filling for these hamentashen with her Malted Milk Chocolate Rugelach.

If you’re a Hamentashen novice, here are a few tips for success:

  • Roll dough between 2 sheets of parchment paper and chill before cutting into circles
  • Don’t overfill. You will regret it when they burst open in the oven.
  • Brush edges of dough with beaten egg white. it acts as an effective glue to hold them together.
  • Pinch edges and corners really well when shaping.
  • Freeze formed hamentashen for about 10 minutes before baking. They will hold their shape better.
  • Brush unbaked hamentashen with beaten egg white for some shine.

Click here to print recipe for Malted Milk Chocolate Hamentashen.

Cheddar Latkes

Happy third night of Chanukah. I really did mean to get this posted last week, but time got away from me. But, luckily Chanukah lasts for 8 nights, so you still have 5 nights left to try these latkes.

When I mentioned to my family that I would be adding cheddar cheese to the latkes this year, it was met with less than enthusiasm. I get it. We really only get to eat latkes once a year, and folks don’t want you messing with tradition.

My husband, ever the diplomat, responded to my announcement with “I’m not really sure how I feel about that.” This coming from a guy that puts ketchup on his latkes (I think it’s an Ottawa thing). My daughter suggested that perhaps I “make two batches, one with cheddar and one without”. Spoken with the innocence of youth, who isn’t peeling and grating the potatoes, squeezing all the liquid out and getting the smell of fried oil in her house and hair for days, as well as trying to film a video!

This is not the first time I have messed with tradition. There was the Latkes with Fried Eggs and Roasted Tomatoes in 2011, the poorly maligned Sweet Potato and Brussels Sprouts Latke variation in 2016, and Apple-Potato Latkes last year.

But hear me out on this one. You know when you make a grilled cheese sandwich and those rogue bits of cheese escape and get all brown and crispy at the edges of the sandwich. That’s the best part, right? So imagine crispy fried potatoes and crispy cheese. Two kinds of crispy. How bad could that be? Pretty damn fantastic. They were met with rave reviews.

The inspiration came from Chef Michael Solmonov. I saw him add cheddar to his latkes on the Rachael Ray show last week, and I was sold. He added a full pound of cheddar to his latkes, but I scaled that back to 5 ounces in my version, which still let the potato flavour come through strong.

A few tips for success:

  • Do not skip the step in the recipe where you squeeze all the water out of the grated potatoes and onions. You will not achieve crispy latkes.
  • Save the liquid you squeeze from the potatoes and onions. Let it sit for a few minutes and then pour off the liquid. The gunk you see at the bottom of the bowl is potato starch. Mix it with the eggs and add it to your potato mixture. That potato starch is a magic ingredient in keeping your latkes from falling apart.
  • Reheat latkes on a wire rack, set over a baking sheet. The wire rack allows the air to circulate so the bottom of your latkes don’t get soggy.

Click here to print recipe for Cheddar Latkes.