Welcome to the Free Recipe of the Month!
The Free Recipe of the Month page is where you'll find the free recipe offered in each newsletter. Just remember the free-recipe-of-the month is free just for the month that it's featured in. After that it's retired into the BetterBaking.com Recipe Archives which are always available if you are a paid subscriber of Betterbaking.com (you also get two months free access with any BB cookbook you purchase).
The Free Recipe of the Month is Cherry Cheesecake Hamantashen!
I love the bright fresh flavors of this hamantashen. It's a bit of a New York Bakery class (cheesecake) and Purim fused together.
Classic Bakery Style Hamantashen Dough
1/4 cup shortening
3/4 cup unsalted butter or unsalted margarine
1 1/4 cups sugar
3 eggs
1/4 cup orange juice or milk
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
4 cups (approximately) all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
Cherry Cheesecake Filling
2 8 ounce packages cream cheese
2 egg yolks
1/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3 tablespoons flour
1 19 ounce can cherry pie filling
Finishing Touches
Sugar (regular or coarse) for dusting (optional)
Egg Wash
For the dough, in a mixer bowl, cream the shortening and butter with the sugar. Add eggs and blend until smooth. (If mixture is hard to blend or seems curdled, add a bit of the flour to bind it).
Stir in orange juice or milk and vanilla. Fold in flour, salt, and baking powder and mix to make a firm but soft dough. Transfer dough to a lightly floured work surface and pat into a smooth mass. Cover and let rest ten minutes. Divide dough into two or three flattened disks. (It’s a bit easier at this point to chill it 20 minutes while you are preparing the filling).
For the Filling, in a mixer or food processor, blend ingredients together until smooth.
Work with one portion at a time. Wrapped in plastic, dough can be refrigerated for 2-3 days. If refrigerating, allow dough to warm up before rolling out. For frozen pastries, bake without defrosting.
Preheat oven to 350 F.
Roll out dough on lightly floured board to a thickness of 1/8th inch. Use a 4 inch cookie cutter and cut into rounds. Brush rounds with egg wash. Fill with a generous teaspoon full of cream cheese filling. Top with 1 teaspoon or so of cherry pie filling.
Draw three sides together into center. Grasp perimeters of circle with your first, second and third fingers and pull inward. You should now have a three-cornered or triangular pastry. Essentially, fold two sides towards the center to form a triangle top. Fold up the remaining dough towards the center to meet the other edges of the touch. Brush pastries with egg wash. If desired, sprinkle with regular or coarse sugar and bake until golden brown, about 18-25 minutes.
Recipe doubles well. About 4-6 dozen pastries.
