Kourabiedes

Almond shortbread buried in icing sugar while still warm, where the butter is beaten far longer than seems reasonable.

Egg. Vegetarian, but not vegan — contains egg, dairy (butter).

Ingredients

• 250 g unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 60 g icing sugar, for the dough
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 tablespoons brandy
• 400 g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 150 g almonds, toasted and chopped
• 500 g icing sugar, for burying
• rosewater, optional

Method

1. THE BUTTER IS BEATEN FOR TWENTY MINUTES AND THAT IS NOT A TYPO. It should go from yellow to almost white and roughly double in volume. There is no raising agent doing any real work here and no liquid to speak of: the air beaten into the butter is the entire texture, and a five-minute cream gives a dense, sandy biscuit that tastes the same and eats completely differently.
2. THEY ARE SUGARED TWICE, ONCE HOT AND ONCE COLD. Hot from the oven they are rolled in icing sugar, which half melts and forms a thin shell that grips; cold, they are buried in it again for the thick white coat. One coat alone either slides off or disappears.
3. Butter and the 60 g of icing sugar beaten together, 20 minutes, scraping down. Set a timer and do something else.
4. Egg yolk and brandy beaten in.
5. Flour and baking powder sifted together, then folded in by hand in three additions -- NOT beaten. The moment the flour is worked, gluten develops and the biscuit goes tough.
6. Almonds folded through last.
7. The dough rolled into walnut-sized balls, slightly flattened or shaped into crescents, on lined trays with room between them.
8. Chilled 30 minutes. Cold dough holds its shape; warm dough spreads into flat discs.
9. Baked at 170C for 20 to 22 minutes. THEY SHOULD BARELY COLOUR -- pale gold at the base and still almost white on top. Browned, they are overbaked and dry.
10. Out, and left on the tray exactly 5 minutes. Hot from the oven they fall apart in the hand; cold, the sugar will not stick.
11. Rolled gently in icing sugar while still warm, then set on a rack to cool completely.
12. Buried in the rest of the icing sugar in a deep tray, sifted over until they disappear, and left overnight. A flick of rosewater over them before the sugar if you like.
13. They keep three weeks in a tin and are better after two days.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Greece · All recipes