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Piñata Cookies

The hollow cut out of the middle layer before baking, never drilled out afterwards.

Egg. Not known. This site has not classified “food colouring”, so it cannot say whether the dish is vegetarian or vegan.

Ingredients

the dough

to fill and finish

Method

  1. THE HOLLOW IS CUT OUT OF THE MIDDLE LAYER BEFORE BAKING, NEVER DRILLED OUT AFTERWARDS. The cookie is three discs stacked: a solid base, a middle disc with its centre removed with a smaller cutter, and a solid lid. The ring is cut from raw dough, which takes two seconds and gives a clean edge. Attempting the same thing on a baked biscuit -- hollowing a cavity with a knife or a corer -- cracks it every time: shortbread has no give and the pressure splits it across the middle. All three discs are baked separately, and only then are they stacked around the sweets.
  2. THE THREE DISCS ARE BAKED SEPARATELY AND ASSEMBLED COLD. Baked as a stack, the hollow fills with molten dough as the layers spread and there is nowhere for the sweets to go. Flat and apart, each keeps its shape, and the assembly is a cold job with icing as the glue.
  3. THE ICING IS THE MORTAR AND IT IS STIFF. A hundred and fifty grams of icing sugar to two tablespoons of water -- thick enough to hold a peak. Piped round the rim of the base, the ring set on, more icing round the top of the ring, the lid on. A runny glacé icing slides and the whole thing comes apart when it is picked up.
  4. THE SWEETS GO IN AFTER THE RING IS STUCK DOWN AND BEFORE THE LID. And the cavity is filled only about two-thirds -- packed full, the lid does not sit flat and the icing seal fails along one edge.
  5. IT IS ASSEMBLED THE DAY IT IS EATEN. The point is that it breaks open and spills, and for that the biscuit must be crisp. Assembled a day ahead, the sweets draw moisture from the air inside the cavity and soften the discs from within, and it bends instead of shattering.
  6. The butter and sugar beaten until pale, then the egg and vanilla beaten in.
  7. The flour and salt worked in to a soft dough. Wrapped and CHILLED 1 HOUR.
  8. Rolled out to about 6 mm on a floured board.
  9. Cut into discs about 8 cm across -- THREE discs per finished cookie.
  10. For every third disc, the CENTRE REMOVED with a 4 cm cutter to make a RING. Cut from the RAW dough, not after baking.
  11. All the discs and rings laid on lined trays and CHILLED 20 minutes.
  12. Baked at 170°C for 10 to 12 MINUTES, until pale gold at the edges. The rings may need a minute less.
  13. Cooled COMPLETELY on a rack.
  14. The icing sugar mixed with the water to a STIFF icing that holds a peak, and coloured.
  15. A ring of icing piped round the rim of each base disc and the RING pressed on.
  16. The cavity filled about TWO-THIRDS with the small sweets.
  17. More icing piped round the top of the ring and the LID pressed on. Decorated on top.
  18. Left 30 MINUTES for the icing to set, and eaten the SAME DAY -- broken open with a spoon.

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 Mexico · All recipes