One thing I dislike about not having grown up with Judaism is that here I am, in my 40s, still scouting for good recipes for the holidays. My Rosh Hashanah honey cake sticks to the bottom of the bundt pan (my food guru Ilana suggests putting bread crumbs at the bottom), my digestion just can’t take latkes anymore, I haven’t seen the coconut macaroons here in Israel that friends use to make their kosher-for-Passover cheesecakes (probably just as well–that’s about a year’s worth of saturated fat), and I don’t have a hamantashen recipe I really love.
Until yesterday.
I enjoy following the discussions and advice on the Israel Food chat list, and at holiday time it is a great resource for new recipes. Yesterday I decided to try a recipe someone named Nita posted on the chat list. This cookie calls for oil instead of margarine (not something I feel terribly strongly about, but in theory I know it’s better) and is flavored with orange zest. After processing a batch of prune and apricot filling (plus a couple of dates and figs), I got going with the dough. It was too soft to handle so I added a cup more of flour than the recipe called for, and rolled it out onto a well-floured surface. When cut, transferred, filled, and wrapped, I popped them into the oven. The smell was fabulous, and when they came out, they looked perfect. The orange rind complemented the fruit filling beautifully. I’m sold. And best yet, they’ll make a delicious cookie for Shabbat when we have margarine-hating guests, or to send in a tray of several dozen in my monthly contribution to Pina Chama (a free coffee shop for soldiers run at the nearby Gush Junction).
Here’s the recipe.
Sharon’s Hamentaschen
(Can substitute lemon rind instead of the orange. For Purim, fill with chocolate or apricot jam; the combination with the orange rind is delicious.)
1 cup oil
1¼ cup sugar
4 eggs
3 tsp vanilla
2 tsp orange rind
5 cups flour (or as needed, depending on the weather)
Pinch salt
2½ tsp baking powder
Mix oil and sugar together. Add eggs, vanilla, and orange rind. Add flour, salt, and baking powder. Bake hamentaschen 12-15 minutes at 180 degrees Celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit). They should still be white on the top, but slightly cracked. They get too hard if overbaked. Recipe makes about 40-50, depending on the size.
Shimshonit 
This looks good. I f I make them, I’ll let you know how they turn out. There is also a recipe on my blog which was included in this month’s edition of KCC.
[…] packages, and my parents will be visiting us, so I plan to enlist my mother’s help in making hamantashen this year, with apricot jam, chocolate, and prune […]