Polvorones de Naranja
Yield: 4 dozen cookies
Baking Temperature: 400°F
Baking Time: 10-15 min
Ingredients
4 C AP flour
½ tsp baking soda
¼ C white sugar
2 sticks butter (room remperature)
4 large egg yolks
1 can/14oz sweetened condensed milk
zest of 1 orange
¼ C orange juice
Instructions
- In medium bowl, sift flour, baking soda and sugar.
- In large bowl, cream butter and egg yolks thouroughly.
- Slowly add condensed milk to butter/eggs, then zest.
- Slowly add the drys until they are all incorporated.
- Finally mix in orange juice.
- Flour a surface and roll out small quantities dough using a rolling pin to ¼ inch thickness or less (see below).
- Cut 2" rounds using cookie cutter.
- Gently transfer to baking sheet/silpat.
- Bake 10-15 min at 400°F, will not brown much at all. Thin cookies take much less time to cook.
- Cool 2 min on sheet (if soft) before transferring to wire rack to complete cooling.
Notes: The zest and juice requirements are more or less what one orange provides. This is a big recipe and expect to do several batches. Cookies will freeze fine in an airtight container. Undecorated this cookie is sophistacated and not overly sweet but (once cooled) a dusting of confectioner's sugar or a sugar cookie frosting are fun additions. Consider having the egg whites for breakfast...
Tool notes: In addition to your usual tools you will need a fine grater, a (hand) juicer, a rolling pin, and a cookie cutter. As you can see, I used stars but a round cutter would have more evenly colored edges. See pictures of these tools here.
About Rolled Cookies
I remember the first time I rolled out sugar cookies. It was just a few years ago and I did a lot of research on how to best go about it. I have to say that this recipe, while not really a sugar cookie, is much easier for a first-time roller as the dough is a lot less sensitive to the heat of your hands.
If you've never made a rolled cookie before but you've got your rolling pin all ready to go, here are my quick hints.
- Refrigerate dough for half an hour if it is too sticky to work with.
- Flour your work surface and pin as necessary. Keep cup of flour nearby.
- Find a BIG area for your work surface. I used my glass dining table. Granite, marble, or steel countertops are ideal.
- Lay out a piece (or two) of cling film (plastic wrap) on your work surface.
- Roll a (handful sized) ball of dough flat onto the plastic.
- Use the cutter all over your flat dough. Flour the cutter if it sticks.
- Peel the large pieces of scrap dough away.
- Lift the plastic wrap and with one hand under you can peel the cookies off easily (or lift wrap right up and slap the cookie onto the silpat/cookie sheet upside-down).
- Be careful about spilling flour on the top of your cookie because the flour will stay there despite baking.
