Alfajores Cookies

If you love crisp, melt-in-your-mouth cookies filled with dulce de leche and rolled in coconut, say hello to Alfajores. This South American cookie is a treat you have to try. Hey, you're watching Preppy Kitchen, where I, John Kanell, teach you how to make delicious homemade dishes to share with your family and friends. These cookies will be ready before you know it, so let's get started. First off, let's get all of our dry ingredients together, starting with one cup, or 120 grams, of all-purpose flour. Hmm, that's not a lot of flour. What's going on here? This is a cornstarch cookie, meaning it's gonna be really delicate, crisp, and melt-in-your-mouth. One and a quarter cup, oh my gosh, that feel of cornstarch on my skin sends shivers down my spine. It's the worst thing ever, but this cookie's worth it. Ha! Let me know in the comments if it bothers you as much as it does me. I need to, like, go wash my hands in a second. Anyways, a quarter teaspoon of salt, and one teaspoon of baking powder. All right, let's sift it out and whisk it up. Set this aside, and let's get a stand mixer or an electric hand mixer out. Into the bowl of your stand mixer, add three quarters of a cup, or 170 grams, of unsalted, room-temperature butter. Now, I'm adding in about a teaspoon of lemon zest. This is gonna give you a really nice kind of underlying flavor in the cookie. Now, two thirds of a cup, or 133 grams, of granulated sugar. Put that paddle attachment on, and we're gonna mix this up. We're gonna mix this on high for about three minutes, or until it's nice, light, fluffy, and homogenous. And you can always either scrape the bowl down, or scrape the bowl down. And continue. While that's mixing, let's separate three eggs. We'll be using the yolks. Okay, my mixture is nice, light, and fluffy. This is what it looks like, mm. We're gonna add our egg yolks in, one at a time, while mixing. Then add the vanilla, and scrape down. To you, it looks just like butter, but to me, I see just egg yolks, so we need to mix it up. Mix this until it is totally smooth. Dump the dry ingredients in. Oh my gosh, the cornstarch. Now, mix this on low until just combined. All right, this needs a little bit of a scrape. Keep mixing until combined. So, it looks really crumbly, and you're like, whoa, this looks wrong, but then, by magic, it comes together, just like in a snap. So, as soon as it comes together like this, you're ready to go. So, as I said earlier, because of all the cornstarch in this recipe, the cookie will really bake perfectly, and you don't need to give it that much chill time. But, cutting the cookie out, and moving it onto your baking sheet means the dough has to be pretty stiff, and because of that, we will be chilling it. Transfer your cookie dough onto either a pastry mat, or a well-floured surface. Lightly floured surface, don't use too much. Form it into a nice lump, and then we're gonna cut it into two pieces. They don't have to be exactly the same, it's just to make it more easy when we roll it out. I'm gonna wrap these in plastic now, and before they go into the fridge, I'm just gonna give them a little bit of a head start, and flatten them even more. This makes rolling it much easier when it's already pretty thin. It'll also chill it quicker. Pop your dough into the fridge, and chill it for 30 to 60 minutes, or until it's nice and firm. Let's go. Once your dough's chilled, leave it on the counter to warm up for just a few minutes, so it's pliable. You want to be able to roll it out without cracking the dough. Lightly flour a surface. I'm using a pastry mat, but you can use your counter as well. And then, we're gonna unwrap and roll. Sprinkle it up. I'm using my favorite cookie rolling pin. It has little bumpers on the side, and I set them to one eighth of an inch, or three millimeters, so it'll be exactly the same thickness all around. As you roll out the dough, make sure to just keep flouring and moving, because it will stick if you're not careful. This has been rolled out sufficiently. Now, we're gonna cut circular cookies, and I mean, not to be crass, but I'm thinking Oreo size for them, so probably this. Place them onto a baking sheet lined with either parchment paper, or a silicone mat, and have your oven set to 350, because we're gonna bake these up as soon as they're ready. My cookies are ready to go into the oven at 350 for about eight minutes, and just give the pan one rotation halfway through for a nice, even bake. I re-rolled the excess dough, and I'm just cutting out a set of circles that are one size up on my graduated circle cutting set. This one is like one and three eighths of an inch, and this is just under two inches. My next batch of cookies is ready to go into the oven, but first, let's take a peek at this dulce de leche. My local markets don't sell it, so I have to make my own with sweetened condensed milk. It's really easy, it just takes a little bit of time. You can click up here if you want all the instructions, and I give you a couple different ways to make it. Let's see. Look at this. That is some caramelized milk magic. It is so silky delicious and perfectly sweet. If you're a dulce de leche lover, you know all about it. It goes so well in so many recipes, including my banoffee pie, which you can click up here for. Dulce de leche, bananas, toffee, whipped cream, mwah. I gave my cookies exactly eight minutes in the oven, and you can see they're lightly golden, just on the edge. I don't want them to go too dark, but they will still taste crispy and delicious, even if they go a little bit further. Transfer your dulce de leche into a piping bag, or if you're feeling adventurous, you can just spoon it in there, but I like using a piping bag. Look at this color. Do you see this silky, majestic majesty? My mom would say, me encanta, but with a much better accent. My mother is from Mexico, but this is more of a South American treat, so think Peru, Argentina. You can let me know if you've heard of these cookies before and if you enjoy any variations. Onto the back of one cookie, then press together to sandwich it. You don't want a ton, because this dulce de leche is very silky and flowy, and they will just kind of fall apart if it's too filled. You can continue this process with the rest of your cookies, and if you'd like, you can make a little assembly line so it goes really fast. These cookies are such a treat to have with coffee in the morning or in the afternoon or at nighttime, and I may have eaten one off camera, so this guy will have a mate when the next batch comes out of the oven. The last step is to roll your cookies in some desiccated coconut, so that's not the angel flake sweetened coconut. It's just dried cocoa. Roll the cookie in that coconut, and you have a delicious treat now. The coconut adds a nice depth of flavor as well as a little bit of extra texture to your cookie. I'm gonna eat these all night now. I'm gonna eat them all. These are the bigger cookies, by the way. You can let me know in the comments which you think you'd prefer, the smaller ones or the larger. I'm torn. If you like this video, check out my cookie playlist. All of my favorite cookies in one playlist for you, but now it's time for a bite. Oh my gosh, that was so good. Crisp, tender, melt-in-your-mouth cookie with a little bit of lemon, the vanilla, and of course that silky dulce de leche. You've gotta try this recipe, and if you like my videos, hit that like button and subscribe, and I'll see you in the next video that's about cookies.