Baking with Julia: Rugelach

This was not my first time making rugelach, waaay back in 2008 the TWD group made rugelach, but the recipe in Julia's book is slightly different. The cream cheese dough is essentially the same: cream cheese, butter, flour, salt, and sugar. After the dough was roughly patted out, it chilled for a few hours before being rolled out and filled.

Julia has recipes in the book for prune or apricot levkar, which I am sure would have been delicious, but I went the cheater route and used apricot pastry filling from the grocery store. The filling was spread on the dough, that was more of a square than a rectangle (I still can't quite get my dough-rolling skills right). On top of that went a mixture of sugar, brown sugar and cinnamon, followed by a layer of coarsely chopped nuts (pecans, walnuts, a few hazelnuts, & pistachios) and topped off with dried cranberries, Mission figs and golden raisins. Unlike the rugelach in Dorie's book, Julia's rugelach recipe calls for you to roll the dough up like a jelly-roll, which was moderately difficult for a dough packed with filling. After the rolling, the dough chilled again, this time overnight (I think you can do as little as four hours or overnight).

The next day I gave the rolls in egg wash, sliced them, dipped the slices into a cinnamon sugar-nut mixture and into the oven they went. I love the finished product, the dough is flaky, the fruit remains moist and the caramelized sugar is delicious. A time-consuming but delicious cookie!  

This week's recipe is hosted by:
The Urban Hiker
My Baking Heart