Apricot Hamentashen

It’s that time of year! I love Jewish traditions that revolve around food, and Purim has some of the most fun food traditions. Hamentashen are tri-cornered cookies filled with a sweet poppy seed or prune filling (the most traditional fillings), or jam, chocolate, or even Nutella if you are adventurous. I’ve even seen some recipes floating around this year for cheesecake and salted caramel fillings!

While I do like to be adventurous sometimes, my absolute favorite way to fill hamentashen is with apricot jam (try this homemade cinnamon apricot jam!). The recipe below provides a soft and pliable dough, and I find that I get the best results (i.e. the least stick-age) by rolling out the dough between two pieces of parchment paper.

Allergy notes:

• If you have a soy allergy, you can use a soy-free margarine, or 3/4 cup of coconut oil in place of the margarine. If you use coconut oil, the dough will be a bit oily but resist adding more flour or the dough will be too dry and crumbly to roll or shape.
• If you can’t have rice, you can substitute millet flour, sorghum flour, or potato starch for the rice flour in this recipe but add an extra 1/2 tsp of xanthan gum.
• You could use a very finely ground almond flour if you want grain-free hamentashen, but they will be a bit challenging to shape. I recommend cutting, filling, and shaping the hamentashen, then moving the parchment paper to a baking sheet rather than trying to move the individual hamentashen. If the dough is too crumbly to shape, try adding an extra egg.

Ingredients

1 cup (2 sticks) of margarine
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cups brown rice flour
1 1/2 cups tapioca starch/flour
1 1/4 cups sweet rice flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp xanthan gum
1/2 tsp salt
apricot jam

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees (if you have convection, use it!) and place parchment paper on three baking sheets (I find this works better than greased baking sheets).
2. Cream margarine and sugar on high for 2-3 minutes. Add eggs one at a time, allowing to combine before adding the next. Add vanilla.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk together brown rice flour, tapioca starch/flour, sweet rice flour, baking powder, xanthan gum, and salt. Turn mixer to the lowest speed and add flour mixture to the wet mixture 1 cup at a time, allowing the dry ingredients to be incorporated before adding more. The dough should be soft but not sticky (you should be able to roll the dough between your palms without anything sticking to you–if it’s too sticky, add 1/4 cup more sweet rice flour).
4. Place about 1/4 of the dough on a piece of parchment paper on the counter (keep the rest of the dough covered with a damp towel). Cover with a second piece of parchment paper and roll with a rolling pin until the dough is about 1/4 inch thick.
5. Using a small dinner glass, a wide-mouth pint mason jar, or any glass about 3 inches in diameter, cut the dough into circles (if the dough is sticking to the glass, try oiling and/or flouring the rim). Fill circles with 1/2 tsp of apricot jam, pinch the corners into a triangle, and carefully move to the prepared baking sheets. These won’t rise or spread much so you can put up to 12 on each baking sheet.
6. Gather up leftover dough, add more dough as necessary, and repeat rolling, filling, and pinching until you have used all of the dough.
7. Bake for 15-18 minutes until the edges are golden brown. Remove to a wire rack and cool completely. Store in an air-tight container on the counter for up to a week, or in the freezer for up to 3 months.