TWD: Rugelach!

OK, so this is my first Tuesdays With Dorie and I'm excited about it! I was so hesitant to start blogging and the Tuesdays with Dorie blogs were probably one of my biggest motivations to start Singleton in the Kitchen.  So, sorry it's late on Tuesday but I had a huge paper snafu and my schedule got all sorts of messed up . . . and I'm still posting on Tuesday, so yay!

Umm, my memories of rugelach are sort of dry cookies that never seemed to have enough chocolate or sugar for my taste so I wasn't too excited about the recipe. But that all changed once I started putting it all together.  I don't have a food processor and while I do own a pastry cutter, I wasn't particularly excited about making a cream cheese pie dough by hand.  Luckily, my mom got me this amazing immersion blender that has a food processor attachment. It's small . . . but the dough just barely fit inside. The dough came together nicely and I promptly wrapped it up, stuck it in the fridge, and forgot about it.  

I knew that I wanted to change the fillings to suit a) what I had on hand and b) what I like.  I used apricot jam, which I've used before but oddly enough I'd never tasted it.  Well, I tried it tonight and it's great!  I highly recommend it for projects like this -- it's tart and sweet but not overpowering.  I omitted the dried fruit . . . I hate raisins and I didn't have any Craisins or dried cherries around.  I decided that for the first batch, I'd make Dorie's recipe as is, using almonds for the nuts and without the currants.  I did use more sugar and cinnamon than she called for because the dough doesn't have any sugar and I like things on the sweet side.  For the second batch I used shredded coconut and white chocolate chips with apricot jam and the cinnamon sugar.  

Verdict:  the only issue I had was the spillage of the jam (and I don't think I used that much jam). I used a silpat so clean up wasn't an issue but the rugelach stick to each other and everything else.  I'm hoping that this will get better as they cool more.  Also, I made the mistake of letting the first batch cool before taking them off of the sheet and then I ended up having a hardened pool of jam around each rugelach.  Other than that, they're much better than the rugelach that I remember.  I like the white chocolate-coconut ones the best but they're both good.  

Cheers to my first TWD.  I would never have made rugelach otherwise and I'm so glad that I did!