(upbeat music) - Rugelach, those delicate rolled cookies, popular in Jewish bakeries
all over the world come in two distinct styles. Now one style is based on a yeast dough and it has more of a bread-like texture, while the other, which is
more popular here in the US, is based on a cookie-like dough that's enriched with cream cheese. And that's the style that
Erin's gonna make for us today. - Absolutely Julia, it's gonna be fun. So what we're making is basically, obviously it's like a crust
between a cookie and pastry. And so you have a lightly sweetened dough. That's gonna be wrapped
around a lot of filling. So, jam, nuts, chocolate sometimes. Like, you can put anything in
these and they're fabulous. - Great. - We're gonna start over here. And as you can see, I
have a food processor. We wanted a flakier texture, so we're gonna actually
use a food processor where the blade cuts the fat
in, much like a pie dough. So I have 11 1/4 ounces
of all purpose flour. I'm gonna add 1 1/2 tablespoons of sugar. And now I'm gonna add
1/4 teaspoon of salt. You need salt, the salt helps
to bring out all the flavors. Don't skip the salt. Now I'm gonna pulse this just
to combine the ingredients. (machine buzzing) So we have two sticks of unsalted butter. There are 1/4" size pieces. Now I'm adding eight
ounces of cream cheese. This cream cheese is
gonna tenderize the dough, and it's also gonna add a little tang. And, last bit not least, 2
tablespoons of sour cream. Again, this is gonna add a
little bit of acid and tang, and help to tenderize the dough. (lid clicking) Now we're gonna cut
the fat into the flour. So I'm gonna pulse this
about 16 to 20 times. Pulsing is the key here,
and count, all right? What we're looking for is, make sure to turn into the
consistency of damp crumbs. If it turns into a dough,
you've gone too far. (machine buzzing) I'm gonna give it a test. You want it to definitely be pulsed enough so your test is to just pinch it together to see if it comes together. So now I'm just gonna dump
this onto the counter. All right, so now we're really
gonna kinda pull it together, and press it together. And I'm just gonna do
it a couple of times. At first it appears like there's no hope. (Julia laughing) So we cut the butter in, but we still had little tiny pieces. And by just kind of pushing it
around and for assuaging it, you're just kind of smearing that, and that's gonna give
us even more flakes down in our cookies. So I'm just pressing this into a 9" log. So I'm gonna cut this into quarters. (blade tapping) - All right. - So you're just kind
of pulling it together. - Like a pie dough. - [Erin] Yeah, and just kind of press it. We don't wanna overwork it,
but we want it to come together into a 4 1/2" disc. - (Julia) Okay. - [Erin] Okay, so we have
all of our four discs, and they're looking
relatively equal in size. And now it's time to roll them out. - Okay. - And you're gonna help me. - Okay. - Hint, hint.
- Hint, hint. - I did, I gave you a
rolling pin and everything. - Oh good, I like helping. - [Erin] So we're gonna roll
these out in between plastic. - All right. - We're gonna roll this into a 9" circle. I know typically, usually
you roll things out between department paper,
and you can do that, but you really have more
control when using plastic wrap 'cause you can actually see
it and adjust as you go. (rolling pin clanking) It's important to make sure, as with any dough that you roll
out, you want it to be even. So I always like to run my hand over it because often the center
will be more rolled out than the edges. And you just wanna make
sure that it's even. There we have it. So now we're just gonna
take the plastic wrap off the top piece. (plastic crackling) Top this with a piece of parchment paper. And then, and this is like the fun part. At least I have fun doing it. - It's kind of fun. - [Erin] That looks great. - [Julia] Yeah. - Now I'm just gonna put this on a plate. - [Julia] Okay. - [Erin] You're just gonna put
yours right on top of mine. - [Julia] All right. - [Erin] All right, are
you up for another one? - [Julia] Oh yeah. - [Erin] Excellent. Once these are rolled out, we're gonna put all four of the rounds into the freezer for 30 minutes. - [Julia] Okie-doke. - [Erin] Okay. (plastic crackling) We are just about ready to roll. Ready to roll? - Am I ready to roll? - Are you ready to roll? You're always ready to roll. So we're gonna start off with
2/3 cup of apricot reserves. I have my dirty food processor bowl. - [Julia] You sure do. - [Erin] You don't need to clean it. (processor clanking) All right, so now we're gonna process this until it's smooth, about 10 seconds. (processor whirring) It smells good. - [Julia] It does smell good. - [Erin] So now we have
our smooth preserves. - [Julia] Nice. - Okay, next up. We have one cup of sugar, and we're gonna spike it with
a tablespoon of cinnamon. - [Julia] Ooh.
- [Erin] Sound good? - [Julia] That's a strong cinnamon sugar. - [Erin] Yes it is. So I'm gonna go grab the frozen rounds. All right. So we have our 30 minute chilled rounds. - [Julia] Okay. - [Erin] You wanna fill one with me? - Yes, absolutely.
- Excellent. You just wanna loosen
it from the parchment, and then put it back on the parchment. - All right.
- And that's it. Now we are going to start
with our apricot reserves. I'm gonna add 2 1/2 tablespoons
of apricot preserves to the center. We're just gonna spread this around. This is gonna be kind of like the glue for all of our other ingredients. Okay, so you're spreading it to, almost all the way to the edge, but leaving it 1/4" border, which will make it a little
easier for you to roll. - [Julia] All right. - All right. And the next step, our
spiked cinnamon sugar. So now we're gonna add two tablespoons and sprinkle it over the preserves. We have golden raisins here, one cup, and we have two cups of
finely-chopped walnuts. - [Julia] Nice. - So we're just gonna take
1/4 cup of golden raisins. Next up, we're gonna add a 1/2 cup of finally chopped walnuts. Now this is gonna be like the blanket. - [Julia] All right. - [Erin] And now the next step here is, we're gonna actually press
them in, that's it, not a lot. So we're gonna cut
these into eight pieces. - Okay. - You have a chef knife over there? - I do. - Perfect, so just cut nice wedges. - [Julia] Do you go in half first? - [Erin] I do half, yep. - All right, I think I got it. - Okay, now grab your
large offset spatula. And the goal here is to
just flip it under there, pull it out. - Okay. - Okay, so now we're gonna roll. - Okay. - You wanna roll tightly, but you don't wanna squeeze
all the filling out. So it's like a nice balance. All right? Some will fall out, but it's okay. So start at the thicker
end, and roll her up. And then transfer it to parchment paper. And I like to put the point so it's right underneath the whole cookie, and the ends, I like to grab
and kind of tuck them down. So it's a crescent-shape. All right. Here's my last one. How are you doing over there? - I'm great. - Those look great Julia. - Thank you. I've got better as I went
along, that's for sure. - So these are the crescent-shape, and I can also make a roulade shape. - Oh, nice.
- Yeah. - So you can find both that
alternate shaping method and a few other variations on
the filling at our website. - Absolutely. So you're up for rolling the next round? - You bet. - Okay, so once we roll them,
and fill them and shape them, we're gonna freeze 'em for 15 minutes, but you can also freeze 'em for
up to six weeks if you want. (bright piano music) All right, Julie, so these
have frozen for 15 minutes. The next step, before
they go into the oven, is to brush 'em with an egg wash. So I made an egg wash with two yolks and two tablespoons of milk. - Okay. - And we're just gonna brush
them all over, get the ends. - Should I be careful not
to get it on the parchment? 'Cause I can tell you right now, I'm getting it on the parchment. - [Erin] Some dribbles are totally fine. - [Julia] Okay.
- [Erin] Absolutely. So don't forget the backs and the fronts, and the two tails. We're gonna bake these
in an oven that is heated to 375 degrees on the upper
middle and lower middle racks. And we're gonna rotate
them halfway through. And they're gonna take
about 21 to 23 minutes. (oven slams) - Oh, beautiful. Erin, they're gorgeous. Oh, smell that? - [Erin] Can you hear the sizzle? - [Julia] You can see the sizzle. - [Erin] Absolutely. So, one more step. We're gonna take the
leftover cinnamon sugar. We're gonna take about a scant teaspoon and sprinkle on each cookie. - Oh wow.
- Here we go. - Okay. - So while they're hot, you
wanna do it while they're hot. - [Julia] Right, so that
way some of the sugar can melt into the dough. - [Erin] You got it, yep. Now that they have sugar, we're gonna transfer them from
the tray to our cooling rack. - Okay. - And it's a lot easier to
do it while they're hot. Okay, so we're just gonna
let these cool completely. And then we can dive right in. It's time. - [Julia] I love that
it's a nice big platter. - [Erin] Absolutely. - [Julia] All right, I
just gotta break this open. Oh, look at that. You can see the flakes of dough on the outside of the cookie. You can see those flakes, but it didn't crumble apart in my hands, it's holding together. - [Erin] Absolutely. (cookie crunching) - [Julia] So good. - [Erin] You can taste all
the individual ingredients from the filling, but it's a
very cohesive, complex flavor. - [Julia] And the dough, the crust, it's part cookie, part pie dough. It is the perfect marriage
of all these textures. - It's very bright, sweet,
nutty, rich, flaky, crispy, crunchy, tender. - Erin, this really was
fun to make, thank you. - Absolutely, you're welcome. This was a lot of fun. - [Julia] To make
perfectly tender rugelach, make the dough in a food processor, using butter, cream cheese and sour cream. Freeze the dough before shaping, then fill it and freeze
again before baking. from America's Test Kitchen, a satisfying recipe for rugelach. You can find this recipe, and all the recipes and product
reviews from this season, along with select episodes at our website, americastestkitchen.com/tv. Thanks for watching
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