Earlier today I posted my Dairy Free Hamantaschen recipe. I also wanted to offer a butter-based dairy hamantaschen dough for those who prefer a more buttery flavored cookie. This dough produces a tender, sweet hamantaschen. While many who keep kosher prefer dairy-free cookies (so they can be served with a meat meal), others don’t mind adding butter to the mix. This dough provides a dairy hamantaschen option for your Purim menu.
I like this dough because it produces a rich, buttery, orange-scented cookie that is full of flavor. The dough will work with any hamantaschen filling, and it won’t open up/expand in the oven during baking, as long as you don’t overfill your cookies and your filling has the proper texture.
There are a few drawbacks–it needs to be thoroughly chilled before rolling out (it’s too sticky to roll at room temperature), and it is not as flexible to work with as my dairy free dough. That is the nature of butter doughs; when cold, butter becomes stiff, which in turn makes the dough somewhat stiff and tougher to shape. That said, if you have some experience with baking and working with butter dough, this one should pose no problems for you… in fact, it’s one of the easier butter doughs that I’ve worked with.
Note: if this is your first time making hamantaschen and/or butter dough, I recommend starting with my Dairy Free dough. It’s easier to work with than the buttery one, and the flavor is similar.
You can use any hamantaschen filling you like with this dough; I’ve linked to the filling recipes available on my site below. The key to a good filling is to make sure it is thick enough to prevent running, but not so thick that it bakes up dry or tough. All of these filling recipes are tasty, and they all have the proper texture for use in hamantaschen. I will update this list of fillings as I add new ones to the site.
Hamantaschen Fillings
Rabbi Olitzky’s Chocolate Chip Cream Cheese Filling
For my Dairy Free Hamantaschen dough, click here. To learn more about the holiday of Purim, click here.
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Buttery Hamantaschen
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
- 2/3 cup sugar
- 1 large egg, room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 teaspoon grated orange zest
- 2 1/4 cups flour
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1-5 teaspoons water (if needed)
Instructions
- Slice room temperature butter into small chunks and place in a large mixing bowl.
- Add sugar to the bowl. Use an electric mixer to cream the butter and sugar together for a few minutes till light and fluffy.
- Add the egg, vanilla, and orange zest to the bowl. Beat again till creamy and well mixed.
- Sift flour and salt into the bowl.Mix with the electric mixer on low speed till a crumbly dough forms.
- Begin to knead dough with hands till a smooth dough ball forms. Try not to overwork the dough, only knead till the dough is the right consistency. If the crumbles are too dry to form a smooth dough, add water slowly, 1 teaspoon at a time, using your hands to knead the liquid into the dough. Knead and add liquid until the dough is smooth and slightly tacky to the touch (not sticky), with a consistency that is right for rolling out. It can easily go from the right consistency to too wet/sticky, so add water very slowly. If the dough seems too wet, knead in a little flour till it reaches the right texture.
- Form the dough into a flat disk and wrap in plastic wrap. Place in the refrigerator to chill for 3 hours to overnight.
- Before you begin to assemble the hamantaschen, choose and make your filling and have it on hand to work with. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly flour a smooth, clean surface. Unwrap the dough disk and place it on the floured surface. The dough will be very firm after chilling.
- Use a rolling pin to roll the dough out to 1/4 inch thick. At the beginning, it will be tough to roll out-- you may need to pound it a bit. A heavy rolling pin works best. As you roll, cracks may form on the edges of the dough. Repair any large cracks with your fingers and continue rolling.When the dough reaches 1/4 inch thickness, scrape the dough up with a pastry scraper, lightly reflour the surface, and flip the dough over. Continue rolling the dough out very thin (less than 1/8 of an inch thick). The thinner you roll the dough, the more delicate and crisp the cookies will turn out-- just make sure that the dough is still thick enough to hold the filling and its shape! If you prefer a thicker, more doughy texture to your cookies (less delicate), keep the dough closer to 1/4 inch thick. Lightly flour the rolling pin occasionally to prevent sticking.
- Use a 3-inch cookie cutter (not smaller) or the 3-inch rim of a glass to cut circles out of the dough, cutting as many as you can from the dough.Gather the scraps and roll them out again. Cut circles. Repeat process again if needed until you've cut as many circles as you can from the dough. You should end up with around 35 circles (unless you've kept your dough on the thicker side, which will result in less cookies).
- Place a teaspoon of filling (whichever filling you choose) into the center of each circle. Do not use more than a teaspoon of filling, or you run the risk of your hamantaschen opening and filling spilling out during baking. Cover unused circles with a lightly damp towel to prevent them from drying out while you are filling.
- Assemble the hamantaschen in three steps. First, grasp the left side of the circle and fold it towards the center to make a flap that covers the left third of the circle.Grasp the right side of the circle and fold it towards the center, overlapping the upper part of the left side flap to create a triangular tip at the top of the circle. A small triangle of filling should still be visible in the center.
- Grasp the bottom part of the circle and fold it upward to create a third flap and complete the triangle. When you fold this flap up, be sure to tuck the left side of this new flap underneath the left side of the triangle, while letting the right side of this new flap overlap the right side of the triangle. This way, each side of your triangle has a corner that folds over and a corner that folds under-- it creates a "pinwheel" effect. This method if folding is not only pretty-- it will help to keep the cookies from opening while they bake.
- Pinch each corner of the triangle gently but firmly to secure the shape. If any cracks have formed at the places where the dough is creased, use the warmth of your fingers to smooth them out.Repeat this process for the remaining circles.
- When all of your hamantaschen have been filled, place them on a lightly greased baking sheet, evenly spaced.
- Place them in the oven and let them bake at 350 degrees for 10-25 minutes, until the cookies are cooked through and lightly golden. Start checking them at 10 minutes; because the dough thickness tends to vary on these cookies they can cook quite fast if rolled thin. In most ovens it will take around 15-20 minutes, but best to keep a close watch over them as they cook to avoid overcooking or burning.Cool the cookies on a wire rack. Store them in a tightly sealed plastic bag or Tupperware.
NOTES
Nutrition
Didn’t try making these yet but really excited to get started on them! I have one question. Is it ok to use earth balance vegan butter? Will it work the same? Don’t want to mess up and would like them to be pareve.
You can use the vegan buttery sticks (not the tub margarine), but honestly if you want them to be parve I suggest this recipe, which tastes very similar and is easier to work with: https://toriavey.com/toris-kitchen/dairy-free-hamantaschen/
when making dough for the Hamantaschen/what do you like better making it with butter or shortening.
I am making the cookies for a contest at my synagogue. They look like winners.
The buttery and dairy free versions taste remarkably similar. The dairy free is a little easier to work with, the buttery are a little trickier to master but they are also a bit more flavorful.
These are perfect. The recipe is simple and the cookies are awesome. We used bottled raspberry preserves when we made them, and it worked awesome.
First try at hamantaschen. It was a great dough. I also used it to make Hungarian lekvaros papucs and they turned out very well. Thank you.
Glad to hear it!
Hi! I am not Jewish, in fact I am Baptist. I made this recipe for my second grade Sunday school class. We were learning the story of Esther and I decided to teach them about Purim. I used orange marmalade for the filing. They tasted so good! This one is staying in my recipe collection.
That is so awesome! The story of Esther has always been my favorite. I’m glad your students got to learn it and eat these delicious hamantaschen cookies 🙂
Hi. I am preparing a study guide for the book of Esther, to help a group of Seventh-day Adventist youth to learn and memorize it. I want to put some recipes that are traditional at a Purim celebration in the back of the study guide. I have never celebrated Purim before, and have never had Hamantaschen. When trying to search for a good recipe, out of the many recipes on the internet, your blog caught my eye, because of the good photos of each step in the process. I tried both the dairy and non-dairy dough today, and the prune/orange filling and a mango filling, following the directions for the apricot filling, with great success. I am sure the apricots taste great, too. Since I don’t have anything to compare this recipe to, as far as other Hamantaschen cookie recipes, I will say that the non-dairy dough reminded me a bit of a fortune cookie, while the dairy version reminded me a bit of a light shortbread cookie. I enjoyed the orange zest in the cookie dough, too. May I use your recipes and pictures in my study guide? When it is finished, it will be freely downloadable at our website, and will look like the study guides for Exodus. Thanks for posting such great recipes, and excellent photos. They helped a lot! Shelley Houser
Hi Shelley! Very glad the blog and recipes were helpful. I would request that you not use the recipes/photos in your materials, as they are copyright protected. You may use the recipe (not photos) in printed materials with proper attribution/credit, if they are only for distribution within your congregation. Any online distribution is prohibited per copyright laws. Thank you for understanding.
These hamantaschen cookies came out great! I pretty much followed the recipe entirely, but I left out the salt for my low sodium diet. Didn’t matter. I only cooked for 20 minutes and that may have been more than needed in our oven. Perfect. Go-to-recipe. Thank you
Best hamantaschen I’ve ever made! Mine usually explode in the oven or end up looking terrible. This one stayed together perfectly and tasted amazing. Five stars all the way!
Bless you for posting this recipe. Worked like a charm
The dough was delicious, the corners stayed shut, and the cookies looked pretty. I will definitely use the recipe again for other sugar cookies. My only reason for giving only three stars is that the dough just didn’t taste traditional. The cookies were great, but they were just too delicate to be hamantaschen.
Hi Lydia– I’m glad they worked out for you. Sorry you feel they didn’t taste traditional. I think it all depends on what type of hamantaschen you grew up with. There is more than one way to make hamantaschen, after all… some people grew up with this kind of dough, others with a yeast dough which has a different texture.
I made these with your apricot filling and some nutella too and they were so good thank you this will be my recipes from now on
Hi Tori
Thanks for sharing this recipie. I am experienced with making dough but I guess I didn’t add enough water. I did add 2 tesp but I guess it wasn’t sticky enough. When I would roll the dough it cracked. However we still made them and as funky as they look they are delicious!!! I couldn’t form them becuase they were cracking. I am going to try again. Any tips??? I also made the Lekcar and it’s so good! Thanks Pam
Hi Pam 🙂 butter dough can be tricky. It really is a “feel” thing. Try more liquid next time. Glad you like the lekvar. Good luck!
Hi 🙂 I’ve tried the dairy recipe out, and my hamantaschen came out a bit hard. Is this normal?
Thank you in advance. X
Hi Yasmin– this means you baked them a bit too long. Try cutting the bake time by 2-3 minutes next time.
Delicious and so easy. Had some with tea. Could not resist and baked a test batch only after 15 min. in fridge. Loved them.
Third year I’ve made these. Each year they’ve been a little off as I don’t have a cup or cookie cutter quite the right size. This year I realized the Nutella lid is almost exactly 3 inches!
¡Perfecto !
Combed through a bunch of hamentaschen recipes and felt overwhelmed as I’ve never made them before. Came across this recipe, took a chance and was super happy with how they came out. The dough is easy to work with, didn’t open in the oven and tastes great! Just be sure to rest the dough when it first comes out of the fridge. I made the nut and honey filling. Added a touch of cinnamon and cardamon. Also made some with store bought strawberry jam. Next year I will definitely try the poppy seed. Highly recommend this recipe.
As I was reaching for the sugar, I paused for a second at the light brown sugar. Dough recipes always stick with white, but I’m curious what would happen if one mixed in a bit of light brown, since that flavor is so wonderful in baked goods. I was too chicken to experiment, though. Any thoughts?
My dough is not rolling and breaks apart, followed recipe. Help
Hi Jenna, sorry to hear that. Crumbling usually means that there is not enough liquid in the dough. It takes some practice to get a feel for it. As I mentioned in the blog above, I really recommend starting with the dairy free dough if you’re new to this type of baking, as it tends to be an easier dough to work with.
Had the same issue upon folding. I forgot the water, but was able to pinch them and that worked.
Hi, I just wanted to tell you I used Ener-G Egg Replacer in this recipe for my egg-allergic child and they came out great!
Great to hear that sub will work Michelle!
Well, my hamantaschen are in the oven! Hopefully they will turn out well. I only have a small convection oven, so I will bake some more tomorrow.
You weren’t kidding about the toughness of the dough out of the fridge! ? I really had to pound to get it rolled out. I tried the poppyseed mix because that’s what I’m used to. I still have quite a lot left over, which can be used tomorrow, when I’ll try the parve version. I don’t have canola oil – would olive oil do? I will, of course, go and buy some, I just don’t normally use it.
Hmm… A nice smell is coming from the oven… Thanks for the recipe!