If you were here, we’d be eating fresh-baked ruggelach

Ruggelach are tasty Jewish pastry swirls, kind of like vertical cinnamon rolls, except with chocolate, raisins and nuts. As far as I’m concerned Fairway makes some of the best chocolate ruggelach I’ve ever had, but we’re a far cry from Red Hook here in Boulder, so it comes down to making your own. Luckily, a for-real Jewish grandma gave me her recipe.  

Sara-Jane’s Ruggelach

For the dough:

• 2 sticks very cold butter, cut up into small chunks
• 8 oz. cream cheese (fat free is ok)
• 1/4 c. sugar
• 2 c. flour
• sprinkle of spices: cinnamon, ginger, ground cloves

For the filling:

• 2 c. raisins
• 2 c. red wine
• 2 Tbs. molasses
• 2 c. coarsely ground nuts (I used pecans and walnuts)
• 1 c. chocolate chips, melted
• spices: cinnamon, ginger, ground cloves

Prepare the dough a day ahead of baking. Blend all the ingredients in a food processor.  I don’t have one of those, so I used an immersion blender until I realized I could do better with my own hands. This took about 5 minutes of concentrated kneading, but it wasn’t hard at all.  When everything is well mixed, roll the dough into a ball, put it in a plastic bag and set it in the refrigerator overnight.

I prepped the raisins the day ahead, too. Put the raisins in a small sauce pan with the wine. Cook on low heat until the raisins have absorbed the wine and are looking plump. I threw in some spices and molasses, too. Let the raisins cool. I blended mine a bit so that they’d be saucy and somewhat spreadable on the inside of the ruggelach.

When you are ready to start baking, preheat the oven to 375.  On a floured surface, roll the dough into several 6” x 12” rectangles. You should be able to make about 4 or 5 of these rectangles from the dough you have. Roll the dough out thin; a little thinner than a pie crust. Brush the raisin goo and/or melted chocolate to within a 1/2” of the dough edges. Sprinkle on nuts and spices. Then, roll the dough along its long axis- so you get a 12” long roll. Seal the edge with some water.  Place the roll on a tin foil-covered cookie sheet. Brush the roll with a mixture of egg yolk thinned with some water.  Sprinkle more nuts and cinnamon on top. Slash the roll at 3/4” intervals, cutting almost to the bottom of the roll.  Bake 30-35 minutes. When cool, finish cutting the ruggelach into pieces along the slash marks.

Now, ruggelach are not especially pretty food. In general, Jewish food isn’t so nice to look at. However, they are tasty as heck. The dough is flaky and creamy and not overwhelmingly sweet. You will not regret eating these.

(photo via loscheiner)