alfajores- a recipe share

i've gotten so many wonderful ideas and recipes from this board i thought i would share one of my all time favorite cookie recipes!

alfajores are a shortbread sandwich cookie from south america filled with dulce de leche. sometimes they are coated in chocolate, coconut, or meringue, meringue and chocolate. i like them plain it just rolled in coconut best. it depends on which country in south america they hail from. each country has different versions of shortbread as well. here is one of my favorite versions!

alfajores

Makes 2 dozen sandwich cookies

Cookie:

375 grams butter (1/2 cup)
1 1/4 cup powdered sugar
2 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon lemon juice
grated rind of one lemon
2 cups corn starch
2 1/2 cup flour
dulce de leche

combine the corn starch and flour in a bowl.
cream the butter and sugar. add the eggs, then vanilla, lemon juice, and zest. then add the dry mixture until it forms a ball.
form into a disc, wrap in plastic, and chill for at least 30 minutes.

Roll out to approximately 3/16" thickness. Cut out to 2" diameter rounds
Bake at 300F for 9 minutes. The edges of the cookies should be browning while the centers will remain a nice golden color.
Cool on rack.
spread the bottom of a cookie with dulce de leche and sandwich another one on top.

you can either leave it this way or for variations roll the sides in toasted fine coconut. or dip them in chocolate

So I made the recipe tonight and mine turned out really densed (shortbread)....did i over-refrigerate it? 1 hour. The shortbread wasn't as flaky like the restaurant one's. The cookies took forever to get light brown on the outside so i ended cooking them for 10 minutes longer, does this have anything to do it. I didn't roll it out thin enough either.
I used the Dulce de Leche in the store bought can...didn't like how it tasted. Does anyone have a suggestion of what brand they use or how i can make it from scratch? I love these cookies so much, i wanna perfect it. I have to drive 1 hour to buy them.

On second look, I have a feeling the oven temperature of 300F is a typo. They'd likely get light brown on te outside and golden in the center in 9 minutes at 350F. 300 is awfully low for baking butter cookies.

Oooh, thanks for this. i will try it for sure -- love the alfajores with manjar blanco (dulce de leche). Have you really found a brand of manjar that comes close to the flavor/consistency of homemade? (I use the canned condensed milk boiling in water method.)

Umm, I think your butter measurement has a typo: 1/2C butter is roughly 120 grams. Which is correct for the recipe: 1/2C OR 375g?

Thanks

ugh strange. i must have typed it wrong. it sbeen about 1-1/2 years since i made them. i assume 375 grams (about 13.2 ounces)

13.2 ounces is just over 1 1/2 cups butter, so perhaps you meant to type 1 1/2 cups? That makes a lot more sense given the recipe calls for 4 cups of dry ingredients, which would not make a dough with just 1/2 cup butter.

So it is 375g butter, 2 1/2 cups flour and 2 cups cornstarch?

i always use scales to measure my ingredients.

but yes.

do you sift the dry ingredients? does it matter what kind of flour? i LOVE alfajores. i am so excited to make these...just don't wanna screw it up ;0)
thanks.

sifting doesn't matter.

use all purpose flour:)

sorry, but 'dulce de leche' is....

a milk caramel. you can make it yourself but there's really no reason to when you can buy it relatively cheap. look for argentine brands (my fav)

These sound delicious - thanks for sharing. Per my post above, do you think they would keep for a week?

no these most definitely would not keep a week. :(

Would they keep well for one day/overnight?

yes. but not for a week for sure.

Mmm, I love alfajores! Thanks for your recipe.

BTW, I prefer them plain with just a heavy dusting of powdered sugar on top. Yum!