Paschalina Koulourakia - Greek Easter cookies

Last night, I started preparing the traditional tsourekia (Greek Easter yeasted sweet breads). I kneaded the dough until soft, smooth and shiny and placed it in the fridge to rest and proof overnight.

Today, as I took it out of the fridge, my nostrils were filled with the aroma of mahlepi and mastiha and I couldn’t wait to bake my breads. I braided the long strips of dough and after an hour or so, my beautiful tsourekia were ready. It was so hard to resist eating them right there on the spot.

Yesterday, though, I made something equally irresistible and delicious; paschalina koulourakia (Πασχαλινά κουλουράκια), Greek Easter cookies, and this year’s batch was a revelation.

I make traditional Greek Easter cookies every year but I was never quite satisfied with the result. Sometimes they were too sweet, other times they puffed up too much or were too hard. This time however, after studying my notes from previous years and making the appropriate adjustments to my recipe, I came up with the ideal, for me, cookies.

They are somewhat longer than the classic cookies of this type, crispy but not hard or crunchy, they have the heady aroma of butter, vanilla and orange, and the sesame seeds on top give a pleasant nuttiness and added texture. Without being too sweet or heavy, they are indeed the best Greek Easter cookies I have ever made.

Hope you give them a try!

Happy Easter to all those who celebrate!

Paschalina Koulourakia (Greek Easter Cookies)

These are the type of Greek Easter cookies served on Easter Sunday since they contain eggs and butter (not Lenten). Τhey are perfect to dunk into your morning or afternoon coffee without disintegrating (an oh-so-important characteristic of a good Greek cookie).

Yield: 35 cookies

Ingredients
200 g unsalted butter, at room temperature, cut into small pieces
200 g caster sugar
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
Zest of 1 orange, grated
2 medium-sized eggs, plus 1 beaten egg for glazing the cookies
400 g all-purpose flour, plus extra for dusting
2 tsp baking powder
Sesame seeds, for sprinkling

Special equipment: stand mixer or hand-held electric mixer, plastic wrap, large baking sheet, baking paper, pastry brush


Preparation
In the bowl of your stand mixer (or in a large bowl) add the butter and sugar and using the paddle attachment (or with your hand-held mixer) beat on medium-high speed until you have a creamy and light mixture. Add the vanilla and grate the orange straight into the bowl so that all the oils from the orange zest fly into the mixture and beat for a few seconds to incorporate. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition to incorporate them fully. Then add the flour and baking powder and mix over low speed until just combined.

Flour generously a clean work surface and empty the dough on top. Flour the top of the dough and knead with your hands for 2-3 minutes, sprinkling with more flour if it sticks to your hands (I had to sprinkle flour a couple of times to achieve the desired consistency), until the dough is soft and pliable but is not sticking to your hands. It may seem that it needs more flour but it doesn’t. You don’t want it to become stiff or too firm otherwise your cookies will be tough rather than crispy.

Shape it roughly into a ball and cover it with plastic wrap. Put it in the fridge for 20 minutes to rest.

Preheat your oven to 180°C.
Line your baking sheet with baking paper.

Remove the dough from the fridge, unwrap it and using a tablespoon measure, scoop out the dough, roll into a small ball (walnut-sized), and then roll it out with your fingers into a thin rope 25-26 cm long. Fold it in half and then twist the ends over each other three times to create the final shape of the cookie.

Note: You don’t need to flour your work surface because a) the dough shouldn’t be sticky at all and b) you need friction in order to shape the balls into ropes.

Place each cookie on the prepared baking sheet and continue with the next. Space them a bit apart as they will spread a little during baking. Using a pastry bush, glaze each one with the beaten egg and sprinkle with a few sesame seeds.

Place the baking sheet on the middle rack of the preheated oven and bake the koulourakia for 15-17 minutes, until set and golden, being careful not to burn them. The edges tend to burn easily so you may want to turn the baking sheet around halfway through the baking time.

Take them out of the oven and transfer them onto a wire rack to cool.
Continue baking the rest of the cookies.

Once cooled, you can keep them in a cookie tin for 1-2 weeks.