Achieving the perfect cookie "crumb" when making Alfajores, is no accident... it is the result of carefully following every single step in the dough making process, that creates perfection. While baking the cookie discs at the bakery yesterday, I thought to myself, why do most people compare the alfajores to shortbread cookies? It might be the texture... however, if an alfajor cookie dough is made right, the cookie discs should be very light... the amount of butter we use to make our alfajores is nowhere near the amount of butter used to make shortbread cookies.
Of course, I feel like I want to explain to people every time that these are not “shortbread” cookies… that the texture comes from the corn starch and the egg yolks which are two of the main ingredients… that the richness comes from the dulce de leche filling and so on. But I often only have time to explain what alfajores are, the different flavors we make, why I started making them, and their cultural meaning for Argentines like myself. This will soon bring me to my next blog post... stay tuned!
Thanks for reading 😊
Lucila