Cookies can be munched on at any time of the year, yet somehow we tend to crave cookies during the ‘dark month a lot more. That is why this Alfajores Recipe is the perfect combination to kill those winter Blues. Our bodies just want something to make them happy. I personally believe Cookies and Chocolate will make me happy any day of the year. Is it healthy? No probably not! But everything in moderation is fine.

I got to know them while I travelled through South America from July to October. Starting of in Chile in July I was introduced to these treats in Valparaiso. Valparaiso once was the most important City of South America, because of it Harbour, before the opening of the Panama Canal. Now the City still a popular hot spot, with a working harbour and a lot of Gratify.

In order to get to know this city, I joined Wally’s Free Walking Tour. These types of walking tours can be found almost everywhere now, in most major cities anyway. Basically the Guide shows you around the city and at the end you give them a tip. This way of course they always try their best, and the service is excellent. To this day, this tour in Valparaiso was one of the best one I have done.  Now you probably wondering what does all this have to do with these Alfajores I mentioned?

Simple; as part of the Walking Tour we ended up at this Gentelmans house and he gave us one each, one of them to try. They where even wrapped in personal little packages. It was a sweet gesture. Of course if you wanted you could buy more, for later.

Biting into this cookie was amazing, it really was a mouth explosion. Somehow however I broke it down in all the Components.

• A basic Cookie
• Dulce de Leche in the Middle
• A Chocolate Coating

Easy Right?! That was exactly my through and I knew I could make this very easy my self, and that it would be one of those recipes to share back home.

Did you know?

The Chileans and Argentines are crazy are about their Dulce de Leche, claiming that it can not be found anywhere else and that is is unique to those Countries? Well I'll let you know, Dulce de Leche really "ONLY" is sweetened Condensed Milk that is boiled on low heat for about 5 hours. Dulce meaning Sweet and Leche meaning Milk in Spanish.
These Dulce the Leche Cookies, Alfajores can be found everywhere in these to Countries, but none of the Packaged Cookies, tasted as good as the first one from that Gentleman.

Because it is so close to Halloween, (like this past Weekend), not only did I make the normal Alfajores. Which were gone in a matter of a day. But also a special Halloween edition or should I say a Autumn edition. Pumpkins may be a symbol of Halloween, but a Vegetable of Autumn.Either way they don't even take much longer than the regular once to make.

Alfajores - Dulce de Leche Cookies

The Alfajores recipe:

125 g Butter
79 g Sugar
1 Egg
250 g Flour

1 Can Sweetened Condensed Milk
100g Milk Chocolate
100 g Dark Chocolate

** Make this ahead of time:
1 Can Sweetened Condensed Milk - Place the Sweetened Condensed Milk in a pot and cover with water, let it simmer at LOW head for about 5 hours. The Toffee should be a medium brown when you open the Can. This is your Dulce de Leche.**

Mix the Butter and Sugar until creamy with a Hand Mixer. Add the Egg and stir together.
Mix in the Flour, continue mixing with the Hand Mixer until you obtain a homogenous dough.
Continue by hand to knead the dough.
Once done, wrap the Dough in Cling Foil and place into the Refrigerator for roughly 30 minutes.
In the meantime prepare a cookie sheet with baking paper.

Before taking the Dough out of the Fridge pre-heat the Oven to 180ºC on Fan Bake.
Take the Dough of the Fridge and knead until it is a little bit softer. Sprinkle Flour onto your Workplace and roll out the dough. About 0.5 cm Take your round cookie cutter and cut out Circles. Continue this process until all the dough is done. Make sure you have an even amount of Circles.

Bake the Cookies 10-12 minutes until they are lightly colored golden brown.

Let the Cookies cool off.
Once Cool, spread on half the cookies 2 tablespoons of Dulce de Leche. Place a second Cookie on top and press down.

Chop the Chocolate and Melt the chocolate in the pot set in warm water. Dip the Cookies into the Chocolate and set back onto the Baking Paper to rest, and harden. (if you have troubles with fishing out the Cookies out of the Melted Chocolate try, taking a baking Brush and spreading the Chocolate on the Cookies that way. One the top hardens, flip them over and repeat the process on the Sides and the "top".

Notes:

For the pumpkin; I used White Chocolate mixed with Kurkuma Powder. (I am not a huge fan of Food Coloring and like to use natural dies. I was surprised how well this worked.) The Pumpkin Pattern is just drawn in melted Dark Chocolate.

 

For the Chocolate Ghost, just place to dots of Chocolate on the desired eye location and place these monster eyes on them. Use heart Sprinkles for the Mouth.

 

If you have any left over Toffee, you can eat if like in Argentina or Chile on Bread, or Pancakes.

So even those it is not Halloween, anymore, Pumpkins are more of an Autumn Image anyways. And YES it is SPRING (in the northern Hemisphere) NOW. But these cookies are just amazing!

 

Have you ever tried this Alfajores Recipe?

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