Authentic Hungarian Pastries

Submitted by Munchkin Mama

"These are amazing! You would not believe that there are only 3 ingredients in the dough. My Great-Grandma used to make these every Sunday. The dough has a delicate cheese taste and the filling is nice and tart. They also have a BEAUTIFUL presentation! I've never paid attention to how many cookies it makes or how much time it takes so that is a guess. I know it looks like a lot of steps, but it is not hard to do."

 

• Ready In: 1hr
• Ingredients: 7
• Yields: 20 pinwheels

ingredients

• Pastry dough

• 16 ounces cream cheese, softened (do not use lite or fat free)
• 1 cup butter, softened (no substitutions)
• 2 cups flour

• Fruit Filling

• 1 lb dried apricot
• 1 cup sugar
• water

• For dusting

• 1⁄2 cup powdered sugar

directions

1. Prepare the fruit filling by putting the apricots in a saucepan. Add water just to cover.Cook until soft, being very careful not to let it burn. You may have to add more water to prevent this.
2. When fruit is soft, add the sugar and cook until thick. When thickened, remove from heat and puree in a food processor. Let cool slightly, then put into a freezer bag. When you are ready to use the filling just snip off the corner of the bag. (You may have extra filling left over at the end- it can be frozen for the next time).
3. Prepare pastry: Mix the dough ingredients together with a pastry blender. Roll out onto parchment paper or a lightly floured board to about 1/4" thick rectangle.
4. Using a sharp knife (or a pie crust wheel), cut the dough into 3" X 3" squares.
5. With a sharp knife, cut the dough diagonally from each corner to within 1/2-inch of center of each square.
6. Put about 1 teaspoons of the filling in the center of each square.
7. Fold every other corner of the square to the center to form a pinwheel shape, overlapping the dough at the center and pushing down gently to seal in center.
8. Transfer cookies to a lightly greased cookie sheet. (They dont really expand so you dont have to worry about leaving a lot of space in-between.).
9. Bake at 350 for 20 minutes on a lightly greased cookie sheet. Do not let get brown or burn.
10. Dust with powdered sugar when cooled.

Reviews

[SaffronMeSilly]

This dessert was very good as stated. However I had enough filling left over to make another batch. The second time I added 1/4 cup sugar to the dough, and they were spectacular. That little extra sugar really made the cream cheese pop. Thanks for the post.

 

[cass and sam]

my greatgrandma used to make these- they bring back such good memories, thanks for refreshing them!

 

[ChloeBowie]

My hungarian grandmother and mother have made these every year for as long as I can remember. We call them Kipfle (Kif-lee). We also sprinkle them in powdered sugar when they're cooked. Wonderful, wonderful recipe!

 

[Jane H.]

I helped my mother make these cookies 100s of times. This is not a authentic Hungarian recipe. We never used cream cheese we used butter. To make a flaky dough we would roll out the dough, lather it with crisco kneed then fold it over cover and refrigerate till firm and repeat the steps 4-5 times, this makes a delicious flakey pastry. Hungarians did not use cream cheese! They didn't have it. All butter. Try it you will love it.

 

[Karen=^..^=]

I'm not rating the recipe but wanted to thank you for the instructions on how to make them into pinwheels! I have a recipe for Kolacky, which I believe these are, except it uses half the amount of cream cheese listed on this recipe. Everything else is the same. Maybe that's the reason one of the reviewers here had a problem? Also, anyone who's wondering: there's no sugar in the dough because the sweetness comes from the filling and the powdered sugar sprinkled on top after baking. Anyway, I made my Kolackys yesterday and made some into pinwheels per your instructions and they're gorgeous! Thank you!