Alfajores with Dulche de Leche

Oh how I love my dulche de leche. I can eat it right out of the jar or can. I have had it on cheesecake and had it dipped with toast. Yum!

I have been trying to find more things to make with dulce de leche. I was going to make cupcakes filled with it, but I just haven't mange to get myself to make them, yet. So I did a short search and came up with Alfajores. They are basically short bread cookies with dulche de leche sandwiched in between. Very popular in South America, specifically Argentina. Alfajores are made differently depending where you go in South America, but it is a traditional Arabic sweet.

Well, I found a recipe from the Martha Stewart website, which is a recipe from fellow blogger Matt Armendariz of mattbites.com, who has been blogging since 2005 and has about 50-60 THOUSAND HITS A DAY!! WOW!! (I'm just happy to see 1 or 2 from people who are not myself, friends or family. LOL!)

Here are my first attempt at Alfajores. They turned out pretty yummy. They looked cute too, but there were way to big to sandwich together. I don't have a mini cookie scoop, so I used my cupcake one. LOL!

Alfajores with Dulche de Leche and Chocolate

Well, next time I will have to make this after I pick up a mini cookie scoop. Although, I have looked up other recipes. I have seen dough that you can roll out and cut with cookie cutters. I think that might be my next recipe to use. But, as you can see these cookies were huge so I drizzled the dulche de leche instead of sandwiching them. I did one (in the back corner) and it was the size of a baseball. I'm not going to lie, I did make two that size and ate one. OMG! It was good, but too much sugar for me.

Here's the recipe I used, I did make some changes and substitutions but pretty much the same recipe. :)

Ingredients

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1/4 cup freshly squeezed orange juice
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• Store-bought dulce de leche, cajeta, or jam
• Confectioners' sugar, for serving (optional)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or nonstick baking mats; set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside.
3. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, and continue mixing until well combined, about 1 minute. Working in batches, add flour mixture; mix until well combined. Add milk, orange juice, and vanilla; continue mixing until a dough forms, 1 to 2 minutes.
4. Using a tablespoon or a small ice cream scoop, drop dough onto prepared baking sheets, about 2 inches apart. Transfer to oven and bake, rotating baking sheets halfway through baking, until golden, 10 to 14 minutes. Transfer cookies to a wire rack until completely cool.
5. When cookies have cooled completely, spread the bottoms of half of the cookies with dulche de leche, cajeta, or jam; sandwich together with remaining cookies. Store in an airtight container for up to 2 days. Just before serving, lightly sprinkle with confectioners' sugar, if desired.

* Here are my changes: I used only 1 cup of sugar, next time I think I'll use only 3/4 cup. It was still a little too sweet for me. I did not have fresh orange juice, so I substituted 1/4 cup orange juice concentrate.

BTW, I did make my own dulche de leche, since I had 1/2 a can of sweetened condensed milk in my fridge. I just poured it into a small sauce pan over low heat and slowly simmered it, while continually whisking it so it never came to a complete boil. Just a note: don't let the dulce de leche get too thick in the sauce pan because it will thicken as it cools. If it gets to thick, heat the pan again and add milk a teaspoon at a time, until it's gets to the right consistency for what you are using it for. However, next time I will try making it using a whole can of sweetened condensed milk in my cockpot. It seems like it would be easier, I'm just afraid of the can exploding, due to all the warnings.

Anyway, the cookies were yummy. The dulce de leche was yummy. So, I would call this a success! :)

Happy Baking! :)