Portakallı Kurabiye
These bite-sized cookies have an orange flavor all the more intense for the lack of vanilla. They’re pretty, too, with a glossy orange egg yolk wash. They may have made their way to Turkey from Greece, where on the islands and in the Peleponnesus, an orange cookie with a similar-sounding name (kourabies) is made with ground toasted almonds and dusted with powdered sugar.
My touchstone for this sweet are the addictive little orange cookies sold at Ottoman-era Yedi Sekiz Hasan Paşa bakery, in Istanbul’s Beşiktaş district. They’re perfect with a glass of tea, or for dessert after a rich meal, and they keep well in a sealed container for about 5 days.
Preparation time: 45 minutes
Makes about 30 cookies
1. Place the racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven and heat the oven to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
2. Beat the egg in a large bowl. Whisk in the butter, oil, and orange zest. Add the confectioners’ sugar and mix with a fork or spoon. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the egg mixture, mixing just to combine.
3. Roll slightly mounded teaspoons of dough into balls and place them 1 inch apart on the baking sheets (the cookies will not spread as they bake). With the heel of your hand or the bottom of a glass, gently press the cookies just to flatten them at their base; they should be be about 1¼ inches in diameter.
4. Beat the egg yolk in a small bowl and generously wash the top of each cookie (drips down the sides are OK).
5. Bake the cookies until they just start to color, about 15 minutes, switching the baking sheets from top to bottom and front to back halfway through. Do not let the egg yolk wash darken; it should remain orange. Cool on a wire rack.