The BEST Alfajores (Dulce De Leche Sandwich Cookies)
These alfajores are soft shortbread cookies filled with caramel-like dulce de leche and dipped in shredded coconut.
Ingredients
- 1 ⅔ cups Flour
- 2 cups Cornstarch plus 1 tbsp
- 1 ⅓ cups Powder sugar
- 2 teaspoon Baking powder
- 4 Egg Yolks
- 14.2 tablespoon Butter soft
- 2 teaspoon Vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon Kosher salt
- 27 teaspoon Dulce de leche
Instructions
- In a big mixing bowl, add the softened butter, powdered sugar, vanilla extract, kosher salt, and egg yolks, and mix with an electric hand mixer for 2-3 minutes or until smooth and creamy.
- Add the cornstarch, flour, and baking powder, and mix until the dough comes together.
- Divide the dough in half cover each dough square with plastic wrap and let the dough rest in the fridge for at least an hour.
- After allowing the dough to chill in the fridge, take one dough half out of the fridge. Place the dough between two parchment papers and roll the dough using a rolling pin to about ¼ inch thick.
- Cut into circles with a round cutter, we use a small 4-centimeter one, but you can make them bigger.
- Carefully transfer the cookies onto a parchment paper-lined baking sheet and bake in a 180c (350f) preheated oven for 10 minutes.
- The cookies will look pale, but they will be ready after 10-12 minutes depending on their size.
- Allow the cookies to cool to room temperature and fill each cookie with about 1 teaspoon of dulce de leche. Use a piping bag to do so or a teaspoon.
- Dip the edges of each cookie in the shredded coconut and serve!
Notes
- Use room temperature ingredients. It is important that you use room-temperature ingredients like eggs and butter. This step ensures that your mixture mixes into a homogenous mixture and bakes perfectly.
- Don’t overmix the batter, you don’t want to develop the gluten in the flour. This step ensures you have moist and tender cookies and not dense and dry cookies.
- Make sure that your butter is at room temperature. An hour or two before making these cookies, take the butter out of the fridge and let it come to room temperature. The butter should be soft to the touch. If your butter is too cold, it will be harder to mix and there will be lumps of butter in the dough.
- Measure your flour correctly! When measuring your flour, avoid scooping it with a measuring cup. Instead, stir the flour with a spoon to create as many air pockets as possible, and spoon it into your measuring cup. Finally, level it with a back of a knife.
- Line your sheet pan with parchment paper or a silicone mat! This step helps the cookies to bake evenly, and it makes sure that your cookies release easily from the pan.
- Chill the dough! This step is crucial and prevents the cookies to spread out too much. After making the cookie dough, cover the dough with plastic wrap, and chill the dough in the fridge for at least 1 hour.
- Be patient! I know it’s extremely tempting to fill these cookies with dulce de leche as they are pulled out of the oven, but let these cookies cool for at least 30 minutes so the dulce de leche won't melt.
- If your dough is starting to get soft, cover it with plastic wrap and freeze it for 15 minutes to let it firm up. We repeat this step until we are out of dough and we baked all the cookies.
Nutrition
Calories: 127kcalCarbohydrates: 21gProtein: 1gFat: 7gSaturated Fat: 4gPolyunsaturated Fat: 0.4gMonounsaturated Fat: 2gTrans Fat: 0.2gCholesterol: 45mgSodium: 124mgPotassium: 14mgFiber: 0.3gSugar: 0.1gVitamin A: 222IUCalcium: 24mgIron: 1mg
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!