It’s the holiday season! I’m on annual leave now until the new year and the first thing I wanted to do with my spare time was get started on my Christmas baking. Of course, I’m going to bake some classics like gingerbread and butter tarts, but I wanted to try out a new recipe this year. I was looking at various options for traditional Christmas cookies from around the globe and came across this recipe for Greek syrup-coated cookies, which sounded divine. Join me as I try baking Greek Christmas cookies called Melomakarona!
I used the recipe from The Mediterranean Dish, except I halved the recipe and used ground cinnamon instead of cinnamon sticks.
Melomakarona Cookies
These cookies taste like a soft shortbread with a cinnamon and citrus kick. Because they’re dipped in syrup and walnuts, they’re reminiscent of baklava. I really enjoyed baking these biscuits! I’ve never baked cookies with olive oil, nor have I dipped cookies in syrup. Despite being a new recipe for me, I found it easy to follow and the biscuit dough was easy to work with. The recipe I used can be found below!
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What am I baking this Christmas?
In addition to the Melomakarona cookies, I’m baking several other tasty treats. I’d like to try baking almond biscotti. Biscotti is a great option for a Christmas cookie because it keeps a long time, making it perfect for baking gift boxes. I plan to make my Dad’s traditional Scottish shortbread round, and a double batch of butter tarts to share with family. I’m also going to bake stamped soft gingerbread cookies and make cinnamon cookies using my Italian cookie press. Lucy is making homemade mince pies, florentines, and chocolate orange peel. Obviously, we can’t eat all this baking ourselves, so it will be shared with Lucy’s family. 🙂
If you’re looking for some other Christmas baking ideas, why not try?
- Butter Tarts and Mince Pies – a new beginning
- Linzer Cookies
- Winter Owl Sugar Cookies
- Christmas Light Chocolate Cupcakes
Melomakarona -Greek Christmas Cookies Recipe
Melomakarona
Ingredients
Syrup
- ¾ Cup Water
- ½ Cup White Granulated Sugar
- ½ Orange Cut into quarters Zest orange and reserve the zest and other half.
- ½ Tsp Ground Cinnamon
- ½ Cup Liquid Honey
Cookie Dough
- 1 Cup Olive Oil
- ¼ Cup Brandy
- ¼ Cup Orange Juice Juice from ½ orange
- Zest from 1 Orange
- ½ Cup White Granulated Sugar
- ½ Tsp. Ground Cinnamon
- 1 Pinch Ground Nutmeg
- 3 ¼ Cups Plain Flour
- 1 Tsp. Baking Powder
- ½ Tsp. Baking Soda
- ½ Cup Finely Chopped Walnuts
Instructions
Syrup
- In a small saucepan, combine the ingredients for the syrup and bring to a boil. Simmer on medium-high heat for 5 minutes to dissolve sugar. Set aside syrup to cool fully. Discard orange pieces before using syrup.
Cookies
- Preheat the oven to 180°C.
- In a large bowl, combine oil, brandy, juice from ½ orange, orange zest, sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Mix well.
- In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, and baking powder.
- Gradually add the flour mixture to the olive oil mixture, mixing with a wooden spoon. Gently knead with hands to get dough smooth.
- Prepare two lined cookie sheets.
- Take 1 tablespoon of dough and roll into an oval shape. Lightly flatten by pressing the tines of a fork in a crosshatch pattern. Space cookies out ½ inch apart on baking tray.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes.
- As soon as the cookies are baked, soak them in the syrup in batches for around 30 seconds per batch. Remove cookies with a slotted spoon and place back on cookie sheet. Sprinkle with chopped walnuts.
