Recipes from Salty's - Seafood Restaurant Seattle Portland  

Prize-winning Chocolate Chip Rugelach

A crescent-shaped crème cheese pastry filled with pecans, sugar, cinnamon and crushed chocolate chips, baked until golden.

By Eileen Mintz

To make dough:

1 cup butter, softened (unsalted)
8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
2 cups of unbleached flour
1/4 cup sugar
¾ teaspoon vanilla
1/8 teaspoon rum extract

To make dough, mix butter and cream cheese together in electric mixer until blended.
Add other sugar, then vanilla and rum extract, cream well. Then add flour. Take out of bowl and form into 5 equal pieces and flatten with hand to form a patty. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.

To make filling:

4 teaspoons cinnamon
4 tablespoons melted butter, cooled
1 12-ounce package of dark chocolate chips
¾ cup of toasted and chopped pecans (toast in a 325 degree oven until lightly browned)
3 tablespoons of instant coffee crystals (Sanka)
½ cup sugar

Have handy: oil and pastry brush, cinnamon and sugar mixture in a bowl (½ cup sugar and one tablespoon of cinnamon) and parchment paper.

Lay out 2 cookie sheets and line with parchment paper.

Crush all the filling ingredients in a food processor. Add cool melted butter. Mix again and set aside. Take 2 patties at a time from refrigerator and leave out for 10 minutes. Roll to about an 8-inch circle. Brush lightly with vegetable oil. Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar evenly and cut into 12 wedges. Add 1 heaping regular teaspoon of chocolate chip filling on edge and roll up like a crescent. Lay out on parchment-covered cookie sheet and brush tops with a little oil and sprinkle again lightly with sugar and cinnamon.
Fill the cookie sheet and bake in a preheated oven at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes, or until browned to a medium toasted color. Cool on racks. Freezes well.