Vanilkove Rohlicky

Discussion in 'Food & Drink' started by Dascha, Dec 14, 2009.

  1. Dascha

    Dascha Member

    My mom has been making these cookies my whole life (long time!) and she was famous for them in Canada but the last 3 or 4 years, they have been really dry and brittle and this year she is about to rip her hair out from frustration and says she is never going to make them again.

    I would like to try but using a different recipe than hers. I've found some on the internet but one has eggs and one doesn't, one calls for regular sugar another says only vanilla sugar. Can anyone help me with a recipe? Do you use eggs? Sugar or vanilla sugar? Or icing sugar instead? I want to try a batch and see what happens, maybe save maminka's sanity...
     
  2. GlennInFlorida

    GlennInFlorida Well-Known Member

    no recipe but a little advice...
    don't "pack" your flour in the measuring cup and level it off with a knife - baking is a science and even a little extra flour can make your cookies dry.
     
  3. Dascha

    Dascha Member

    She says she used even less flour this year than the recipe calls for and extra butter. But they still came out dry and brittle. I think it must be the temp in the oven or too long baking time but she says it isn't. I don't know. Guess I will try a few different recipes and see what happens.
     
  4. GlennInFlorida

    GlennInFlorida Well-Known Member

    here is a recipe

    1-1/2 cups flour
    2 tablespoons sugar
    1/3 cup ground almonds or filberts
    1/2 cup butter
    1 egg yolk
    1 teaspoon vanilla
    1 cup Vanilla Sugar (see below)

    Mix together flour, sugar, and almonds. Cut in butter. Add egg yolk and vanilla and work quickly into a dough. Chill for about 1 to 2 hours. Shape into small crescents and bake in a preheated 300 degree oven for 15 to 20 minutes. Roll in Vanilla Sugar while hot.

    Vanilla Sugar

    Wrap a vanilla bean in foil and dry in the oven until brittle (it doesn't say how hot - I would think a low heat would work best). Break into small pieces and beat in a mortar with 2 or 3 sugar cubes to a fine powder (I would use a food processor).Sift. Keep in an airtight jar. Mix with confectioners sugar for use.

    This is from Joza Brizova's "The Czechoslovak Cookbook" - hope it works for you.
     
  5. Dascha

    Dascha Member

    Thank you so much! I'm going to try it tonight...
     
  6. dzurisova

    dzurisova Well-Known Member

    Thanks Glenn, I made cukrovi with Czech friends at thier house and things turned out fine - they have a grams measuring device from CR. I went home and tried to duplicate using a conversion table to cups and they were too dry. The Roličky taste like way too much flour. But I always pack the cup and level it off with a knife. Perhaps thats the problem. So what do you suggest we do, just pour it in until it's almost full?
     
  7. GlennInFlorida

    GlennInFlorida Well-Known Member

    No, just a bit more than the full measure then level it off with a knife (of course some recipes will tell you to pack the flour - if they do , follow the directions - if it is too dry, ignore the packing comment).
     
  8. meluzina

    meluzina Well-Known Member


    this is the recipe my mother used (and which i still use) - i think it used more nuts... although that is hard to tell as i am used to the recipe in grammes - is it still dificult to find a kitchen scale in the us that has them? i know it took me mum forever once her old one broke...


    150 grammes cake flour
    20 grammes sugar
    100 grammes butter at room temp
    50 grammes ground walnuts or almonds (i prefer the walnuts personally)
    1 egg yolk
    vanilla (you can use vanilla extract or packaged vanilla sugar as well)

    otherwise the process is the same as glenn's
     
  9. Petronela

    Petronela Well-Known Member

    I know this is absolutely “wrong thing to do” but while back someone told me 1 cup of all purpose flour is 4 oz. and ever since then I have been weighing all purpose flour this way in recipes written in “cups”and really have to say it helped. But it’s only my personal experience.

    As for metric scales, they are relatively easy and cheap these days to get. The one I have I picked up on e-bay about a year ago for $12. It’s digital, has a little button to switch from pounds to kilos and goes up to 5kg/11lbs.

    I do prefer recipes in kilos/litters, it’s just so much more accurate and fool-proof. I wish America just got on with the system and converted already! :twisted:
     
  10. GlennInFlorida

    GlennInFlorida Well-Known Member

  11. meluzina

    meluzina Well-Known Member

    i agree - and it gors for measuring graphic layouts as well -i used to annoy everyone at work by doing mine in mm rather than in 100ths of an inch - but mine always came out righton the first try asopposed to having to maneuver them around :)

    do you think america will convert? it was in the plans sometime in the 1970s - i was in grade school when they started teaching us the metric system and how to convert - and why certain road signs in california have both miles and kilometres on them - don't know why they dropped the plan, as it is an easier system to remember..
     
  12. Petronela

    Petronela Well-Known Member

    I think eventually U.S. will convert, but why it’s taking so bloody long just makes no sense to me because it’s really creating a handicap by leaving general population on a sideline.

    Medical world operates only in metrics already, I am yet to see a doctor who would write my prescription in tea spoons, cups, pounds, pints or other nonsense. Quite frankly if I would ever see a doc doing it I would politely back out of his/her office and never come back.

    Same for scientific communities. Any research or study is always done in metric for two main reasons: accuracy and understanding by rest of the world.
    So why not just get it over and done with and make life easier for everyone.....

    As not to derail too much here’s my recipe for rohlicky:
    -150 g. Flour
    -20 g. Powder sugar
    -100 g. Butter
    -50 g. Grouned nutts
    -1 egg yolk
    -1 package of vanilla sugar
    plus mixture of powdered sugar and vanilla sugar for rolling the finished rohlicky in.
     
  13. dzurisova

    dzurisova Well-Known Member

    My husbands cousin went back to CR for Christmas and brought me back a measuring device for grams!! :) I had made plenty of czech cookies before Christmas, but I just had to try it again with the device. They were MUCH better with the proper measurements. My bread recipe was also much better. I'd recommend to anyone that can to pick up a gram measurer when using these recipes.

    btw, He also brought some packages for knedliky. All I have to do is add water and roll! :D
     
  14. Irena M

    Irena M Well-Known Member

    I'm slowly converting my recipes from cups to either grams or ounces. I get better results this way. You can get an inexpensive digital scale that weighs either in grams or ounces at places like Walmart, Target or Bed, Bath & Beyond.
     

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