When planning to make Turkish recipe for the theme, I was very specific that I would only be making savory dishes. I had a lovely dinner recipe planned out, but things did not work out quite as well at home and I had to skip making it. Being a dessert loving family, one could not stay away from the Turkish sweet recipes for too long and I had to give up on my initial planning and made this delicious Sekerpare.
I was very reluctant about choosing a cookie recipe that is dunked into sugar syrup and was not sure how that was going to work. I am glad that I gave it a try and did not stay away from it as this was more of a very sophisticated and elegant dessert than just a cookie. The cookies once baked, soaks up all the sugar and takes over a soft and melt in the mouth texture.
This dessert is quite heavy and large. The actual recipe had a bit more sugar in the syrup, but I chose to reduce it and that worked out quite well. The cookies were perfectly sweet with this measurement. If you want a very sweet dessert, then increase the sugar to 1 cup.
Preparation time – 10 minutes
Cooking time – 25 minutes
Difficulty level – easy
Ingredients to make Sekerpare – Makes 12
For the cookies –
- All purpose flour – 1 cup
- Semolina / Rava / Sooji – ¼ cup
- Sugar – ¼ cup (fine)
- Butter – 5 tbsp (softened)
- Yogurt – ¼ cup
- Baking powder – ½ tsp
- Salt – a pinch
- Pistachios / almonds/walnuts – to garnish
For the syrup –
- Sugar – ¾ cup
- Water – 1 cup
- Lemon juice – 1 tsp
Procedureto make Sekerpare –
To make the sugar syrup –
- Combine the sugar and the water in a saucepan and begin to heat them in low to medium heat.
- Once the sugar melts and the syrup comes to a boil, add the lemon juice and let it boil for 5 minutes until it gets slightly syrupy.
- Turn off the flame and let the syrup cool down entirely to room temperature.
To make the cookies –
- In a bowl, add the softened butter and the sugar and mix until well combined. Now add the yogurt and mix well. I used my whisk to combine them.
- Now add the semolina, flour, baking powder and salt and mix together using your hands to form dough. You may add a little bit more flour or yogurt to make soft, non sticky dough.
- Preheat the oven to 350 F. Layer a baking tray with parchment.
- Divide the dough to 12 equal balls and flatten them slightly with your hands and place them on the prepared tray.
- Press an almond or pistachio on the cookie dough and bake them for about 25 minutes until they are slightly brown.
- Remove the cookies on a tray and spoon the cool sugar syrup immediately over the warm cookies. Add all the sugar syrup and keep spooning the syrup on the cookies once in a while for few times. In about an hour, you will notice that the cookies have absorbed all the syrup.
- The Sekerpare store well outside for 2 to 3 days and can be refrigerated for a week.
Suv says
Tried the recipe. .. it turned out delicious. ..Thanks for sharing.