Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies

Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies
Melomakarona the Greek!
Melomakarona is a famous Greek delicacy to enjoy the Christmas season. They are made with flour, semolina, beer, olive oil and fresh butter from sheep and goat of unique flavor, stuffed with nut and dipped in syrup of honey, sugar and mandarin with extra grated nut with spices to sprinkle them on top.
Oriental spices, honey and citrus aromas to smell our homes during Christmas, this beautiful and hopeful celebration of Christianity!

Happy Christmas!
Happy Holidays!
work: 1h:00′ time: 2h:00′ easy:

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Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies

Ingredients (~50 melomakarona)

  • 300g (10.6oz) olive oil or half and half with vegetable oil
  • 120g (4.2oz) butter in room temperature
  • 200g (7.1oz) sugar
  • 1 mandarin, zest
  • 2 tsp ground cloves
  • 2 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 250g (8.8oz) beer
  • 330g (11.6oz) fine semolina
  • 700g (1.5 lbs) + 1-2 tbsp flour for all uses
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • ½ tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp salt
  • walnuts for sprinkle
In a large bowl pour the oil, spices, sugar, butter and zest of mandarin. Keep aside the rest of the mandarin for the syrup. With a hand mixer, beat well the ingredients to soften and melt the sugar.
Add the beer and mix with a plastic spatula from the bottom to the top and circularly to add the beer to the mixture.
In the mixture add a little bit of semolina gradually and alternately…
… with a little of the flour in which we have added the soda, salt and baking powder, stirring each time to be well absorbed by the watery mixture.
When the mixture begins to tighten and makes it difficult to mix, use a wooden spoon.
Do not knead just mix. If in the end you need add a spoonful of flour to have a soft dough, neither too soft nor hard. You feel it in the touch.
Put disposable gloves and take a quantity (~40g - 1.4oz) of the melomakarona mixture to form an oval shape and in the middle of it sink ¼ walnut.
Cover the walnut with the dough and roll into oval shapes. Roll the roller over the small surface of the kitchen grater…
… and touch them in a row and at a distance between them in the large baking pan of the oven covered with non-stick paper. It will take 2 oven plates.
Bake in a preheated oven with air at 180℃ (356℉, Gas Mark:4.2) for 30' until golden brown.
In the meantime prepare the syrup for their bounty.

Syrup Ingredients (~50 Melomakarona)

  • 300g (10.6oz) sugar
  • 250g (8.8oz) water
  • 500g (1.1 lbs) honey
  • 1 cinnamon stick
  • 1 mandarin, cut to 2 or 4
  • 100g (3.5oz) walnuts chopped finely for sprinkling
  • some cloves and a little nutmeg
Put the syrup ingredients in a pot, except walnuts and spices in powder. Boil for 4' from boiling. Remove the foam when it is created.
Once the melomakarona is removed from the oven, let 5'-6' to become lukewarm and then immerse a few in the warm syrup. Keep the syrup warm on a very low heat without boiling until you finish the melt process.
Place them on a flat surface, and if there is leftover syrup, put it on top of it with a teaspoon. Choppe finely nuts together with spices and sprinkle generously.
Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies Melomakarona - Greek Christmas Honey Cookies
In the Kitchen Stories archive, there are many salty and sweet recipes for Christmas Festivals for those who want to prepare their holiday list.
If you want to find them all concentrated, go to their page Recipes (top left of the site) and select those that interest you.


Author Zambia G. Sifaki