Egipcios - Moroccan Shortbread Cookie with Dates

Growing up my brother Daniel and I went to my grandparents every Saturday for Shabbat lunch.  Mama (grandmother from my dads side) was an amazing baker, and had a lot of family recipes.  I am not sure how many of them got passed on to family.  I know my brother had a few of them that he shared but I couldn't find the Egipcios recipe on here.

Not to long ago, our cousin posted a picture of these cookies on Facebook.  So I absolutely asked for the recipe from my dads cousin. Rachel was my dads cousin than Dan always went to first when seeking out Moroccan family recipes.

Egipcios are cookies that are probably best described as a short bread cookie stuffed with dates.  The cookie is usually crumbly and not too sweet, but stuffed with a date mixture that adds just the right amount of sweetness.

Me, not being the baker, asked my mother'n'law if she could try to make these cookies for me.  Nancy is always up for a challenge in the kitchen, so she was quick to accept.  I just gave her an extra twist to my challenge because my wife has Celiac Disease, and I wanted this recipe to be gluten free so I could share the experience of one of my favourite childhood cookies with my wife.  This didn't phase Nancy and she went to work and didn't disappoint.  Within a week she had all the ingredients needed to make this happen.

Here is the family recipe, I hope you enjoy!  If you want to make it gluten free, just make sure the flour is a gluten free flour and that the baking powder is gluten free, because not all are.

EGIPCIOS

Ingredients:

Cookie Pastry:
½ PKG CRISCO
7 TBLP WATER
7 TBLP OIL
7 TBSP SUGAR
3 TSP BAKING POWDER
ABOUT 3 CUPS FLOUR
PARNOOSH DATES IN A CONTAINER PITTED

Date Mixture:
DATES USE ½ CONTAINER
IN FOOD PROCESSOR PUT IN DATES
½ TSP CLOVE
½ TSP NUTMEG
½ TSP CINAMON

Directions:

1. Mix date mixture well.  Adjust spice ration to taste.
2. Using oil on your palm, form sticks a bit shorter and thicker than the size of a crayon.
3. Mix the dough and form the dough into halves (not to long)
4. Take the dough and put the date in.  Put another dough around to close and form the egipcios
5. Set oven to 300 degrees and bake until bottoms are lightly browned.
6. Garnesh with confectionery sugar.
7. Any leftover date mixture can be frozen.

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