Ghraybeh Cookies

For the effort and ingredients in these cookies i was expecting an outstanding treat. There was very little "taste" to these cookies and i will be frosting my batch to accomodate.

I can fully assure everybody that they will like it. I'm Egyptian and this is a traditional cookie that we enjoy all year round. Then to my surprise after living 3 years in Scotland and enjoying the yummy Scottish shortbread I discovered that it is the same taste and recipe. It seems that tasty bites has no nationality but humanity!

I have been searching for the recipe to duplicate the cookies of my childhood and this is it! When we used to visit relatives, I would eat tons of these but I never got a recipe. The look was not 100% the same so I might try to shape them a little differently but the taste is exact! Not only are they delicious, the texture is amazing. Last but not least, lactose free!

The recipe my mother-in-law, who was from Bethlehem, gave me was far different than this one. Her recipe is light, flaky, & full of flavor. There is no way you could frost this cookie. It's my favorite Arabic pastry, & if made right, they almost melt in your mouth and coat your fingers. There isn't any semolina in her recipe, that would make the cookie heavy.

Quite tasty! The orange blossom flavor is nice and delicate, but the dough was very crumbly and hard to work with. I made some of mine with pistachios instead of almonds--tasted pretty good that way.

I just made this recipe, which is actually from Paula Wolfert's fabulous "Cooking of the Eastern Mediterranean" cookbook. Shame on the original poster--you Grethel--for apparently lifting the recipe and headnote verbatim from Paula's cookbook without attribution. That's very bad food karma. Paula's a legend in the cookbook world.