Chamuco in Spanish means “devil” or “demon”, ominous I know. But you can’t take it in a literal sense, it has more meaning behind the name. The term chamuco is often used as a Mexican slang, meaning something is mischievous or devilish.
Chamuco is actually referring to a dark chocolate, spicy flavored cookie. The intense flavors make it “devilishly” alluring and tempting, which makes sense because dark chocolate is tempting, right? The only thing is, I can’t find a recipe for dark chocolate chamuco cookies. I only find recipes for sugar and cinnamon chamucos. Nonetheless, these sugar cookies are still considered to be tempting so the name still fits.
Chamucos
A cinnamon and sugar cookie that wraps around a concha paste filling. Link for video
Equipment
- 1 large cookie sheet
- 1 pastry cutter
- 1 kitchen scale optional
Ingredients
Cookie Dough
- 280 g all purpose flour 2 Cups leveled
- 1 tsp salt
- 80 g granulated sugar 1/3 Cup heaping
- 1 TBS cinnamon 1 TBS heaping
- 100 g vegetable shortening 9 TBS
- 1/2 Cup room temperature water
Sugar Paste
- 280 g flour 2 Cups leveled
- 230 g granulated sugar 1 Cup leveled
- 200 g vegetable shortening 17 TBS
- 50 g salted butter, softened 3 TBS
- food coloring optional
Instructions
Cookie Dough
- In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, salt and cinnamon. Mix dry ingredients together with a whisk until well incorporated. Add shortening and cut it into the flour mixture until you get a pebble-like consistency. Using your hands will let you really work the dry ingredients into the shortening.Add water and knead ingredients until well combined. Place dough in a bowl, cover and set aside while you make sugar paste.
Sugar Paste
- In a large bowl, combine flour and sugar and whisk together until well combined. Add shortening and butter and cut into flour mixture until you get a pebble-like consistency.*At this point you can also add food coloring, optional.Using your hands, knead the dough until wet and dry ingredients are completely incorporated together. Form into a ball and put into a bowl. Cover and set aside.
Forming cookie
- Separate the dough into 12 equal parts. Roll each piece into a ball.Take one dough ball and get ready to roll. Using both of your hands, start at the center of the dough and gently roll dough outward. Repeat this step until you get desired length. I try to get about 10-11 inches long. Once you have reached desired length, form dough into a circle and twist or pinch the ends together to close. Place on cookie sheet. *Be careful not to be so aggressive while rolling dough or making string too thin, it will break the dough.*You can also separate the dough ball, roll them out and twist both strings together to get a fun twist design. Totally up to you!
Forming sugar paste
- Separate sugar dough into 12 equal parts, form into balls. Cut each of those balls in half. This will give about 30 grams of paste to place in center. Set aside. *Yes, you will have some paste left over. You can add a little more than half, but I wouldn't recommend too much. It will break the cookie. Trust me, I know from experience. *You can even double the cookie dough recipe, and you should have enough sugar paste to fill another 12 cookies.
Putting the cookie together
- Place sugar paste balls in the center of each cookie. Lightly flour your hands and gently press down on paste and cookie dough at the same time, until paste fills the cookie. The cookie dough and paste should be level. Make sure not to press down too hard, you can break the cookie dough. Bake for 15 minutes at 350 degrees F. You can dust some sugar on top or leave them plain.
