Meet Irene, beloved local Greek grandmother and baker
If you love buttery shortbread biscuits and almond cookies, you will adore today’s Greek Cretan Biscuits. But first, I want you to meet Irene! My hairdresser Deange Hair is run by two Greek sisters, Angela and Diane, in a small shop attached to their parents’ house. On any given day, the salon buzzes with customers getting their hair done as they nibble homemade cookies while young children dart around the shop. Irene, the family matriarch, holds court with clients as she interjects with “advice” for her daughters as they work with delicious aromas wafting in from her kitchen. You might even catch her doing a weekly audit of her biscuit sales to ensure her daughters aren’t shortchanging her. “Make sure this money goes to your mum!” I sternly remind Angela and Diane every time I buy some. 😂 It’s a wonderfully familiar scene that provides much amusement to regulars. Of all the homemade cookies I’ve tried (and I’m pretty sure I’ve tried them all!), the Greek Cretan biscuits have been my favourite. Thank you Irene for sharing your recipe!
Ingredients in Irene’s Cretan Biscuits
Here’s what you need to make Irene’s Cretan Biscuits.
biscuit dough
Decorating
Egg white – Used to brush the top of the biscuits to make the almond flakes stick. Use the yolk plus leftover egg whites for your morning scrambled eggs or omelette! Almond flakes – For decorating the surface. Not critical, but a nice to have for both extra almond flavour plus visual. I would plough ahead with this recipe if I was out!
How to make Irene’s Cretan Cookies
This is a straightforward cookie recipe. However, this section has a fair amount of descriptions so even novice bakers can have confidence making this recipe. For pro bakers, head straight to the abbreviated directions on the recipe card below! Can you use regular almonds with skins? Yep, you sure can and the flavour will be similar. But prepare yourself for little dark brown bits inside your cookies! Got jumbo eggs? Crack, whisk, measure out 45g / 2 1/2 tbsp. (More information here). Make sure your egg is at room temperature, not fridge cold. else you will struggle to get it mixed into the butter properly.
1. crushed ALMOND BITs
2. BISCUIT MIXTURE
3. MAKING THE COOKIES
Use whatever method you find easiest to roll 30 x 2 tablespoon balls (30 ml). The steps below depict the method I find to be the fastest to make even size cookies. Roasting is not an essential step because the cookies are lovely as is. But it does bring out the almond flavour. It’s especially good to do this if you are using almonds a little on the old side. 🙂 Tool – I prefer to use a handheld beater because you can move it around the bowl so you don’t really need to scrape the sides down. If you want to use a stand mixer, use the paddle attachment and scrape down the sides of the bowl at least twice. ⚠️ Important to ensure the egg is at room temperature as it will incorporate into the butter mixture more easily. Fridge cold egg will not mix in properly.
Then place the cookies 4 cm / 1.6″ apart on the trays. I do 15, being 3 rows of 5 cookies on each tray They don’t expand outwards that much but we want sufficient heat circulating around each cookie so they cook properly.
Matters of storage – and the most important thing
Once fully cool, store in an airtight container in the pantry, not the fridge. They stay fresh for 5 days and still very, very good at 7 days, making them excellent for…..oh, I don’t know. Selling at the counter of your hair salon? 😂 While shelf life information is useful, I know what you’re all waiting for – Irene’s review of my Cretan Biscuits! Very happy to report that she gave them a big thumbs up. 👍🏻 PHEW!!! – Nagi x
Watch how to make it
For cookie monsters
Life of Dozer
Dozer’s raincoat. Cute and practical! From Surf dog Australia. No that is not an affiliate link. 🙂
Irene’s original recipe used self raising flour (which has baking powder built in) plus a touch of baking powder. I typically prefer to use flour plus baking powder because the rising power of self raising flour can vary depending on the freshness. Old self raising flour = loss of baking powder rising ability = flat cookies and cakes = 😤I just find baking powder + regular flour to be a more reliable combination for consistency of outcome. I also reduce the bake time slightly from 25 minutes to 20 minutes which gives the cookies a paler golden colour (but still fully cooked through) so they are more similar to lovely buttery shortbread cookies. And lastly, I roasted the blanched almonds briefly to see if it improved the almond flavour and it does. So I added this into my recipe. Not a critical step but especially useful if your almonds are a little on the old side.
I just find baking powder + regular flour to be a more reliable combination for consistency of outcome. I made this recipe using US cups, Australian cups and the weights I’ve provided and there was no difference in the end result. So the difference in cup sizes does not matter for this recipe! Astute bakers may also notice that the ingredients lists “2 sticks butter” which is a US measurement for butter. This equates to 226g (being 113g per stick) which is less than the 250g listed. This is deliberate, to account for the US cups being slightly smaller.
