By Yossy Arefi
- Total Time
- 40 minutes, plus cooling
- Rating
- 4(712)
- Notes
- Read community notes
Pleasantly bitter tahini and rich, sweet dulce de leche make a perfect pair in these charming little cookies. The tahini gives the baked dough a fudgy, halvahlike texture and flavor, and a chewiness that’s totally irresistible. Top the dulce de leche centers with a sprinkle of flaky salt for sweet-salty perfection in each bite. These cookies are also excellent filled with a dollop of raspberry jam in place of the dulce de leche.
Featured in: 24 Days of Cookies
or to save this recipe.
Print Options
Include recipe photo
Advertisem*nt
Ingredients
Yield:About 28 cookies
- 1⅓cups/170 grams all-purpose flour
- ½teaspoon baking powder
- ¼teaspoon baking soda
- ½packed cup plus 2 tablespoons/130 grams light brown sugar
- 6tablespoons/85 grams unsalted butter, softened
- ¾cup/200 grams tahini, stirred well
- 1large egg plus 1 large egg yolk, at room temperature
- 2teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- ½teaspoon fine sea salt
- Heaping ½ cup/180 grams dulce de leche, store-bought or homemade
- Flaky salt
Ingredient Substitution Guide
Nutritional analysis per serving (28 servings)
145 calories; 7 grams fat; 3 grams saturated fat; 0 grams trans fat; 2 grams monounsaturated fat; 2 grams polyunsaturated fat; 18 grams carbohydrates; 1 gram dietary fiber; 12 grams sugars; 3 grams protein; 79 milligrams sodium
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
Powered by
Preparation
Step
1
Place racks in the upper and lower thirds of an oven and heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 sheet pans with parchment paper.
Step
2
In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and baking soda, and set aside.
Step
3
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer, cream together the sugar and butter on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the tahini and mix on medium speed until well combined, stopping to scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl as needed with a rubber spatula.
Step
4
Add the egg, egg yolk, vanilla extract and salt to the butter-tahini mixture, and mix on medium speed until emulsified, about 1 minute. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl to ensure the dough is evenly mixed.
Step
5
Add the flour mixture, and mix on low speed until just combined and no streaks of flour remain. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl to ensure the dough is evenly mixed.
Step
6
Roll the cookies into tablespoon-size balls and place them on the baking sheets about 2 inches apart.
Step
7
Bake the cookies for 7 minutes, then remove them from the oven and very carefully use your thumb or the handle of a wooden spoon to make a teaspoon-size indent in the center of each cookie. The cookies will crack slightly along the edges; that’s OK. Return the cookies to the oven, rotating the pans from front to back and top to bottom. Bake until the cookies are set and just barely golden at the edges, another 5 to 7 minutes. Set the pans on cooling racks and press on the indentations slightly if they have puffed up during the baking process. Let the cookies cool for 10 minutes.
Step
8
Use a small spoon or pastry bag to fill the indentation of each cookie with about 1 teaspoon of dulce de leche, and sprinkle with flaky salt, if using. Let cool completely on the pans. Store in a single layer in an airtight container for up to 5 days.
Ratings
4
out of 5
712
user ratings
Your rating
or to rate this recipe.
Have you cooked this?
or to mark this recipe as cooked.
Private Notes
Leave a Private Note on this recipe and see it here.
Cooking Notes
Mouse
Has anyone tried these with GF flour? If so, did it work?
Peter _ Chiicago
The dough was very oily for me -- press on. They turn out just fine
Elaine
Should be great with Nutella as a filling.
monique leana
Worked beautifully with sour cherry jam - get the one with whole cherries in it - to balance the cookie sweetness. Delicious!
heather
Greek tahini can be quite bitter. Israeli tahini is not so bitter.
Cristina S
I thought they were delish…sprinkled a little sea salt on top and that was just right.
stompandshout
Pipe the dulce de leche as a Hershey’s kiss shape and suddenly it’s a peanut butter blossom cookie illusion. These were incredibly easy and straightforward but came out elegant AF and bake shop worthy.
Cindy
These were amazing. I made 3 versions, one as written with the caramel and 2 with Hershey chocolate kisses in the middle. Dark and milk chocolate. Just pop them in the center after the first 7 minutes of baking. The chocolate ones were the crowd favorite! Also did not add the extra 2 T of sugar. Just the half cup since my tahini paste was very fresh with little bitterness.
Elizabeth
I love tahini but it made for a dull cookie here, and the dulce de leche was an almost sickly sweet contrast. Unfortunately I didn’t love these and don’t think I’d make again. If I did, homemade dulce de leche might help, and I’d make the cookies half the size. One final note: I weighed out my tahini, and I think 200 grams would have been far too much! 3/4 C came out to about 125 grams for me.
Emelinaqueen
Did you use fresh tahini? It can go rancid quickly
Alia
Like another commenter, my dough was very oily. I had to squeeze it to form balls. Rolling it just made the dough fall apart. But these taste delicious-Like caramel halva.
Al Daigen
How do you store 28 cookies in a single layer? Even if you've eaten 8 immediately, it's a strange container that would store 20 cookies side by side. Or do all cookie bakers except me own very flat, wide containers?
Christy
I made these with Bob’s Red Mill gluten free 1:1 flour and they came out perfectly fine.
Kate
These were a party favorite. Instead of dulce do leche, I used Girl Meets Dirt Pears and Bay Preserves and it paired so well with the tahini.
Mark W
A twist on the peanut butter blossom, and a good one. Tahini was a nice change from peanut butter and the dulce de leche a nice compliment. I used 3/4 cup, which weighed out to 185g, so a little less than the 200g in the recipe. Not much of a difference, but that amount seemed perfectly sufficient. Otherwise stuck perfectly to the recipe and baking instructions and turned out great!
adds
Delicious with rhubarb compote. Probably other jam. Can cut sugar
djm
I disagree with a lot of the posters here. Maybe it’s having grown up with tahini as a staple and eating lots of halva but the combo of brown sugar, butter and tahini in the dough was absolutely sensational! It amped it up the flavor for sure. The dulce (I used canned) was nice and I found the cookie to be moist, tasty and not overly sweet. Also was a breeze to make and they look gorgeous!
CJS
Yum!! Unique combination of flavors. I accidentally overbaked my last pan -- they were well-browned and crisp but not quite burnt. The extra texture was a sublime contrast to the dulce de leche. I forgot the salt on my first tray and they were a little bland. Used pink salt on the remaining and they were perfect!
Chloé
Made the cookies as instructed but filled with semi sweet chocolate filling instead of dulce de leche. This suits my palette better and allows the cookies to be stored in multiple layers. They turned out really good! Next time I would add a touch more sugar to the batter. Semi sweet chocolate filling:4 oz chopped semi sweet chocolate 4 tbsp butter1.5 tsp agave or honeyMicrowave in 30 second intervals until melted. Stir between each interval
hh
Loved these!! Made my own dulce de leche by simmering a can of sweetened condensed milk fully submerged for 2.5 hours—it’s foolproof!
Theresa
The cookie dough was full of oil, and I had mixed the tahini well. The dulce de Leche melts at room temperature, so I had to refrigerate the cookies. Frankly, I thought regular peanut putter would have worked better, and a jam filling. I will not make these again.
Ginny
I made these as stated in the recipe. While they were good, I didn't think they were much different than pnut butter blossoms. Since tahini is quite a bit more expensive, my opinion is that it wasn't worth the extra money to make them with tahini as opposed to pnut butter.
Lila
Couldn’t find dulce de leche so I chopped up a chocolate bar (Lindt intense orange) and mixed it in the batter. Delicious!
R
Eggless - tried with egg replacer, slightly more crispy than fudgy still good thought.Next time replace with apple butter or apple sauce
R
Absolutely delicious!Tahini I used says it’s made from toasted sesame seeds (villa jerada brand)I think this recipe can be made by hand, as long as you can cream sugar and butter together in the beginning.I store them one on top of another! They don’t clump together like I had thought.
Trudy I
These were good but not great. I’ll try the Salted Tahini Chocolate Chip recipe on NYT next, but the Half Baked Harvest salted tahini cookies are easier and better than this recipe.
Hinda
Zack said these are good.He made dulce de leche from condensed milk
Private notes are only visible to you.
