Brazilian Coconut Cookies | What's Cookin' Chicago (2024)

What I miss these days is baking. I’m so looking forward to baking fresh loaves of bread, cookies, cakes, etc once the weather cools a bit. But I recently got to the point where I couldn’t hold off anymore and turned the knob to preheat my oven. I had cookies on the brain and wanted to try my hand at baking these Brazilian Coconut Cookies after enjoying some Brazilian cuisine not too long ago. These cookies are light, subtly sweet and one that will have coconut lovers wanting more. Who knew that 6 common ingredients could give you a sweet taste of South America?

If I had to describe these cookies, they’re almost like tea biscuits. In fact, I enjoyed them the most with a nice glass of iced tea. They’ll go just as well with hot tea and coffee too. I will say that the trickiest part of this recipe is making sure the sugar syrup is at the right temperature and consistency. You may be tempted to stir or even jiggle the saucepan as the sugar and water cook away but don’t! Step away and let it do it’s magic on the stovetop. Once you have the sugar syrup, flour and eggs yolks are combined and tempered with the syrup before incorporating everything together. Grated coconut and vanilla extract is introduced to create a nice cookie dough. It will be a bit warm to handle at first so allow the time for it to cool so you can shape them. I shaped them into rectangles that were then cut in half on a diagonal. Traditional recipes call for shaping the dough into a ball and flattened, so feel free to make them as round cookies if you wish. While they bake, definitely start preparing a cup of coffee, hot tea or a cool glass of iced tea. You’ll need it to fully enjoy these cookies!