Today we’re sharing our mom’s traditional Croatian dessert recipe for making delicious coconut crescent moon cookies (aka kiflice) with an option to also make pretty bow-shapes using the same dough.
Coconut Crescent Cookies
These tasty cookies are made by first melting the butter on the stove top and then gradually adding the additional ingredients until worked in to a cookie dough. It’s important to move the butter off the stove top and allow it to cool to a warm temperature before mixing.
Although the prepared dough is typically formed into crescent moon shapes (also known as kiflice in Croatian), we also like to change things up and form half the batch in to pretty bow shapes. Once removed from the oven, they are coated with a light dusting of icing and vanilla sugar and can immediately be enjoyed!
Coconut Crescent Moon Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup butter melted
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 1 tbsp baking powder
- 2 eggs
- 2 cups fine coconut shavings semi-sweet or unsweetened
- 3 ½ cups all purpose flour
Sugar Coating
- 1 cup icing sugar
- 2 tbsp vanilla sugar
Instructions
- Place cold butter in a medium sized saucepan and melt on low temperature on the stove.
- Once melted, remove from heat and let it cool down to a warm temperature before proceeding.
- Add sugar when butter is warm (not hot) and mix until sugar is well combined.
- Add eggs and continue to mix.
- Add baking powder and continue to mix.
- Transfer to a large mixing bowl.
- Add coconut and stir together.
- Add flour and continue to stir together.
- Work into a dough.
- Remove from bowl and continue kneading by hand.
- Divide dough in half to make two different shaped cookies.
For moon-shaped cookies
- Break off ½ tbsp size of dough and roll into a ball in your hands. Next, roll the ball into a line with your hands on a flat surface. Taper the ends and gently fold into a crecent shape.
For bow-shaped cookies
- Break off ½ tbsp size of dough and roll into a ball in your hands. Next, roll the ball into a line with your hands on a flat surface. Press both ends gently with a fork to resemble a bow.
- Line baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Bake at 355F for 15 minutes.
- Leave for 5 minutes to cool.
- Prepare mixture of powdered sugar and vanilla sugar.
- Dip cookies into sugar mixture and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
Nutrition
Other Croatian Dessert Recipes
If you’d like to try some other classic Croatian baking, here are some more tasty traditional dessert recipes:
- Croatian skoljkice shell cookies
- Croatian kiflice (jam filled crescent cookies)
- Jam filled linzer cookies
- Palačinke rolls
Croatian Skoljkice Shell Cookies 
Jam Filled Crescent Cookies 
Jam Filled Linzer Cookies 
Classic Palačinke
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