I have loved butterhorns for years, especially the ones from Starbucks.  Probably because of all that butter and cinnamon.  They are flaky, buttery, sweet, and pie-crusty.  What’s not to love about them?

But I had never tried making them before today.  Shout out to my faux-cousin Lauren and also to Facebook’s “On this day” app for showing me a flashback of a few years ago where Lauren tagged me in a post asking me if I had a good butterhorn recipe.  I did not at the time.   When this popped up on my feed a couple of days ago, I made it my business to go about getting one.

These butterhorns are deceptively simple for how complicated they look and seem.  There is a two hour chilling time required, but very little work involved, especially if you own a food processor.

I’d say I spent about 15 minutes total making these if you don’t count the chilling time and baking time.  Well worth it in my opinion.

This recipe made a ton of cookies too.  I made them to have tea with my mom and sister, but there will be many leftover.

My husband is going to have some very happy co-workers tomorrow.

These would be the perfect pastry addition to a brunch or shower, but are also a great cookie to make “just because” and have with a cuppa tea or coffee.

Recipe adapted from FOODjimoto

Enjoy!

Ingredients:

Dough:
2 cups flour
2 sticks (1 cup) of cold butter, cut into one inch cubes
1 egg yolk
3/4 cups sour cream
1/8 teaspoon salt

Filling:
3/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon

Glaze:
2 cups powdered sugar
4-6 tablespoons milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:
Place your cold, chopped butter and your flour and salt into a food processor fitted with a blade, and pulse for about 15 seconds, until butter is cut into the flour and you have pea sized lumps. (If you don’t own a food processor, you can cut the butter into the flour and salt with a fork or pastry cutter)

Add the sour cream and egg yolk, and pulse for 15-20 more seconds until large chunks of dough form . You don’t need it to be one large ball, just large chunks.  (If you don’t have a food processor, you can stir in the egg yolk and sour cream gently until combined.)

Divide the dough into 5 equal parts, wrap in plastic wrap and chill for at least two hours.  You cannot skip this step, the dough must be well chilled to get a flaky pastry.

When dough has chilled, preheat the oven to 375° and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.  On a lightly floured surface (parchment paper if you have it) roll out each ball, one at a time, into an 11 inch circle, keeping the other balls in the fridge until you are ready for them.

Once you have an 11 inch circle, use a pizza cutter or a knife to cut the circle like a pizza, into 8 equal sections. Sprinkle on each circle about 2 tablespoons of cinnamon sugar mixture. Starting at the widest end, roll each one tightly up to the point, and place onto your prepared baking sheet, bending it slightly into a crescent shape.

These do not spread much at all so you can place them quite close together.

Bake for 25-30 minutes until the edges are slightly browned.  Remove from oven and place on a cooling rack with paper underneath (to avoid messiness).  Mix your glaze ingredients together until smooth, and dip the top of each warm cookie into your glaze, placing it back onto the baking rack to cool.

Serve warm or cool and store in an airtight container.