Guyuria, pronounced guw-dzu-ree-ya, used to be jawbreaker-hard way back when. In fact, they are called jawbreaker cookies. Adding butter to the flour and coconut milk dough makes these cookies crunchy so you don't break your teef, or teeth.
If you want to spend hours in your kitchen, enjoying a rainy or snowed-in day, or if you want to get back to your island roots, make guyuria. The recipe is listed in the "step-by-step" link below and is also available in A Taste of Guam. This recipe was handed down from my grandma Cabe to my mom to me.
This guyuria recipe yields about 11, slightly over-flowing cups of guyuria; pieces avearge an inch long and about a 1/2-inch in diameter. In total, the batch fills 2 1/3-gallon freezer bags or about 7 lb. 11 oz of finished guyuria.
Since the publication of A Taste of Guam, I have fried the guyuria dough in coconut oil instead of vegetable oil. It's even better as the cookies have a stronger coconut scent and flavor. I've also frozen some of the dough in small discs because sometimes 5 pounds of flour is just too much to fry at one sitting. Once thawed, the dough rolls just as nice as when freshly made. The resulting cookies, to me, seem even more crunchy.
from a fan: "BTW.....got both your books on amazon. Made the guyuria....awesome! Can't wait to make the empanadas!"
from a fan: "My family always wants me to make the Guyuria now and the chocolate cookies which I will be making again for October, Sinajana Fiesta in Killeen, Texas. Like I said.. It's a BIG hit!"
Effective March 2021, PaulaQ will begin replacing Canola and vegetable/seed oils in recipes with pure lard from Reverence Farm, coconut oil, and avocado oil.
