Grandma's Hamantaschen Recipe

Haman, legend has it, was a bad guy who wore a bad hat. He is remembered and reviled on the holiday Purim in story, song and snack. Rare is the leader — good or bad — who has a pastry named for his hat. Haman's crime (plotting to do in ancient Persia's Jews) figures in a complicated plot retold in a complicated story called the megillah, synonym for complicated. His hat kept it simple: a neat triangle, now neatly tied to treachery.At Purim we read the megillah, we tell the story of bad Haman and his bad hat. We fold circles of dough over prune or poppy-seed or apricot filling, shaping glistening, buttery triangles, which are not bad at all. In fact, they're delicious. Which might explain the enduring power of the whole megillah.This recipe is adapted from my grandmother, Etta Hoffmann and was originally published in The Chicago Tribune.