Thursday, December 15, 2011

Operation Rolling Pin is GO

In an effort to induce an attack of Christmas Spirit ™ , I started Christmas baking yesterday - code name Operation Rolling Pin.

Christmas baking


So, I grabbed the biscuit cutters, a recipe for Linzer Sterne and cranked some seasonally appropriate music and I was off and running baking.

Linzer Sterne dough is wet and a bit of a challenge to work with, but with enough flour on the pin, it rolls out eventually.

dough

A dollop of Rote Johannisbeere Gelle (red currant jelly/jam) and creative hole making with the apple corer and in the oven for 18 minutes.

A quick dusting of icing sugar, being careful to avoid the jam centres and you are DONE. Package nicely and give away.

Linzer Sterne

Recipe as follows:

Linzer Sterne
Source: Brigette.de

Yield: recipe says 75, but I only managed to get about 60

Ingredients:
250g plain flour (plus extra for rolling out dough)
0.5 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
150g sugar
1 pinch of salt
lemon zest from 0.5 unprocessed/organic lemon
200g almond meal
1 tsp cinnamon
1 knife tip (ie less than a pinch) ground cloves
1 knife tip ground nutmeg
250g margarine
175g red currant jam
icing sugar for dusting

Method:
Mix flour and baking powder.

Add eggs, sugar, salt, lemon zest, almond meal, spices and margarine and mix to a smooth dough.

Wrap the dough in cling film and refrigerate for an hour.

Heat the oven to 175 deg C (or 150 deg C fan forced)

Roll the dough out thinly on a WELL FLOURED surface. (This step may induce rage)

Cut star shapes. In half of the stars cut a hole in the centre (I used an apple corer). Dollop red current jam on the stars without holes and place the hole-y stars on the top and gently press the two stars together.

Place the stars on a prepared baking tray and put into the oven and bake for around 18 minutes.

Allow to cool and then dust with icing sugar (avoid the jam holes).

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.

...up next: Cranberry Kipferln.








7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think we need to run the cooky-cutter algorithm through some linear optimisation

Rute said...

I´ll run the same program this weekend...

they look delicous!

pyjamamel said...

gorgeous! Bet the kitchen smelt wonderful!

Kate said...

What beautiful gifts! May I ask what is almond meal? I have never been successful at baking, but I'm a "mean" cook, and I'd like to try these!!

Kate said...

All I had to do was "google" it and found the definition of almond meal. Wonder if I can find it here; will call some gourmet shops.

Helen said...

@YMBFA - I'm a very free-form star cutter-outer. Optimisation algorithm be damed.

@Rute - good luck with your baking.

@pyjamamel - HI! Yes, the kitchen smelt great. I hope all is going swimmingly with your new little one.

@Kate - good luck with the baking. As you probably already know - almond meal also goes by the name of almond flour/ground almond. My only advice would be to be generous with the flour when rolling the dough out - it is really sticky/wet.

Anonymous said...

Scoffed the lot (almost) in a very linearly optimisational manner.
Yummy! Girl done good.