What a wonderful autumn is this one. And today was a perfect holiday - a day of giving and thanking the ones, who make our lives different ... in a very inspiring and magical way.
Traditions are sculpted by the memories of the people. For some traditions is particularly easy to cross time and geographical borders, because of the taste. The well known gingerbread houses today are the young ancestors of the lebkuchen houses, born in Germany two hundred years ago, when Brothers Grimm wrote "Hansel and Gretel". German bakers were inspired by the descriptive story and freed their imagination into baking differently shaped and coloured small and big delicious houses. Decorated with candies, small cookies, chocolate pieces and lots of icing, the houses are extremely appealing not only because of their whimsical appearance, but because of the heavenly aroma of the spices as well. Make this in advance and you will have Christmas feeling all season long. I chose to bake lebkuchen houses because of the variety of spices used in the recipe . My houses are gently decorated with white royal icing and I did not use any candies. I like this way of decor...
This is the classic recipe for Christmas Cookies from old Germany, or Switzerland (if you'd prefer). A recipe, I was hoping to find for a long time. Thanks to Sara Kelly Iaia and her fine memories, collected in the book "Festive Baking", I am happy to bake the first cookies for this Christmas. The honey and the quantity of the fragrant spices make these cookies unique. I would advise not to skip any of the spices or to change their quantity. I am pretty conservative when it comes to perfumed spices. I think the simpler ingredients make one dish tastier. But here, the spices are in perfect unison. for the cookies: 490 g all purpose flour 1 tsp baking soda 1 tsp baking powder 1 Tbsp cinnamon 1 tsp cardamom 1/2 tsp ground cloves 1/2 tsp powdered anise 1/2 tsp grated nutmeg 1/2 tsp ginger 225 g honey 160 g light brown sugar 134 g unsalted butter 1 large egg 1. Sift the flour in a bowl. 2. In another bowl, sift all...
adapted from the recipe of Christophe Felder for the brioche: 250 g flour 30 g sugar 1 tsp salt 3 g dry yeast 3 large eggs 130 g butter, softened 1 egg, beaten, for the wash 1. Scale the flour, sugar and salt in a bowl. 2. Add the yeast. 3. Add the eggs and knead to form a dough. 4. Add the butter piece by piece until well incorporated. 5. Cover with foil and refrigerate for 2 hours. for the huney-almond paste: 100 g honey 80 g butter 80 g sliced blanched almonds 1. Heat the honey and butter in a pan. Let it cook for about 10 seconds. 2. Add the almonds and stir to coat. Set aside to cool. Tailoring: 1. Preheat the oven to 180 C. 2. Take the brioche out of the fridge. Roll the dough 6 mm thick. 3. Using 8 cm round cutter, cut out the rolled dough in small brioches. Let them rise for 2 hours. 4. Give each brioche an egg wash. Spread a teaspoon of the honey mixture on top of every brioche. 5. Bake for about 10 min. Transfer on a wire rack to co...
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