More cookies for the world!

The last cookies want to be eaten before the new year begins - I had to take a quick photo before they vanish: here's a short run down on the essential german christmas cookie varieties!


Let's go around the clock:

12: selfmade Schokoladeprasselplaetzchen, I posted the recipe in the last cookie letter..

1: Anise cookies - they are close to Macaroon-style cookies, with beaten egg white, but also added flower. Very dry and crunchy, and nicely anisy.

3: Cinnamon wafers - those are special, one needs optimally a special device to bake them - like for normal waffles, but heavier, making them thinner, and imprinting different pictures in them.
The recipes I saw are simple and similar to this: 250 g butter, 8 eggs, 400g flour, 400g sugar, 40g cinnamon, mix it up, put little portions into the waffle baker and bake it..

5-6: these are tiny Weihnachtsstollen! Stollen are actually big cakes with dried fruits in them, check out the wiki description, it's pretty complete.. These cookies though are the tiny modern version for people like me... I don't like Stollen.. too much dough. Too much dried fruit that got a strange texture when you bite on it.. But the cookies: one type is filled with ground poppyseeds, one with marzipan, just like the real big Stollen can be, but they are so tiny, that there is a much higher ratio of filling to dough! Lovely... :)
Stollen is typically baked weeks before christmas and stored wrapped in waxpaper in an airtight container.

7: Spritzgebaeck ("spritz" is best translated by 'squirt') - they are made with butter, sugar, eggs, and a little flour. The very creamy dough is put into a bag with tip cut off, and squirted onto a baking sheet in different simple forms (typically just circles). They are best eaten very fresh.

9: Schokolebkuchen - these are similar to little gingerbreads that are covered in dark chocolate. Also best when they are fresh, or stored well and airtight not to get very dry.

10: Anisplaetzchen - yes, another one! This one is acutally an Anisstern, i.e. anise star. Obviously. It is a hazelnut or almond macaroon, with anise sugar icing brushed on.

11: simple, classical hazelnut macaroons - best fresh out of the oven...

That complete's this years christmas cookie section - one should not need many more than these...
Hope you didn't eat too many! :)