Nativity recipes
Jan. 8th, 2009 11:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elvenjaneiteAs requested by several people.
Springerle (originally from Festive Cookies of Christmas)
4 eggs
2 c sugar
1 t anise extract
¼ t baking powder
grated peel of ½ lemon
4 c cake flour
4 t anise seed
Beat eggs until thick and lemon colored. Gradually add sugar, beat until mixture is almost white and thick enough to ribbon. Add anise, lemon peel, and baking powder. Gradually add sifted cake flour. Dough should be very firm. Add a little flour if necessary. Chill at least 2 hours (and usually more like overnight).
Dust wooden mold (Springerle have special carved wooden molds. You can get them individually or on a rolling pin. The rolling pin is faster but leads to great aggravation for everyone involved.) with cornstarch, tap off excess. Be sure it’s dusted, but also be sure that it doesn’t have too much cornstarch or flour in the cracks or else the mold won’t come out. It’s actually been a couple of years since I’ve been involved in making these, but I’d say err on the side of too little cornstarch/flour because this dough isn’t very very sticky (or shouldn’t be) and you do want the picture to turn out. Turn dough onto lightly-floured board, roll to ¼ inch thickness. Press molds into dough, bearing down firmly and evenly. Cut cookies apart with a floured knife (I think we just always use a sharp kitchen one and don’t bother about the flouring). Place on cookie sheet which has been greesed and sprinkled with anise seed, about 1 inch apart. Cover with a tea towel, let stand in a cool place overnight.
The next morning, place in a 375 degree oven; immediately turn it down to 300 degrees. Bake for 15 minutes. Cool on cake racks (in my handwritten copy of the recipe I somehow combined these two so that it says “cool on rakes.” Erm.). Store in airtight containers. Keeps for months. We have, on occasion, eaten Christmas Springerle the next fall. These are very hard cookies and excellent for dunking in tea or coffee. Or hot chocolate.
Stollen (originally from The Cooking of Germany)
Italicized ingredients can be omitted if desired.
1 c dried currents
1 c golden raisins
1 c mixed candied citrus peel
¼ c candied angelica, diced
½ c candied cherries, halved
½ c rum
¼ c lukewarm water
2 pkgs (T) yeast
¾ c sugar
5 ½ c + 2 T all-purpose flour
1 c milk
½ t salt
½ t freshly grated lemon peel
2 eggs at room temperature
¾ c unsalted butter, cut into bits [this year we used ½ cup of butter, ¼ c margarine left over from something else]
8 T melted unsalted butter (This is approximate. If you commonly dab your rising bread with bits of softened butter, or turn it over in a greased bowl, you really only need 2 T melted butter.)
1 c blanched slivered almonds [since we had both almond paste and almond extract this year, we left this out]
1 can almond paste
¼ c powdered sugar, sifted
Combine fruit and candied stuff in bowl. Pour rum over, soak for at least 1 hour. We usually just do candied cherries. This year it was ½ c, but I’d increase that a bit next year. Of course, I like candied cherries. We also didn’t do the rum because Stollen is flavorful enough without it.
Prepare the yeast by dissolving it in lukewarm water with a pinch of sugar.
Drain fruit, reserving the rum, pat dry. Place candied fruit in a bowl, sprinkle with 1 T flour, turn about with spoon until flour is absorbed. Set aside. (You may want a bit more than 1 T flour—I put too much in but I’d say you want it to actually stop being absorbed.) Set aside.
In a heavy saucepan, combine milk, ½ c sugar, and salt. Heat to lukewarm, stirring constantly until sugar dissolves. Take off heat, stir in almond extract, lemon peel. [This next bit is the way I did it this year and everyone agreed the Stollen was excellent. So.] Pour milk mixture then yeast mixture into large mixing bowl. If you have an upright mixer, I’d use it. Mix well.
Add about 4 c of flour, mixing after every cup or so. Add the eggs and the ¾ c unsalted butter. Let rest ten minutes. Add enough more flour to make a sticky dough, keeping in mind that you’ll be kneading in at least ½ more cup. [End my method.]
Turn out dough onto board with ½ c flour. Knead until dough is worked into flour. If necessary add more flour. This is where prior bread experience is handy. It should make a nice elastic dough. At some point in the kneading, press fruit into dough about ½ c at a time, knead it in but be careful not to overhandle as it will discolor the dough. (This is why you flour the fruit earlier.)
Coat deep bowl with 1 t melted butter, drop in dough. Brush top with 2 t melted butter. (Or grease your bowl with non-melted butter or what have you, drop in the dough, wiggle it about a bit and turn it over.) Cover, set in a warm place for 2 hours or until dough doubles.
Punch dough down and divide in two equal parts. Let rest for 10 min. Roll out into strips 12” long, 8” wide, ½” thick. Brush with 2 T melted butter and sprinkle with 2 T sugar. Fold strips lengthwise by bringing one long side over to center of strip; press down edge lightly. [If you are doing almond paste, before folding the Stollen over, roll the paste out into a cylinder about ½ in thick. Put it in the middle of the rolled out dough and fold the dough over, sealing in the almond paste.] Fold other long side across it, overlapping seam by 1 inch. Press edge gently (or not gently—you don’t want it springing up) to keep in place. Taper ends of loaf slightly. Should be about 3 ½-4 inches wide and 13 inches long. Place on greased cookie sheet, let rise until double. Bake at 300 until golden brown and crusty, about 45 minutes. You can brush with melted butter and sprinkle with granulated sugar to help seal the bread and keep it soft. Just before serving, sprinkle with sifted powdered sugar.
Lebkuchen (Betty Crocker Christmas)
½ c honey
½ c molasses
¾ c packed brown sugar
1 egg
1 t lemon peel, grated finely
1 T lemon juice
2 ¾ c flour
1 t ground allspice
1 t ground cinnamon
1 t ground cloves
1 t ground nutmeg
½ t baking soda
1/3 c cut-up citron
1/3 c chopped nuts [We like our Lebkuchen plain and leave out the citron and nuts. You can decorate the cookies with almond slivers though.]
For glaze:
1 c sugar
½ c water
Mix honey and molasses in saucepan. Beat to boiling, remove from heat. Stir in brown sugar, lemon peel, egg, and lemon juice. Stir in next 8 ingredients (or 6 if you’re leaving out the citron and nuts). Cover, refrigerate at least 8 hours.
Heat oven to 400 degrees. Roll about ¼ dough at a time to ¼ inch thick on a floured surface. Cut into rectangles or circles [circles for me]. Place about 1 inch apart on greased cookie sheet. Bake until no indentation remains when lightly touched, 10-12 minutes. Brush glaze over cookies.
Mix 1 c sugar, ½ c water in a sauce pan. Cook over medium heat (do I need to add stirring constantly?) to 230 degrees, remove from heat. Stir in ¼ c powdered sugar. If it becomes sugar while you’re brushing the cookies, heat slightly and add a little water until it’s clear again.
Springerle (originally from Festive Cookies of Christmas)
4 eggs
2 c sugar
1 t anise extract
¼ t baking powder
grated peel of ½ lemon
4 c cake flour
4 t anise seed
Beat eggs until thick and lemon colored. Gradually add sugar, beat until mixture is almost white and thick enough to ribbon. Add anise, lemon peel, and baking powder. Gradually add sifted cake flour. Dough should be very firm. Add a little flour if necessary. Chill at least 2 hours (and usually more like overnight).
Dust wooden mold (Springerle have special carved wooden molds. You can get them individually or on a rolling pin. The rolling pin is faster but leads to great aggravation for everyone involved.) with cornstarch, tap off excess. Be sure it’s dusted, but also be sure that it doesn’t have too much cornstarch or flour in the cracks or else the mold won’t come out. It’s actually been a couple of years since I’ve been involved in making these, but I’d say err on the side of too little cornstarch/flour because this dough isn’t very very sticky (or shouldn’t be) and you do want the picture to turn out. Turn dough onto lightly-floured board, roll to ¼ inch thickness. Press molds into dough, bearing down firmly and evenly. Cut cookies apart with a floured knife (I think we just always use a sharp kitchen one and don’t bother about the flouring). Place on cookie sheet which has been greesed and sprinkled with anise seed, about 1 inch apart. Cover with a tea towel, let stand in a cool place overnight.
The next morning, place in a 375 degree oven; immediately turn it down to 300 degrees. Bake for 15 minutes. Cool on cake racks (in my handwritten copy of the recipe I somehow combined these two so that it says “cool on rakes.” Erm.). Store in airtight containers. Keeps for months. We have, on occasion, eaten Christmas Springerle the next fall. These are very hard cookies and excellent for dunking in tea or coffee. Or hot chocolate.
Stollen (originally from The Cooking of Germany)
Italicized ingredients can be omitted if desired.
1 c dried currents
1 c golden raisins
1 c mixed candied citrus peel
¼ c candied angelica, diced
½ c candied cherries, halved
½ c rum
¼ c lukewarm water
2 pkgs (T) yeast
¾ c sugar
5 ½ c + 2 T all-purpose flour
1 c milk
½ t salt
½ t freshly grated lemon peel
2 eggs at room temperature
¾ c unsalted butter, cut into bits [this year we used ½ cup of butter, ¼ c margarine left over from something else]
8 T melted unsalted butter (This is approximate. If you commonly dab your rising bread with bits of softened butter, or turn it over in a greased bowl, you really only need 2 T melted butter.)
1 c blanched slivered almonds [since we had both almond paste and almond extract this year, we left this out]
1 can almond paste
¼ c powdered sugar, sifted
Combine fruit and candied stuff in bowl. Pour rum over, soak for at least 1 hour. We usually just do candied cherries. This year it was ½ c, but I’d increase that a bit next year. Of course, I like candied cherries. We also didn’t do the rum because Stollen is flavorful enough without it.
Prepare the yeast by dissolving it in lukewarm water with a pinch of sugar.
Drain fruit, reserving the rum, pat dry. Place candied fruit in a bowl, sprinkle with 1 T flour, turn about with spoon until flour is absorbed. Set aside. (You may want a bit more than 1 T flour—I put too much in but I’d say you want it to actually stop being absorbed.) Set aside.
In a heavy saucepan, combine milk, ½ c sugar, and salt. Heat to lukewarm, stirring constantly until sugar dissolves. Take off heat, stir in almond extract, lemon peel. [This next bit is the way I did it this year and everyone agreed the Stollen was excellent. So.] Pour milk mixture then yeast mixture into large mixing bowl. If you have an upright mixer, I’d use it. Mix well.
Add about 4 c of flour, mixing after every cup or so. Add the eggs and the ¾ c unsalted butter. Let rest ten minutes. Add enough more flour to make a sticky dough, keeping in mind that you’ll be kneading in at least ½ more cup. [End my method.]
Turn out dough onto board with ½ c flour. Knead until dough is worked into flour. If necessary add more flour. This is where prior bread experience is handy. It should make a nice elastic dough. At some point in the kneading, press fruit into dough about ½ c at a time, knead it in but be careful not to overhandle as it will discolor the dough. (This is why you flour the fruit earlier.)
Coat deep bowl with 1 t melted butter, drop in dough. Brush top with 2 t melted butter. (Or grease your bowl with non-melted butter or what have you, drop in the dough, wiggle it about a bit and turn it over.) Cover, set in a warm place for 2 hours or until dough doubles.
Punch dough down and divide in two equal parts. Let rest for 10 min. Roll out into strips 12” long, 8” wide, ½” thick. Brush with 2 T melted butter and sprinkle with 2 T sugar. Fold strips lengthwise by bringing one long side over to center of strip; press down edge lightly. [If you are doing almond paste, before folding the Stollen over, roll the paste out into a cylinder about ½ in thick. Put it in the middle of the rolled out dough and fold the dough over, sealing in the almond paste.] Fold other long side across it, overlapping seam by 1 inch. Press edge gently (or not gently—you don’t want it springing up) to keep in place. Taper ends of loaf slightly. Should be about 3 ½-4 inches wide and 13 inches long. Place on greased cookie sheet, let rise until double. Bake at 300 until golden brown and crusty, about 45 minutes. You can brush with melted butter and sprinkle with granulated sugar to help seal the bread and keep it soft. Just before serving, sprinkle with sifted powdered sugar.
Lebkuchen (Betty Crocker Christmas)
½ c honey
½ c molasses
¾ c packed brown sugar
1 egg
1 t lemon peel, grated finely
1 T lemon juice
2 ¾ c flour
1 t ground allspice
1 t ground cinnamon
1 t ground cloves
1 t ground nutmeg
½ t baking soda
1/3 c cut-up citron
1/3 c chopped nuts [We like our Lebkuchen plain and leave out the citron and nuts. You can decorate the cookies with almond slivers though.]
For glaze:
1 c sugar
½ c water
Mix honey and molasses in saucepan. Beat to boiling, remove from heat. Stir in brown sugar, lemon peel, egg, and lemon juice. Stir in next 8 ingredients (or 6 if you’re leaving out the citron and nuts). Cover, refrigerate at least 8 hours.
Heat oven to 400 degrees. Roll about ¼ dough at a time to ¼ inch thick on a floured surface. Cut into rectangles or circles [circles for me]. Place about 1 inch apart on greased cookie sheet. Bake until no indentation remains when lightly touched, 10-12 minutes. Brush glaze over cookies.
Mix 1 c sugar, ½ c water in a sauce pan. Cook over medium heat (do I need to add stirring constantly?) to 230 degrees, remove from heat. Stir in ¼ c powdered sugar. If it becomes sugar while you’re brushing the cookies, heat slightly and add a little water until it’s clear again.
