Today is thew start of december and I'll be posting a christmas related post every day until christmas. This is my way of making a Advent Calendar for you. I hope you will enjoy this.

The vanilla wreath, or Vanillekranse, is a classic Danish cookie. You'll find them in tins with Danish Butter Cookies. If you like the Danish Butter Cookies, you have to make these. They are so much better.

Every year I bake cookies for christmas, and vanillekranse is always a given. In my house it’s not christmas without vanillekranse. They are one of my favorite cookies. I'm pretty sure that you'll find vanillekranse in every danish home at christmas time.

Thinking about it, I should have done my homework better, when I met my now husband. I should had made sure that my favorite christmas cookies was his too. It could have saved me from hours in the kitchen, baking ;0) Well we all have to make sacrifices, right?

I have been trough a lot of different recipes for vanillekranse, but after tasting Mette Blomsterbergs, the search was over. These are by far the best vanilekranse I have ever had. So this is Mette Blomsterbergs recipe.

Ingredients:

1 vanilla pod (or half if it's a thick one)*
200 g butter (salted and room temperature)
180 g sugar
1 egg
250 g all-purpose flour
75 g blanched** almonds, ground into flour

Directions:

Spilt the vanilla pod lengthwise and scrape out the seed with the tip of a knife. Using the knife, mix the seeds with some sugar. This helps the seeds to distribute in the dough. You want an even distribution of seeds in the dough, like small black freckles.

Cream the sugar, vanilla seeds with the butter. Mix in the egg, finally mix in the ground almonds and flour.

Put the dough into a decorationg bag with a star decorating tip. Pipe the dough in small circles approximately 2 inches (5 cm) in diameter, onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

If you have a stand mixer, a meat grinder attachment and a vanillekrans attachment to make stings of star shaped dough; you can do this instead of piping the cakes:

Chill the dough in the refrigerator overnight. Add the cold dough to the feeder on the grinder, and push it into the grinder, and long strings of star shaped dough comes out of the grinder. I do this on medium to high speed. You can also use a cookie press.

Place the strings of dough on the table, an cut them into 4 inch pieces. Join the ends to form a wreath, and place the cookies on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

Bake at 356℉ (180℃) until lightly golden about 10-14 minutes. Cool the cookies on a wire rag. Store in an airtight container at room temperature.

* You can substitute the vanilla pods with 2 teaspoons vanilla paste.

** blanched is when the skin is removed from the almonds.

The danish Version:

Vanillekranse

Ingredienser:

1 vanillestang (eller en halv polynesisk)*
200 g smør (saltet og stuetemperatur)
180 g sukker
1 æg
250 g hvedemel
75 g smuttede** mandler, malet til mel

Vaniljestangen flækkes på den lange led og kornene skrabes ud med en lille kniv. Mas vaniljekornene og lidt af sukkeret sammen med en paletkniv, således at kornene skilles ad.

Vaniljesukker, sukker og det stuetempererede smør røres sammen. Rør ægget med i og tilsæt slutteligt mandelmel og hvedemel.

Dejen kommes i en stofsprøjtepose med en stjerne tyl & sprøjtes straks ud i "kranse" på bagepapir - diameter ca. 5 cm. Bages ved 200 grader til de er let gyldne - ca. 10 - 14 minutter.
Afkøles på bagerist og opbevares i tætsluttende dåse.

* Du kan erstatte vanillestangen med 2 tsk vanille pasta

** smuttede mandler, er mandler uden den brune hinde.