Gingerbread Reindeers

One of the thing I remember from baking Christmas cookies with my mom, were making gingerbread men, women or pretty much all kinds of shapes. And the part where we got to decorate them with colorful icing. But I never thought to be this creative, turning the gingerbread man upside down, making a reindeer.

Makes a lot.

INGREDIENTS:

• 125 g butter

• 200 g dark syrup or molasses

• 150 g brown sugar

• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper

• 1 teaspoon ground ginger

• 1 teaspoon ground cardamom

• 3 teaspoon ground cinnamon

• ¼ teaspoon ground all-spice

• ¼ teaspoon ground cloves

• 2 teaspoons baking soda

• 1 egg

• 500 g all-purpose flour

Decorating:

• 150 g confectionary (powdered) sugar

• 1 egg white

• a spinkle og cream of tartar

• food coloring

DIRECTIONS:

Melt butter, syrup/molasses and brown sugar in a saucepan over medium heat. Remove from heat, and stir in baking soda and spices. Let the syrup cool down for a bit, before you add egg and flour. 

Add syrup to a stand mixer, and mix in the egg and flour and keep mixing until you have a smooth and shiny dough. 

Let the dough rest in a ziplock bag in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours, before rolling out.

Preheat the oven to 355 ℉ (180℃).

Roll out the dough on a floured surface. The dough needs to be about 0.1-0.2-inch (3-5 mm) thick. Cut out the small gingerbread men and place them on a parchment lined baking sheet. 

Bake the cookies for about 5 minutes, and let them cool completely on a wire rack.

Royal Icing: 

Put all the ingredients in the bowl of the stand mixer. Whip the icing for 2 minutes, until it has an uniform consistency and is crisp white color. It starts off with a grayish hue.

Decoration:

Decorate the gingerbread men upside down like a reindeer with brown and white icing, red mini m&m's for the nose.

Danish Shortbread Sticks

December 3th

This is a take on the traditional Danish Shortbread or Finskbrød as they are called. I really like the addition of the lemon zest, and the more modern look. Normally Danes do not like changes to their traditional food and cookies. 'It has to be exactly like my mom made it' - but some changes are for the better, like this one.

Inspired by a Blomsterberg recipe.

Makes 30.

Ingredients:

Dough:

• 200 g butter, salted, room temperature

• ½ teaspoon vanilla bean paste

• 60 confectionary (powdered) sugar

• 1 lemon, the zest of

• 275 g all-purpose flour

Topping:

• 1 egg,

• coarse raw cane sugar

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375℉ (190℃)

Mix all the ingredients until it forms a dough, be careful not to overwork the dough. Wrap the dough in plastic film, and let it rest for 30 minutes in the refrigerator.

On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough into a 6 x 12-inch (15 x 30 cm) rectangle. Transfer the cookies to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, set aside. Beat the egg, and brush a thin even layer on the dough. Sprinkle with a good amount of raw cane sugar. Gently press the sugar into the dough with the rolling pin. Put the dough into the refrigerator to chill for about 10 minutes. Cut the dough in half so you now have 2 squares 6x6-inches (15x15 cm) each. Cut each square in 14-15 long thin logs, 

Bake for 7-10 minutes, until light golden brown. Let the cookies cool on a wire rack. Store in an airtight container at room temperature.

Enjoy!

Checkerboard Cookies

Checkerboard Cookies

8th Day of Christmas.

I only make cookies one time a year, around Christmas. Well, cookies like chocolate chip cookies, will be made all year round.

I really like vanilla cookies, and my husband loves everything chocolate. So these checkerboard cookies is the perfect compromise. They are fun to make, they look fancy, and luckily they are really tasty too.

Makes 100-120 cookies

Ingredients:

Vanilla dough:

• 170 g butter, salted and room temperature

• 100 g confectionary sugar (powder sugar)

• 45 g almonds, bleached and grounded

• 1 egg yolk

• 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste

• 255 g all-purpose flour

Chocolate dough:

• 170 g butter, salted and room temperature

• 100 g confectionary sugar (powder sugar)

• 40 g almonds, bleached and grounded

• 30 g unsweetened cocoa powder, I use Valrhona

• 1 egg yolk

• ½ teaspoon vanilla bean paste

• 255 g all-purpose flour

Directions:

Vanilla dough:

Cream the butter until soft and creamy. Add the confectionery sugar, mix until fully combined, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Add the ground almonds, egg yolk, vanilla and flour, and mix until  just blended. Be careful not to over mix the dough. 

Roll the dough between two sheets of parchment paper into a large rectangle about ⅓ inch (9 mm) thick. Transfer the dough onto a baking sheet and refrigerate for a minimum of 3 hours until hardened.

Chocolate dough:

Follow the instructions for the vanilla dough. Add the cocoa with the ground almonds. Roll and chill the chocolate dough as for the vanilla dough.

Assemble the cookies:

Remove one of  the doughs from the refrigerator, peel off the paper from both sides and set the dough onto a fresh sheet of parchment. Using a sharp knife, slice the dough lengthwise into square strips about ⅓ inch (9 mm) thick. Place the dough strips in the refrigerator, while repeating the other dough.

Remove dough strips from the refrigerator. Lay a strip of vanilla dough lengthwise on the baking sheet, then lay a strip of chocolate dough next to the vanilla, another strip of vanilla  and finally another chocolate, so you now have 4 strips alternating colors. Press the three strips gently together so that they stick to one another. You can brush the sides with some diluted apricot preserve, to help the dough to glue together.

Do this with the rest of the strips, so you end up with logs of striped cookie dough.  Place the logs on top of each other, so the chocolate and vanilla alternates and you have  4x4 colors per log.

Gently press the log together on all sides. Wrap the log with plastic wrap, a place in the refrigerator.   Make more logs with the remaining dough.

Chill the logs for at least an hour before slicing.

Preheat the oven to 375℉ (190℃). Line baking sheets with parchment paper.

Slice into cookies about ¼ inch (6 mm) thick. Set the squares ½ inch (1 cm) apart on the baking sheet and bake for about 8 minutes, until the vanilla parts are lightly browned. If your oven is baking unevenly rotate the sheet halfway through. Cool on the parchment paper on a wire rack. 

Store the completely cooled cookies in an airtight container.

Enjoy!

Honey Hearts - Honningkagehjerter

Honey Hearts - Honningkagehjerter

December 5th. Second day of Christmas.

Honningkagehjerter or honey hearts, are a classic December or christmas treat. As a child I got at least one of these in my advent calendar during the month of December. Honey hearts are kinda like a gingerbread cookie, but more spongy. The chocolate adds some creaminess and sweetness. A honey heart is the taste of Christmas.

In Denmark it is the tradition to put a glossy picture of a Santa or an angel on the heart, which adds to the Christmas cheer.

You have to start up the pre-dough a little early, but the result is scrumptious, and well worth the effort. but if you want to take a shortcut make this Honey Cake instead, it's not the same thing, but a bit similar.

Makes 16-18 hearts.

Ingredients:

Pre-dough:

• 450 g honey

• 450 g all-purpose flour

Cake-dough:

• 900 g pre-dough, shredded

• 2 egg yolks

• 10 g potaske (Potassium carbonate (K₂CO₃))

• 5 g ground cinnamon

• 5 g ground ginger

• 2½ g ground ground cloves

• 2½ g ground allspice

• 1 tablespoon orange zest, grated

• 1 tablespoon water

Topping:

200 g good dark chocolate, tempered

glossy pictures or icing and sprinkles

Directions:

Pre-dough:

Pour honey in a small cooking saucepan and heat to 104-122℉ (40-50℃). Pour the warm honey into the flour and knead it until you have a smooth mixture. I did that in my stand mixer. Place the mixture in an airtight container, and place it in a cool dry place for about 4-6 weeks. The pre-dough will turn very hard. 

Cake-dough: 

Preheat the oven to 350℉ (180℃). Line 3-4 bakings sheets with parchment paper, sprayed with baking spray and lightly floured. Set aside.

Mix the egg yolks with the potaske and set aside. Shred the hard pre-dough into you bowl for the stand mixer. Mix in the egg yolks, spices and zest. Start with your mixer on low for about 3 minutes. Then increase the speed to high and keep mixing for another 3 minutes. You end up with a smooth but somewhat sticky dough. If your dough seems to dry add a little water. 

Scrape the dough out on a work surface sprinkled with good layer of flour. Sprinkle more flour on top of dough and roll dough out to about ⅕-inch (5 mm) thickness. Make sure to keep flouring your dough, so the dough doesn't stick. Using a heart-shaped cookie cutter, cut out hearts placing them on the prepared baking sheets, spacing them with about 2-inches. Keep rolling the dough and cutting out hearts until all the dough is used up.

Bake hearts for 8-10 minutes. The hearts will be done when the cookie spring back when you gently press a finger in the center of the cookies. You don't want the cookies to deflate. 

Let the hearts cool completely on a wire rack. The hearts will be crispy at this point. So to soften them up store the cookies in the refrigerator in an airtight container, with a damp towel for 3-4 days. (Place the towel, so it won't touch the hearts.) As is the hearts will keep for weeks in the refrigerator.

When ready to eat, cover the hearts with tempered chocolate. Place a glossy picture centered on the heart. Or decorate with icing and sprinkles.

Enjoy!

Gingerbread House

Gingerbread House

December 17 th.

Nothing says Christmas like a homemade gingerbread house.

Template for large gingerbreadhouse.

The recipe is from a Danish Weekly magazine

Ingredients:

• 125 g butter

• 200 g dark syrup or molasses

• 150 g brown sugar

• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper

• 1 teaspoon ground ginger

• 1 teaspoon ground cardamom

• 3 teaspoon ground cinnamon

• ¼ teaspoon ground all-spice

• ¼ teaspoon ground cloves

• 2 teaspoons baking soda

• 1 egg

• 500 g all-purpose flour

Directions:

Melt butter, syrup/molasses and brown sugar in a saucepan over medium heat. Remove from heat, and stir in baking soda and spices. Let the syrup cool down for a bit, before you add egg and flour. 

Add syrup to a stand mixer, and mix in the egg and flour and keep mixing until you have a smooth and shiny dough. 

Let the dough rest in a ziplock bag in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours, before rolling out.

Preheat the oven to 355 ℉ (180℃).

Roll out the dough on a floured surface. The dough needs to be about 0.1-0.2-inch (3-5 mm) thick. Cut out the small and large house and place them on a parchment lined baking sheet. If you want other shapes than gingerbread houses, use cookie cutters to cut them out.

Bake the cookies for about 5 minutes for cookies, and 10-12 minutes for the larger pieces for the houses.

For houses with candy windows. Bake the house-parts for 5-7 minutes, remove from the oven and fill the windows with crushed Jolly Ranchers hard candy. Bake the house for another 5 minutes until it's baked and the candy is melted and filled out the window frame. Glue the house together with royal icing or hot melted sugar. And go crazy with the decorating.

For cookies - decorate your heart out with color and sprinkles.

The Danish version:

Peberkagehus

Skabelon til et stort peberkagehus.

Opskriften er fra: Familie Journal.

Ingredienser:

• 125 g smør

• 200 g mørk sirup

• 150 g brun farin

• 1 tsk stødt sort peber

• 1 tsk stødt ingefær

• 1 tsk stødt kardemomme

• 3 tsk stødt kanel

• ¼ tsk stødt allehånde

• ¼ tsk stødt nelliker

• 2 tsk natron

• 1 æg

• 500 g hvedemel

Fremgangsmåde:

Smelt smør, sirup og farin i en tykbundet gryde. Når det er smeltet, tag gryden af varmen, rør natron og krydderier i. Lad massen køle lidt af og kom den i en stor røreskål. Tilsæt æg og mel, og bland dejen indtil den er glat. Lad dejen hvile tildækket i køleskabet, i mindst 4 timer inden den rulles ud. 

Rul dejen ud til den er ca. 4-5 mm tyk. Skær både de små og store huse ud.

Dejen bages ved 180°C fra 5 minutter til 10-12 minutter - alt afhængig af om det er små kager eller større flader til peberkagehuse.

For huse med "glasvinduer" bages husdelen først 5-6 minutte, tag dem ud af ovnen og fyld vinduesrammen ud med knust bolche. Bag husdelen videre i 5 minutter, indtil bolchet er smeltet ud i vinduesrammen og kagen er gennembagt. Lim huset sammen med royal icing og dekorer som du lyster. 

Kager dekoreres med glasur og sprinkles.