For the last little while I have been bent on making German sweets. I am always on a hunt for good recipes, and from time to time for one reason or another, I especially get inspired with particular ethnic or regional cuisine. It is a real joy to get into depth of research, looking for signature dishes of particular culture or region. German cuisine in particularly is very close to me. I have family in Germany, and through my youth I used to spend a couple of months of my summer breaks there. I remember my first trip to Germany at the age of seven. Unbelievably thrilling, that was my first trip abroad and at the same time the longest one too. Until this trip I never traveled further than 50km away from my home, so this was a really big deal for me.
It was a hot early July as we left Dalmatia’s clear blue skies and scorching summer heat. I was wearing a white short sleeve shirt, blue shorts and sandals. My little sister was in her tiny skirt and had a broad shaped summer straw hat. We traveled all night and part of the following day to finally arrive to what I found was a shockingly cold and wet Munich. Looking through the fogged up rainy train windows I noticed a busy train station with rushing crowds of people all wearing long rain coats. As we stepped out of the train it truly felt being in a different world. I remember just looking in every one direction, amused with unexpected new environment. Where are we, why is it so cold; these were just few of the thoughts streaming through my mind then.
It was all good and eventually we managed to find our way around, locate my father and at the end of the day finally settle down in Frankfurt. That is where my dad lived and worked. Every since that time, Germany for me had its own unique smell, feel and its own flavour. Just about everything felt different: weather, people, architecture etc. Even a scent in the humid summer air had hints of moss fragrance that I inevitably linked it in my mind with Germany. Streets were clean and everything appeared extremely well structured and organized. I immediately noticed and fell in love with their Gothic alphabet. It perfectly complemented the traditional feel of their old city architecture.
Next novelty to experience was sparkling water mixed with apple juice. What a discovery, I couldn’t have enough of it! My father at the same time enjoyed his apple wine, which was weird to me. Until then I thought that wine was made exclusively from grapes. Apple wine was a truly German thing.
German bakeries were amazing with their huge selection of breads, fruit pies, sweets and cookies of all sorts. Just looking at them through the store window display would have made me salivate. Once the bakery door was open and wonderful scents entered my nostrils I was done, I had to have something. I especially loved their fruit pies; either apple, sour cherry or plums. They were all delicious!
As I said I have been developing an itch to make something from Germany. Must be all the memories making their way through. Just a few weeks ago I made their cheesecake (Käsekuchen) and a week later, Apple Cake with Vanilla Custard. They were both wonderful and tasty!
Now I wanted to make one of their delicious nut based cookie recipes. Hazelnut is one of my favorites, especially when is roasted. Germans seem to be in great love with hazelnuts too, as many of their traditional sweets are made with hazelnuts. This recipe is traditionally made for Christmas but I am sure there is no issue making it at any time of the year. It is quite unique recipe as each cookie dough round shape is first filled with a dollop of meringue mixture, containing hazelnuts and chocolate chips, and then folded in half before placing it on a baking pan. At first look it leaves impression that if left open like that, in sandwich like shape, during the baking process all the meringue will leak out and make a mess. But instead you end up with a most wonderful tasting cookie; moist, fragrant and soft, with everything held intact. It is a delicious cookie, rich and flavorful! Great companion for morning or afternoon coffee!
The recipe has been adapted from “Cinnamon & Coriander – Life is too short for bland food” blog.
| Prep Time | 30 minutes |
| Cook Time | 12 minutes |
| Passive Time | 2 hours |
| Servings |
servings
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- 3 egg whites
- 1/8 tsp sea salt
- 1/2 tsp cream of tartar
- 100 g confectioner's sugar
- 150-200 g hazelnuts toasted and coarsely chopped
- 120 g hazelnuts toasted and ground
- 100 g chocolate chips
Ingredients
Meringue Filling
|
|
- Toast the raw hazelnuts, cool and remove skin.
- In a medium size mixing bowl, add softened butter and sugar; run the mixer at high speed for 5 minutes until creamed and fluffy.
- Mix the egg in the mixture at low speed.
- Combine the rest of ingredients together and then gently fold all into a creamed butter mix. Mix by hand just until everything comes together.
- Transfer the dough to a plastic film stretched on a counter. Shape the dough into an oblong disc shape, about 20 mm (3/4") thick, wrap in a plastic film and refrigerate for 2 hours.
- In a medium size mixing bowl at high speed, mix together egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks are formed. Gradually add confectioner's sugar at low speed and then finish up at high speed with meringue looking shiny and stiff peaks.
- Combine together all the rest of the dry ingredients and then using a rubber spatula, gently fold into egg whites. Do not over mix and deflate the egg whites!
- Preheat the oven to 200 ºC (390 ºF) with rack in the middle of the oven.
- Line the baking pan with parchment paper.
- Take the dough out of fridge and let acclimatize for about 5 minutes.
- Using a rolling pin, roll the dough between two plastic films to approximately 4 mm (1/4") thickness.
- Using a 10 cm (4") cookie cutting mold, cut circular shapes in the stretched dough.
- Carefully remove one cookie dough at a time. Fill half of the shape right to the edge with healthy tablespoon of meringue mixture, fold the other dough half over, sandwich like, and place it on the parchment paper. Do not press or seal the dough ones it is filled with meringue mixture filling. Meringue should slightly peak out and it will not run out during the baking.
- Repeat the process with the rest of the cookies. Collect the dough around the edges, knead together, roll out and repeat the process until the dough is completely used up.
- Bake cookies for 12 minutes and then let cool completely on a cooling rack.
- Dust with confectioner's sugar before serving.
- hazelnuts roasting and skinning process can be found in this link to my previous blog post.
- the easiest way to create oblong disc is to loosely wrap the dough with plastic film and than using a rolling pin flatten the enclosed dough until it fills the available space within the wrap.
- hazelnuts can be substituted with walnuts, pistachios or their combination.
- chocolate chips can be substituted with chopped dried apricots, cherries, dates or cranberries.
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