Thursday, September 8, 2011

Lebkuchen- German Spiced Cookies

Don't you just hate it when you find a recipe that you're excited to try out, so you take all the effort to make it, and it turns out great.....



..... only to realise that you never really liked that particular type of food in the first place?

Or I could be the only strange one who does that.

But it's happened to me a couple of times!


I was recently sent a copy of Baked and Delicious in the mail, much to my excitement, which came with a set of beautiful brightly coloured silicon muffin cups! I don't own much silicon bakeware (infact, I'm pretty sure the only bit of silicon in my kitchen is my silicon spatula!) but I love the colours! The magazine itself is formatted like a thin cookbook, with bright pages of delicious baked goods and detailed step by step instructions for some recipes.

There were quite a lot of recipes I wanted to try, but I was most intrigued by the Lebkuchen (German spiced cookies). The cookies contained an acceptable butter content (by my standards), and I thought the large amount of honey would make for a great tasting cookie.



It was only when I was halfway through making the batter, that I realised I didn't have enough honey so I did a quick google search of other lebkuchen recipes and ended up making a substitution of some sugar and an egg. The recipe I've included at the end of the post is the original recipe I had intended to make.

I was pleased to find that the cookies still turned out beautifully, if a little different to the pictures in the magazine. I coated them in chocolate because i didn't have any gold leaves, as suggested in the recipe, but I personally think that chocolate looks better than gold leaves ;) On cookies anyway.

What I wasn't so pleased about was that after my first bite, I finally remembered why I've never made spiced cookies before. I don't really like them! I shouldn't have been so surprised though, I'm often lured by the sight of tasty spiced cookies, only to be dissappointed by the taste. Whilst I like spices in cooking, and to some extent, certain cakes and desserts, spiced cookies are definitely not my thing. Which is a shame because I think they would have been really good cookies for someone who likes spiced cookies!





Lebkuchen
Recipe from Baked and Delicious Vol. 1

Ingredients
250g plain flour
75g ground almonds
1tsp baking powder
1/2tsp bicarbonate of soda
2 tsp ground ginger
1/2tsp ground nutmeg
1/2tsp ground cinnamon
1/2tsp ground cloves
zest or an orange and a lemon
200ml clear honey
85g unsalted butter

To decorate
a handful of halved blanched almonds
edible gold leaf (optional)

1. Mix the flour, ground almonds, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, spices and orange and lemon zest in a large bowl. Gently melt the honey and butter together in a saucepan and then tip them onto the dr ingredients and m ix into a fairly stiff dough. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and leave the mixture to cool and solidify a bit.
2. Preheat the oven to 180 C/350 F. Use your hands to roll the dough into balls about 3cm across and lay them out on the prepared baking sheets with plenty of space between each one. Flatten the balls into circles with your fingers. Put an almond in the centre of each cookie and sprinkle with a few edible gold leaf to decorate. Bake for about 15 minutes until risen and golden, then turn them out to cool on wire racks.

23 Comments:

Dolly said...

god these look like the ones you buy outside..

i really like the colour contrast there :)

OohLookBel said...

Covering the Lebkuchen in chocolate was a brilliant idea. They look like chocolate Montes (and I LOVE those!).

נєαи said...

They look funny and cute :3
I like spice cookies! They're nice for christmas! :D

Vivian - vxdollface said...

lol that is hilarious! never made something that i didn't like to eat but i'm not a huge fan of spiced cookies either - at least they turned out well!

esther said...

Haha, the cookies look really good. Too bad you didn't like them. Did your family/friends like them though? I've never made something that I didn't like eating...I made stuff that I messed up on and didn't like eating. XD I love your pictures, they're so bright and pretty.

Anonymous said...

Well, despite not really liking spice cookies, they turned out great looking! And, thanks for commenting on my blog. I've added yours to my Google Reader and look forward to reading your future posts.

Evelyne CulturEatz said...

Very funny, at least you enjoyed baking them I hope. I would love those cookies for sure.

T and Tea Cake said...

Good thing you covered them with chocolate. What kind of snotty dimwits cover their lebkuchen with gold leaves?! I'm German and can assure you that I have never ever seen them that way. Chocolate however, is probably besides sugar the most common glaze and makes way more sense, doesn't it? I'm not too much of a fan, either, but yours definitely look authentic. :)

Cheers,
Tobias

Kristy Sayer-Jones @ Southern In Law said...

I have done the exact same thing! I always think chocolate cake smells reaaaaaaaaaallyy good (brownies too) when it's baking, so I wait in anticipation only to take a bite and realise.. I really don't like chocolate cake :P

These cookies look delicious though! Last year I made Ina Garten's ultimate ginger cookies and they were delicious - super soft and chewy and full of christmas-sy spices.

laurie said...

Send them my way..I love spice cookies!

Lynn said...

it's too bad you don't like spiced cookies...but I do!! YUM!

Nic@diningwithastud said...

What a shame that you realised you dont like it haha. They look fab and I love the chocolate coating :)

Unknown said...

I used to eat tons of these when we lived in Germany. When I made my Hurricane Irene cookies this week, I also used allspice powder but only put 1/2 teaspoon to a cup of flour so the flavor wasn't too overwhelming. You cookies do look great, though...chocolate corrects everything! :-)

Viv said...

you're welcome to send them my way von :D but like you i disliked spiced baked goods growing up...i guess it grew on me over time one cake/cookie at a time! so im guessing u dont like chai latte too?

this german cookie looks incredible i have to say...the shape is awesome and so's the choc glaze too!

JasmyneTea said...

All that effort and you don't even like them! Send em here ;) lol!

Liz That Skinny Chick Can Bake said...

They sure turned out well! And I love any cookie dipped in chocolate...even spiced ones. I'm thinking I may need to add some silicone cups to my bakeware collection :)

Adriana said...

Your cookies are beautiful! Lebkuchen are on of my family's favorite cookies - we eat them every Christmas. I've never tried making them, partly to keep the tradition of eating them only in winter. But this recipe will have to change that.

Rita (mademoiselle délicieuse) said...

Teehee, I'm pretty much like that every time I eat gingerbread! I enjoy making it, cutting out the different shapes and decorating them, then I remember that I don't actually like the taste much... =p

Joanne said...

I actually do this all the time and plan out recipes that include ingredients that I HATE. It makes absolutely no sense to me! I love spiced cookies though so I'm sure I would adore these!

tori said...

I love spiced cookies (I'll have them :) Particularly with a small glass of vin santo at the end of a big meal. These look gorgeous.

sugarpuffi said...

the cookies look so nice! i cant remember the last time ive had one of those!

Paula @ Spoons 'n' Spades said...

These cookies look wonderful, although I have to admit, as a child, they were always the ones I left behind when we had biscuits to choose from! I think my tastebuds have changed as I've matured though, as I love them now :-)

Ruxi said...

You have no ideea for how long I have been searching for this kind of recipe. I wasn't even sure what to google, I only knew the look of it and yours are just as the ones I buy at Christmas. I will try them, for sure. Thanks!

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