Cake thirty - two Xmas Cookies

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Gingerbread cookies or Lebkuchen, as they’re called in Germany, are kind of a family. There’s not only one type. There’s a recipe with cream, and one with molasses instead of honey, you can use butter or margarine and according to the percentage of honey you use the cookies change. Then there’s a variety of delicious cookies which are typical of Xmas time, the ones we call Swedish Sugar Crystal Cookies or  the Starry Night Cookies,  for example.

Gingerbread Cookies (German traditional recipe)

200 g butter or margarine

500 g honey

250 sugar 

2 teaspoons spices (ginger, pepper, nutmeg, cinnamon)

15 g cocoa powder

1200 g flour 

1 packet baking powder

a pinch of salt

2 eggs

for procedure see:

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/01/cake-eighteen-gingerbread-decorations.html

Gingerbread Cookies (with cream)  - this recipe is in cups

2/3 cup whipping cream

1 cup sugar

2/3 cup maple syrup or molasses

11/2 tbs ginger

1/2  ts grated lemon zest

1 tbs baking soda stirred into 2 ts water

3 1/2 flour

Lightly whip the cream. Add the sugar, syrup or molasses, ginger, lemon and soda. Beat for 3 miutes. Add most of the flour, kneading well. Cover and let rest at room temperature overnight. 

Turn dough onto floured surface. Knead until smooth. Roll the dough into a thin sheet on a floured surface. Cut out different shapes with cookie cutters. Decorate with sugar pearls or chocolate grains. Place them on parchment-lined baking sheets. Bake at 180° on the centre oven rack for around 7 minutes.. Let cool on the baking sheets. 

If you use molasses the cookies will be of a darker brown and of a slightly more chewy consistency.

French Gingerbread cookies 

3/4 cup margarine or butter

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup maple syrup or molasses

11/2 tbs ginger

11/2 tbs cinnamom

1 ts baking soda 

1 cup chopped almonds

2 1/2 flour

Beat the butter, sugar and syrup or molasses, until light and fluffy. Gradually add the dry ingredients and almonds. Mix well. Turn dough onto floured surface. Knead until smooth. Divide in half and form thick logs. Wrap each log in plastic and refrigerate for several hours or overnight.

Cut into thin slices with a knife, use heart-shaped cutters to give cookies a nicer look. Place them on baking sheets. Bake at 180° for about 10/12 minutes.

Norwegian Xmas Rings
3 eggs
1 yolk
160 g icing sugar
250 g butter
350 g flour
1 yolk 
crystal sugar
Boil eggs for 10/12 minutes. Cool and peel eggs. Sieve boiled egg yolks and mix with fresh yolk and icing sugar. Soften butter and slowly add butter to mixture. Fold in flour and knead until smooth. Wrap dough in aluminum foil and refrigerate for at least 3 hours. 
Divide dough into walnut sized balls and roll out each piece into about a 10 cm long dough snakes. Lightly scramble egg yolk and use it to stick the two ends of the snake so as to make a ring. Cover rings with yolk and crystal sugar. Place cookies on baking sheets and bake at 190° for about 10/12 minutes.

Swedish Sugar Crystal Cookies

250 g butter

120 g sugar

1 egg

400 g flour

1 ts baking powder

1 egg white

1 pinch salt

1/4 cup crystal sugar

174 cup cinnamon

Cream butter, sugar and egg until light and fluffy. Fold in flour, salt  and baking powder. Mix well. Turn dough onto floured surface and knead until smooth. Wrap dough in aluminium foil and refrigerate for 3 hours.

Divide dough into three parts. (Keep the dough you don’t use in the fridge.). Roll dough into a 3 mm thin sheet on a floured surface. Cut out 6 cm circles and place them on a baking sheet. Slightly mix the egg white and spread on cookies. Cover cookies with sugar and cinnmon. Bake at 180° for about 8/10 minutes.

Starry Night Cookies

300 g flour

150 butter

100 g icing sugar

1 egg

4 tbs apricot jam

chocolate icing

glacé icing (100 g icing sugar - some teaspoons water)

Make a mound of flour on a work surface, add butter, sugar and egg. Knead until smooth. Wrap dough in aluminium foil and refrigerate for 2 hours. Roll dough into a 3 mm sheet and cut out your cookies using cutters in the shape of stars and moon. Place them on baking sheets. Bake at 180° for about 10/12 minutes.

Cool cookies. Divide cookies into two groups. Sandwich the cookies with heated jam. 

Melt chocolate over a bain maire and spread over some of the cookies.  Make some glacé icing by mixing icing sugar and water. Cover the rest of cookies. Decorate with sugar sprinkles.

also visit: http://time-for-a-cake.blogspot.it/2014/01/xmas-cookies-2013.html

Cake seventeen - Xmas Fruit cake - 2013

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This cake’s undoubtedly another Xmas must have! It’s quite easy to make, but pay attention to the right baking time, Anyway it’s better to bake a little bit longer so that flavours can blend together well. Then the longer you store it the nicer it smells and tastes - one month is a good period of time, in my opinion Storing time does make the difference! I think you should try it yourself. I do love this cake, you can make it in any shape: my favourite moulds for Xmas are trees or stars, whether smaller or bigger, but if you use a square or round pan it looks traditional and if you put a ribbon around it and a decoration in the middle, something like a Xmas tree candle holder it looks quite elegant and original. 

But this cake hides another secret! You can change some of the ingredients and there you have another cake! The original recipe is with candied fruit, raisins and almonds, but I never put almonds - we don’t like them much - and use chocolate instead! And for chocolate lovers use white and dark chocolate without candied fruit or raisins. It taste delicious, believe me!

for recipe see cake seventeen 

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2012/12/cake-seventeen-christmas-fruit-cake.html

As you see, this year, I decorated the big Xmas tree in green with little red Xmas balls using cream cheese frosting and tiny chocolate rounds. 

Cream cheese frosting

green food colouring 

300 g cream cheese or mascarpone

200 g icing sugar

Mix cream cheese and icing sugar together until they’re well blended together. Add as much green colouring as to reach the shade you like. Refrigerate for at least one hour.

Red Xmas balls

100 g White chocolate

red food colouring.

Melt white chocolate over a bain maire. Cool it. Add some red colouring until you get the shade you want. Pipe small rounds on baking paper or better on a silicon baking mat. Refrigerate.

also visit: http://time-for-a-cake.blogspot.it/2013/12/xmas-fruit-cake-2013.html

Cake nineten - Santa's House 2013 edition

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It’s been long since I first attempted to make a gingerbread house but every year I’m as thrilled as the first time I made it and I note down some little changes to make the next time. This time I used  a sugarless dough for the house external walls, the trees and sleigh and it really proved very good to look at but quite weak to bear the weight of the roof. So we had to make other walls with the old style (I mean the one we’ve always used) dough and stick two walls together - one made with the new dough and one with the old using some brownish icing as glue. Another new thing was to bake the roof in two parts and bake them twice so that they become harder. 

Sugarless gingerbread dough
200 g butter 
500 g honey
2 tsp ginger, pepper, cinnamon and muscat nut
15 g cocoa
1200 g flour
1 packet baking powder
1 pinch salt
2 eggs
same proceeding as in Cake nineteen
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/03/cake-nineteen-father-xmass-house.html

for ‘old style’ gingerbread dough see link above

for assembling advice see:

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/03/cake-nineteen-father-xmass-house-making.html


http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/03/cake-nineteen-father-xmass-house_10.html

 House details:
1. House grounds and trees

2. Front wall, window with flowers and wreath

 3. Side walls and window 

4. Inside wall with door and Santa Claus

5. Inside the house 

6. Sides and back

 7. ready!

 also visit http://time-for-a-cake.blogspot.it/2013/12/cake-nineteen-2013-edition.html

Cake thirty-one The Duchess Cake

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It sometimes happens I have an idea in mind which I think it’s perfect but then when it comes to the actual realization .. it turns out totally different... Do I get mad about it? Of course I do.... but I try to keep calm and consider it like a challenge between the cake and me: I must win anyhow! No good reason to give in.. anyway, a good chance to use my creativity and make something even better.The Duchess Cake is an example, in fact. It was my elder son’s graduation family dinner and I wanted to make a splendid cake for the occasion.

 I let him choose the cake, and I liked it too, quite a solemn cake, suitable for the event. But, while making it, I got more and more disappointed: the cake was nearly ready and looked like a white omelette tier cake! I felt desperate at first, but after a few minutes I had a new plan..  I baked some eclairs, and used all the former cake components to make a totally new cake, an elegant and quite sumptuous cake: no doubt about the name to choose - it was a duchess cake. Why duchess? No logical explanation, simply a stream of thoughts of pictures in my mind: in a moment’s time a flashback from some fairy tale books, royal receptions with ten meter long tables full of cakes and young princesses strolling along huge ball rooms. There it was my cake, the cake for a duchess, for sure!

Here’s what you need to make: (preparation’s quite long, I must say...)

Meringue Cake

Éclairs

Pastry cream

Choco Cream 

Chocolate decorations

Step 1 - Meringue Cake

6 egg whites

200 g icing sugar

1 tbs starch

80 g icing sugar

80 g grated almonds

Preheat the oven to 110° C. Pencil a 24cm circle on four baking paper sheets. 

Beat the egg white on medium speed with an electric mixer until the mixture resembles a fluffy cloud and stands up in stiff peaks when the blades are lifted. Now add icing sugar, a spoonful at a time, continue beating for 3, 4 minutes between each addition. Continue to fold in the remaining icing sugar until the mixture looks thick and glossy. Fold in starch and grated almonds. Spoon the meringue on the 4 circles and bake them for about one hour, until they’re crisp and you can lift off the paper easily. Leave the oven door slightly open with the help of a wooden spoon. Leave to cool completely.

Step 2 - Chocolate decorations

200 g dark chocolate

Place the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water. Allow the chocolate to melt so that it is smooth, shiny and glossy. Spoon some on an aluminum foil paper and make 20 small thin rectangles of different sizes.

Step 3 -Pastry cream

3 egg yolks

250 ml milk

75 g sugar

2 tbs flour

Bring milk to a boil in small saucepan. Meanwhile beat egg yolks, sugar and flour in small bowl with electric mixer until thick. Gradually beat in milk. Return mixture to saucepan and stir over heat until mixture boils and thickens. Cool to room temperature.

Step 4 - Éclairs

40 g butter

120 ml water

70 g flour

2 eggs

60 g melted dark chocolate

Combine butter with the water in small saucepan, bring to boil. Add flour, beat with a wooden spoon over heat until mixture comes away from base and side of saucepan and forms a small ball. Cool. Beat in eggs with electric mixer until mixture becomes glossy. 

Spoon mixture into piping bag. Pipe 5cm lengths of mixture 3cm apart onto prepared trays with baking paper. Bake at 220° C for 7 minutes, then reduce heat to 180° C and bake further 10 minutes or until they’re browned lightly and crisp. Carefully cut éclairs in half, removing any soft centre. Bake further 5 minutes or until they’re dried out. Cool to room temperature.

Spoon pastry cream into piping bag fitted wit 1cm plain tube. Pipe cream into éclairs halves, top with remaining halves. Spread with melted dark chocolate

Step 5 - Cream cheese frosting

300 g cream cheese

200 g icing sugar

Mix cream cheese and icing sugar in a small bowl, cover and refrigerate for at least one hour.

Step 6 - Assembling cake

Centre one meringue circle on serving plate. Spread with some cream cheese frosting. Repeat with second layer and some of the pastry cream. Place third layer on top and spread with cream cheese frosting. Top with remaining cake layer. Cover top and sides of cake with pastry cream. 

Decorate top and sides with éclairs, chocolate rectangles and small cream cheese dollops.

also visit: http://time-for-a-cake.blogspot.it/2013/11/cake-thirty-one.html