Cookies appear in abundance during holidays. For some reason they always seem to be the more intense recipes to perform. The Linzer is a jam filled sandwich cookie whose simple beauty masks its complicated beginnings.
Linzer cookies hail from Austria where Linz is the third largest city in that country. They are the diminutive form of the torte that first became popular in the 1600s. These delectable treats have traveled throughout all of Europe and settled in the U.S with our immigrant ancestors.
Black Currant jelly, jam, or preserve is the traditional filling for the cookies. In the States raspberry is the most common filling in commercial packages. Honestly though, use your favorite flavors. The buttery almond dough compliments any flavor.
The original recipe comes from Meine Gute Landküche and uses traditional jams and jellies for the filling. I didn’t have whole grain flour for the original recipe and have had to tweak it. The recipe is in Euro measurements. There is no conversion as I was gifted a German metric measure and ALDI offered digital kitchen scales at the start of the Holiday season. The recipe below is the one that I used to compensate for the lack of ingredients.
Ingredients
- 125 grams Butter
- 50 grams Sugar
- 1 medium egg
- 200 grams all purpose flour
- 50 grams finely ground Hazelnuts
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- a pinch of ground glove
- a pinch of cinnamon
- 100 gram jelly
- 100 gram powdered sugar
Beat butter and sugar till fluffy. Stir in egg.
Mix flour, nuts, baking powder, and spices together. Gradually add to the butter mixture until a smooth dough forms. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
Preheat over to 355°.
Roll dough out 4 milimeters thick. Cut out shapes with the cutter. Place on baking paper lined tray. Use the smaller punch to cut centers of one half of the large cookies. Bake on middle rack for 10 minutes.
Cook tray on the baking rack for a few minutes then remove individual cookies to the tray to finish cooling.
Gently heat your choice of jelly or jam until it becomes spreadable. When the cookies have cooled spoon the jelly or jam onto the complete circles. Sprinkle powdered sugar onto the cutout tops and lay on top of the jellied round. Allow the jelly to reset to glue the cookies together.
My choices for jam were Holunderflüten (above) and Strawberry Rhubarb (right). The Holunderblüten jelly softened fast and needed to reset a little before I could put it on the cookies. The jams cooperated nicely.
The recipe makes only 24 full cookies.