Price - German and American Cookies

Hello and GutenTag! I am so happy you picked this little book among all the thousands ofcookie, bake and cook books that have been published over the years. This is asmall collection of cookies that has been compiled from German and Americanfriends who are still traditional bakers. Christmas is still the most important time to bake cookies in Germany. A virtual baking frenzy starts in early November to be ready for the Adventtime, four weeks before Christmas.

Countless tins will be filled and stored inice cold bedrooms. Many pretty paper plates will be filled with a variety ofhomemade cookies, chocolate and Marzipan, decorated with bows and freshgreenery and given to friends and family and co-workers. Of course, by now cookies are an all-year round treat, so don't feellimited by just baking for Christmas. Most of the recipes come from friends who were born around the secondWorld War and just cooked and baked for their family. None of us had any professionaltraining or pretended to know everything. The only teachers were tradition andexperience.

As we moved, we experimented with high altitude, with lowaltitude, with tired old ovens and with new temperamental ones. We learned totranslate grams to cups. We advanced from greased and floured cookie sheets toparchment paper. We still use the old-fashioned measure of a "pinch" and a "tad." And then there is the question, why you do haveto cool and rest the dough in the fridge before rolling it out ? You have tolet it come to room temp anyway before using it again. Professional bakers areprobably cringing by now, but we do what works for us. Our cookies are not beautiful little artifacts, but simple anddelicious treats that shine with great flavor.

And of course, there are reallyno health food cookies here. This must be a contradiction in terms, exceptfor an occasional one without flour . So I would love to encourage you to try a few of these recipes and whoknows -- three or four might turn out to be your favorites, too. A few helpful hints Many of the German Christmas cookies in this book are made from atraditional "Knetteig" (Kn-ate-tyke) which means a dough hasbeen kneaded by hand until it is smooth. To make a Knetteig, mix flour and baking powder in a bowl, add thesugar and small pieces of butter. Cut the butter in with a pastry cutter or afork until the dough resembles coarse crumbles.

Add slightly beaten eggs andflavorings and work the dough with your hands until everything has beenincorporated and you have a smooth ball. You can do this in a food processor also: Pulse the dry ingredients afew times to mix, cut in the butter and let it process until you have coarsecrumbles. Mix the slightly beaten eggs and let the blade work until it forms aball. Of course, if you have a kitchen machine with a dough hook, that willbe the easiest. Parchment and wax paper Lining cookie sheets with parchment makes baking cookies really easy. No buttering or spraying is necessary, nothing sticks, and although you mightthink the parchment is a little pricey, it can be reused several times.

Justwipe it off or shake off the crumbs and you are ready for the next batch. Wax paper can be used to roll out the dough. No need to add flour,which keeps the cookies more tender. We also cut out all the cookies at once,placing them on wax paper and layering them on one cookie sheet. The sheetstays in the fridge until we are ready to bake, often the next day, thentransfer the cut-outs onto the parchment. Not enough time to roll out the dough and cut out shapes? A muchfaster way is removing small amounts of dough and patting it out with yourhand.

Not as pretty as bells, hearts, stars, trees, comets or snow men, but ittastes the same and the kids will gobble them up just as well. Vanilla sugar Vanilla sugar in Germany is the normal preferred way to flavor adough. Dr. Oetker Vanille Zucker comes in small yellow packages in manysupermarkets. You can use either the artificially flavored vanilla or thebourbon. The more intense flavor is the artificial vanilla sugar.

However, if you plan ahead, fill a jar with powdered or regular sugarand stick a vanilla bean into it. The sugar will be infused in time. Many of the ingredients like vanilla sugar, extracts, and spices thatare essential for gingerbread can also be found on-line at Germandeli.com. Hazelnuts For many years, hazelnuts were the most widely known nut in Germany. Many people have bushes or trees in their backyards. By now hazelnuts are aquite fashionable flavor in the States, but still not easy to find for baking.

If you live close to a Trader Joes, an Aldi store, or a German deli orbakery, you often can purchase hazelnuts either shelled and whole, or alreadyfinely ground. Note that one pound whole shelled nuts make 3 cups, and 1/4pound ground nuts make about 1 3/4 cups. If you grind the hazelnuts yourself, put not more than 1/4 pound nutsinto your food processor, adding some powdered sugar or flour to keep itfluffy. Nuts have quite a bit of fat and would otherwise turn into a paste. Best,of course, would be if you can find an old-fashioned nut grinder if you cannotalready find the nuts ground.