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Walnut muffins with apples and cranberries



(By the way, the sign under the platter says: NO! - Any further questions? I love it!)

Ingredients:
150 grams of white flour
2 teaspoons of baking powder
150 grams of brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons of cinnamon powder
150 grams of ground walnuts
150 grams of butter or margarine
1/4 l yogurt (natural flavour)
1 large apple, grated
100 grams of cranberries, dried

How to make it:
- smear baking forms with butter or margarine;
- pre-heat oven to 180°C;
- mix flour, ground walnuts, baking powder and cinnamon;
- stir eggs with brown sugar and soft butter until smooth;
- add yogurt, grated apples, dried cranberries and the dry ingredients and stir thoroughly;
- fill the forms to 2/3rds;
- bake the muffins for 20, minutes;
- decorate them with icing sugar or walnut pieces while still warm.

Good appetite!

Aka raisin-cinnamon rolls. This is the cookie every sane person simply makes of ready-made puff pastry. Since I consider myself a sane person (sometimes), that was my original intent, too. Only that the local grocer's didn't have puff pastry. Well, not the cheap version I always use. And I wasn't willing to pay double price. So I made these instead:



THIS IS WHAT YOU WILL NEED:
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Are delicious and surprisingly easy to make. This was the first time I tried them, and got them right at once. Go me!

Ingredients:
100 gr butter or margarine, room temperature
50 gr brown sugar
1 egg
150 gr white flour, with a pinch of baking powder
30 gr chopped almonds (without the peels)
50 gr dried cranberries
100 gr white chocolate cubes
(just take an ordinary 100-gr-bar and chop it)

How to make:
- pre-heat oven to 180°C
- line baking tin with baking paper
- stir soft butter with sugar until it's fluffy
- add egg and flour, one spoon at a time
- when dough is smooth, stir in the other ingredients
- with the help of a teaspoon, place small heaps of dough on the baking paper
- bake them for 15 minutes
- let them cool on a rack thoroughly



Sorry for the quality of the picture. I made it with my iPad, and I can never hold the dratted thing steady enough. :(

I've just spent over six hours baking cookies for the Christmas charity fair of our school. Roughly 400 pieces of them. I can barely feel my hands from all the cutting and rolling the dough. Cinnamon stars, chocolate hearts and coconut crescents were on the menu, in case anyone is interested. You can find the recipes by clicking on the similarly named tag.

The fair is in more than 3 weeks' time, actually. At least one of which weeks the kids and I will be spending by decorsting the cookies each afternoon, before packing them away in airtight tin boxes. When we're not making Christmss ornaments. Or Christmas cards.

Yes, I am mad, why are you asking? :(

Edit: The cookies are now all decorated and boxed, so that is one complicated task out of my hair. I can happily return to producing Christmas decoration for the fair. Oh, joy.

This is the plan. Biscuits/cookies already baked will be linked to their respective recepies. Give them a try, most of them are easily made and all of them are very tasty.

1) Oatcakes with Dates
2) Weiße Pfeffernüsse
3) Chocolate-Peanut Cookies
4) Vanillekipferl
5) Eierbrezeln mit Marzipan
6) Hazelnut Hearts
7) Chocolate Chip Cookies
8) Orange Hearts
9) Walnut Cookies, filled with marzipan
10)Cinnamon Stars
11)Schwarz-Weiß Gebäck
12)Nougat Crescents
13)Karlsbader Krapferln mit Haselnusskrokant
14)Coconut Crescents
15)Chocolate-Almond Cookies
16)Hazelnut Wheels

As always, changes in the plan are possible (and likely). We'll see how the next weeks turn out.

This was an unexpected addition. I found this recipe in an advert booklet for Dr Oetker products and couldn't resist.

Ingredients:
300 gr flour
2 flat teaspoons of honey cake spice, mixed with baking powder
125 gr margarine
125 gr powdered sugar (or is it called icing sugar in English?)
1 pck vanilla-flavoured sugar
1 egg (size M)
2 tablespoons of milk

For the decoration:
50-100 gr powdered sugar
2-3 tablespoons of lemon juice
1-2 teaspoons of food colouring (red)
small white stars of sugar (you can buy them ready-made here)

How to make it?

*Pre-heat oven to 160-180°C (Gas: Grad 3-4), depending on your oven.
*Cover baking tin (30x40cm) with baking paper.
*Mix all ingredients in a bowl and knead until you have a nice, smooth dough.
*Divide dough in 4 equal parts.
*Roll out each part to a square of 24x13cm.
*Divide each square in 8 equal parts.
*Cut diagonally each part - you'll get 13 triangles.
*Fold back the narrow side - that will be the brim of Santa's hat. You can fold the peak of the hats back, too, they look rather cute that way.
*Bake the biscuits for 12-15 minutes; again, depending on your oven.
*Let the biscuits cool. In the meantime, mix powdered sugar with lemon juice. You'll need a thick mass, like molasses. Paint the brims of the hats with white icing.
*Then add red food colouring to the mass and paint the rest of the hats.
*Decorate them with little stars of sugar and let them dry overnight.

In a sealed tin box these biscutist should remain fresh for 3 weeks.

Another quick and inexpensive one. I baked this with the schoolkids recently, and although we made 2 batches, the whole thing was done within the hour! (And let me tell you, it isn't a fast process when you work with 15-20 children between the age of 10 and 12.)

Ingredients:
400 gr white flour
250 gr margarine
2 dl (1/4 l minus a tablespoon) sour cream
30 gr fresh yeast (not the dried and pulverized version!)
150 gr grated cheese (any sort, it doesn't matter)
3 teaspoons of salt (or less, if you like it milder)
1/2 teaspoon of sugar (for the yeast)

For the decoration:
1 beaten egg (small)
50 gr grated cheese

How to make it:
1. Pre-heat oven to 180°C, cover baking tin with baking paper
(or simply paint the tin with fat - oil or margarine - if you don't have any baking paper at hand, it works just as well)
2. Sieve the flour and the salt onto the working surface, make a dent in the middle, crumble the yeast into the dent, mix it with the sugar and the sour cream. Attention: all ingredients must be room temperature, or else the buns won't rise in the oven!!!
3. Add the grated cheese and the margarine, which should be cut in small cubes. Knead the dough until smooth.
4. Roll out the dough - it should be as thick as your finger - cut out small buns (diameter: 2 centimetres), paint them with beaten egg and put a pinch of grated cheese on each.
5. Bake it in the oven until it is golden-yellow.

Photo as promised:

I thought I'd make a semi-permanent post about the biscuits and cookies baked for this year's Christmas. I'll also link the names of the goodies to my time-honoured recipes for anyone who wishes to give them a try. Feel free to share the results with me - at least verbally. Or visually, should you take pictures. ;)

Items produced so far:

1) chestnut biscuits
2) chocolate-peanut cookies
3) marzipan bretzels
4) orange-almond biscuits
5) cinnamon cookies
6) English biscuits
7) coconut kipferln
8) cinnamon stars

We haven't actually baked these yet: they're on tomorrow's programme. But they are really tasty, and I've got a little time right now, so I thought I'd post the recipe now-

Ingredients: (for cca 50)
100 gr butter or margarine
100 gr icing sugar (or normal sugar, it's better with that anyway)
120 gr white flour
50 gr roasted, grated hazelnuts
1 egg
1 pinch of salt
1 teaspoon of vanilla flavoured sugar

For the decoration:
roasted, chopped hazelnuts
(I use ready-made crocant from Dr. Oetker anyway)

How to make it:
* stir softened butter with the sugar, the vanilla sugar and the salt thoroughly;
* add egg and stir some more;
* add flour and hazelnuts and stir into the mass carefully;
* pre-heat oven to 200°C and cover baking tin with baking paper;
* with the help of two teaspoons, place small amounts of the dough onto the baking paper ( leave some distance between them, as they become bigger while baking);
* spread the chopped hazelnuts over them;
* bake them cca 10-12 minutes;
* dust them with icing sugar while still hot;

These biscuits remain fresh for at least two weeks, if kept in a well-sealed tin box.

Since we were off town yesterdayday, I had to organize the baking orgy this afternoon. I baked 3 different kinds of biscuits; will post the recipe for the other two tomorrow. Right now: Crumble Cookies. I tried them this year for the first time, and I'm very content with the results.

Ingredients for the dough:
200 gr white flour
1 pinch of baking powder
20 gr sugar
10 gr vanilla flavoured sugar
100 gr butter or margarine
1 egg
1 tablespoon of rum (I always use aroma)

For the crumble:
175 gr white flour
175 gr sugar
25 gr ground almonds
1 tablespoon of cinnamon
150 gr soft butter or margarine

For the decoration:
some milk
candied cherries

How to make it:
* mix all ingredients for the dough, knead it through and let it rest in the fridge for an hour;
* pre-heat oven to 180°C; cover baking tin with baking paper;
* roll out dough 1/2 cm thick, cut circles (diameter: 4 cm), put them onto the baking tin;
* for the crumble, mix all ingredients and, well, crumble the result. ;o))
* paint the circles with milk, put walnut-sized amounts of crumble on them and decorate it with candied cherries;
* bake cookies for about 20 minutes.