Baking season continues: Vanillekipferln

I baked at home today, for a change. It was really nice, having time to do things properly. Anyway, Vanillekipferln is a German word of course, but I haven't got the faintest what it's called in English. Perhaps someone recognizes the cookies and can tell me.

This is Grandma's old recipe, which we always bake for Christmas.

Ingredients:

250-260 gr white flour
70 gr white sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla-flavoured sugar
100 gr ground almonds
250 gr butter or margarine (room temperature)
vanilla-flavoured powdered sugar to roll them in it when baked

Preparation:

* Mix flour, sugar, vanilla-sugar, almonds and butter on a board. Kneed it to a smooth dough. Rest dough (wrapped in tinfoil) in the fridge for one hour.
* Take dough from the fridge. Form a long roll. Cut slices (about the width of a finger). Roll them and form little kipferls (half-moons).
* Put them on a baking tin (on baking paper). Bake them in a hot oven (in the middle, in the case of a gas oven on level 2) for 15-20 minutes.
*Take the hot cookies from the baking tin and roll them in vanilla-flavoured, powdered sugar generously.

They remain fresh for at least 3 weeks in well-sealed tin box.

Baking season continues: Chocolate-Almond Cookies...

... with red currant jam and chocolate covering, oh yeah, baby!

They were today's other item to produce. Well, they aren't technically done yet, as I've only baked the biscuits today, filling and icing will be done tomorrow, but nonetheless, I fell very accomplished.

Ingredients:

For the biscuits:
200 gr butter or margarine
110 gr sugar
100 gr ground almonds
1 eggyolk
250 gr white flour
30 gr strong cocoa powder
30 gr vanilla flavoured sugar
a pinch of salt

For the filling
100 gr red currant jam or jelly
1 tablespoon of rum

For the decoration:
dark chocolate covering

For the baking tin
baking paper

How to make it:

* Stir soft butter (or margarine) with the sugar, the ground almonds, teh salt and the vanilla flavoured sugar.
* Add eggyolk and stir some more.
* Add cocoa powder and flour, knead it until you have a smooth dough.
* Let it rest in the fridge for 2 hours.

* Pre-heat oven for 180°C.
* Roll out the dough 3 mm thin.
* Cut circles with a diameter of 4 cm.
* Bake the biscuits for 12 minutes, let them cool on the tin.

* Boil red currant jam with the rum.
* Glue always 2 biscuits together with the hot jam-rum mix.
* Melt chocolate covering over hot water and dip one half of the cookies into the molten chocolate.
* Let them cool until the chocolate becomes solid again.

In a well-sealed tin box the cookies remain fresh for about two weeks.