Almond chocolate balls - Marzipankartoffel

Get
300g organic almonds
1 tbsp honey (Prickly box honey, Bursaria spinosa)
2 tbsp organic cocoa powder

Do
Blanch almonds.
In a saucepan or bowl, use a puree stick to make a smooth paste from the almonds and the honey. Kneed the paste to marzipan. Cool for some time in the fridge.
Put the cocoa in a bowl.
Roll into small balls and roll them in the cocoa.
Place them on a baking tray.
Put into a preheated oven and bake at 180°c for about 10 minutes on the second shelf from the bottom.

By keeping the amount of honey small, the marzipan is dry. If it is too moist the powdery cocoa becomes moist and the outcome is more like truffles. They should feel powdery to the touch. Refrigerate.

Baked Marzipan Biscuits

These biscuits are pure nuts and honey. They can be very brittle.

Get
300g organic almonds
2 tbsp honey (Prickly box honey, Bursaria spinosa)
Some (macadamia) nuts for decoration
2 tbsp organic cocoa powder optional
1 egg yolk

Unglazed

Do
Blanch almonds.
In a saucepan or bowl, use a puree stick to make a smooth paste from the almonds and the honey. Kneed the paste to marzipan. Cool for some time in the fridge.

Take a clean (pure linen) tea towel and role out the ball of marzipan. Use cookie cutters to get the desired shapes or make a roll and cut into pieces and decorate with nut pieces. Mix the egg yolk and paint biscuits. Put into a preheated oven and bake at 180°c for about 10 minutes on the second shelf from the bottom. They should be golden.

One traditional shape is little cones, called Bethmännchen ("a little Bethmann"). They have been around since 1393 on Christmas markets in Frankfurt. They usually contain powdered sugar, rosewater, flour and egg as well.

Click to enlarge

For our cones we made a ball, flattened it with an indentation in the middle, and added a fresh macadamia nut in the centre. Pinch the top to close around the nut.
When little bits are left over that cannot be rolled out at the end, cocoa was used to hand kneed them into shapes.
Refrigerate if done anywhere on The Mid North Coast at this time of the year.

Sunken Sour Cherry Nut Cake

Get
70g organic almonds
300g organic hazelnuts
8 tbsp agave nectar
3 eggs separated
125g unsalted butter
about 80g light spelt flour
1 packet Weinstein baking powder (15 - 20 g)
250g fresh dark red sour cherries

Do
Wash and pit the sour cherries. Place in a bowl to save some juice.

Grate the almonds and hazelnuts coarsely.
Preheat the oven to 190°.
Beat the soft butter in a large bowl with a wooden spoon until it is smooth. Beat in alternately the egg yolks and 5 tbsp agave nectar. Beat well into a soft mixture.
Add the flour mixed with the baking powder a tablespoon at a time while beating. Beat well.

Whip the egg whites until stiff, then add the remaining agave nectar and continue beating until very stiff.
Mix some of the egg white under the mixture to keep it soft and moist.

Fold in the nut meal into the mixture gradually.
Fold in the remaining egg whites.

Butter a 28 cm baking form and dust it with a little flour.
Add the mixture to the form and spread it evenly.

Decorate with the cherries. Dribble a little of the juice on the fruit
Bake on the 2nd shelf from the bottom for 25 minutes. Cover it with paper. Turn the oven down and bake for a further 20 minutes at 150°c. It should be golden-brown on top. Test with a thin knife that it is cooked. The knife should come out clean. If it is not clean, return covered to the oven for another 10 minutes and then test again. Turn off the oven. Allow the cake to cool in the oven with the door partly open.
Remove from form onto a cake plate when cool.
Store in a linen cloth.

This sour cherry cake is a good alternative to Black Forest cake. When served with whipped cream it has a similar character, without chocolate but more nutty than the Black Forest cherry cake.

Blueberry Banana Cake Pacific Style

The mid-north coast of NSW is converting from banana production to blueberries, so this recipe takes advantage of the presence of both fruit in one place. You can use as many blueberries as you wish.

Get
150g organic almonds
1 bowl blueberries
8 fat ripe cavendish bananas (more if small)
some lemon juice
8 tbsp agave nectar
4 eggs separated
200g unsalted butter
1 tsp cinnamon
about 150g flour
5 level tsp baking powder (no aluminium or phosphate, quantity depends on the type of baking powder, do not use too much)

Do
Roughly mash 8 bananas with some lemon juice.
Grate the almonds finely.
Preheat the oven to 190°.
Beat the soft butter in a large bowl with a wooden spoon until it is smooth. Beat in alternately the egg yolks and 5 tbsp agave nectar. Beat well into a soft mixture.
Add the cinnamon.
Beat the bananas into the mixture one at a time.
Beat the almond meal into the mixture gradually.
Add the flour a tablespoon at a time while beating. Alternately add the baking powder so it mixes in evenly. Only use enough flour so that the mixture is thick but still falls slowly - “heavily” - from the spoon. Beat well.

Mix in the blueberries keeping some aside for decoration.
Whip the egg whites until stiff, then add the remaining agave nectar and continue beating until stiff.
Lift the egg whites under the mixture.
Butter a baking form and dust it with a little flour.
Add the mixture to the form and spread it evenly.
Decorate with the remaining blueberries and press them lightly into the mixture.

Vaccinium myrtillus

Bake on the 2nd shelf from the bottom for 25 minutes. Cover it with paper. Turn the oven down and bake for a further 25 minutes at 120°c. It should be golden. Test with a thin knife that it is cooked. The knife should come out clean. If it is not clean, return covered to the oven for another 10 minutes and test again. Turn off the oven.
Cool in form in the open oven.
Remove from form when cool.
Store in a linen cloth.

Sugar banana almond cake

Get
 
200g organic almonds
12 fat ripe sugar bananas (more if small)
some lemon juice
8 tbsp agave nectar
4 eggs separated
140g unsalted butter
some grated lemon rind
about 150g flour
5 tsp baking powder (no aluminium or phosphate, quantity depends on the type of baking powder, do not use too much)
1 tsp ground cinnamon (optional)

Do 

Peel 4 bananas, slice them and sprinkle with lemon juice. Set aside.
Preheat the oven to 190°.
Beat the butter in a large bowl with a wooden spoon until it is soft. Beat in alternately the egg yolks and 5 tbsp agave nectar. Beat well into a soft mixture.
Mash the remaining 8 bananas with some lemon juice. Beat them into the mixture one at a time.
Grate a little lemon rind into it. Mix in the cinnamon.
Grate the almonds finely. Beat them into the mixture gradually.
Add the flour a tablespoon at a time while beating. Alternately add the baking powder so it mixes in evenly. Only use enough flour so that the mixture is thick but still falls slowly - “heavily” - from the spoon. Beat well.
Mix in the banana slices.
Whip the egg whites until stiff, then add the remaining agave nectar and continue beating until stiff.
Lift the egg whites under the mixture.
Butter a baking form and dust it with a little flour.
Add the mixture to the form and spread it evenly.

Bake on the 2nd shelf from the bottom for 25 minutes. Cover it with paper. Turn the oven down and bake for a further 25 minutes at 140°c. It should be golden. Test with a thin knife that it is cooked. The knife should come out clean. If it is not clean, return covered to the oven for another 10 minutes and test again. Turn off the oven.
Cool in form in the open oven.
Remove from form when cool.
Store in a linen cloth.

Plain almond biscuits

get
350 wholemeal flour (spelt flour)
2 tbsp honey
1 egg
1.5 heaped teasp ground cinnamon
250g butter
200g almonds

do
Mix honey and egg in the middle of the flour in a large bowl.
Add cinnamon, butter flakes, ground almonds
Knead to a pastry. Add extra flour if sticky.
Cool in fridge.
Roll out thin and cut out circles (or shapes)
Bake at 190°c for 10 minutes on a baking tray. Cool.

Store in a tin lined with greaseproof paper.

These biscuits are soft and without any chunky bits in them. Just a homogenous nutty taste with a touch of cinnamon. They go well with coffe and tea. Best on the second day and after.

Image
August Macke, Still life hyacinths carpet, 1910

Nut cake with sultanas

Get
125g butter
5 eggs, separated
3 heaped tbsp honey
200g almonds, grated
80g haselnuts, grated
100g spelt flour
1 packet Weinstein/wine stone baking powder
200g sultanas
2 lemons
100g icing sugar

 

















Do
Wash sultanas and soak for several hours in the juice of 1 lemon with the grated lemon rind of both lemons.
Preheat the oven to 180°C.
Beat butter with 1 tbsp honey in a bowl with a wooden spoon until smooth. Add egg yolks one at a time while beating.
Whip the egg whites until stiff. Add 2 tbsp honey and whip until integrated.
Add weinstein baking powder to the almonds and add the haselnuts. Mix a little.
Beat half the nuts into the butter-egg-yolk mixture. Add a little egg white and mix it in.
Add the sultana-lemon mixture and mix in.
Continue to add more nuts and small amounts of egg white until the nuts are all mixed in.
Gradually add the flour while carefully and slowly mixing with a wooden spoon. Add more egg white as necessary.
Lift the remaining egg whites under the mixture.
Add just enough flour so that the mixture remains moist and light.
Put the mixture in a buttered 28cm cake form and smooth it on top.
Bake for 25-30 minutes on the second shelf from the bottom.
When finished, check that the cake is baked through with a skewer or fine knife. If not, return to the oven. If it is getting dark on top, cover it with a piece of natural paper.
Remove from the form when cooled.
Make icing from icing sugar and lemon juice and decorate the cake with it.
It is also nice without any icing.

Lemon almond cookies

Get
250g wholemeal flour (spelt flour)
2 tbsp honey
1 egg
1.5 heaped teaspoon ground Sri Lanka cinnamon, known as 'Ceylon cinnamon'
250g butter
400g organic almonds
rind of 1 lemon
all organic

Do
Beat butter in a large bowl with a wooden spoon. Add honey and beat it creamy.
Add egg and mix. It will not mix in so add a little flour and beat, then a little more flour and beat again. The mixture will become smooth.

Add cinnamon and grated lemon rind. Grate almonds and add to the mixture.
Add flour gradually while mixing.
When it becomes too firm to mix, add more flour and
knead to a pastry. Keep adding flour and kneading until it is not sticky
Cool in fridge.
Roll out thin.
Using cookie cutting tools cut out shapes.

Bake at 190°c for 6-8 minutes until light but not brown on a baking tray in batches on the second shelf from the bottom. Remove from oven and cool on the tray to avoid breakages.
Store in a tin lined with greaseproof paper in a cool place.

Use cookie cutting tools without narrow features as this pastry is quite crumbly.

Lemon slices

This is a new recipe for lemon slices which we developed while living next to a few well-endowed lemon trees. The slices are very juicy and the filling is very thick. It is an alternative to the lemon slices recipe previously published, but more time consuming.

get
300 g light wholemeal flour
2 tbsp honey
1 egg
140 g butter

500 g almonds
5 tbsp honey
4 juicy lemons

7 tbsp icing sugar

do
Add honey then egg in the middle of the flour in a bowl. Mix with a wooden spoon into a paste and then into the flour. Add butter in flakes. Knead to a pastry. If it is sticky add more flour. If it is too dry, add more butter. Cool for 15 minutes covered with a linen cloth (tea towel).
Blanch almonds. Grate finely with a hand grater.
Grate the lemon peel into the almond meal. Add the juice of 3.5 lemons. Add the honey. Mix to a sticky paste.Sieve the icing sugar. Add lemon juice slowly until it is a thick liquid while mixing with a spoon. If there is too much lemon juice add the rest to the almond paste.
Preheat the oven at 190°c. Butter two baking trays.
Roll out half of the pastry on a linen tea towel. Turn it over from time to time and use the tea towel to fold over and straighten the the edges. Roll out a thin pastry, rectangular if your baking tray is rectangular. When it is as thin as possible, turn it again and cut into the pastry along the middle so two identical rectangles are mirrored by the cut.
Spread half of the almond paste on one side evenly, right to the edges. Use the tea towel to lift to other side onto the first so it fits exactly. Use the flat edge of a knife to press the almond paste inside the pastry, straightening the edges.
Place on a baking tray and bake for 15 minutes on the second shelf from the bottom.
Remove from the oven and paint with half of the icing while hot. Allow to cool.
Repeat with the other half of the pastry and the rest of the almond paste.
When cool, or before serving, cut off edges for private use. Cut into slices about 2 x 6 cm for public presentation.Store on a plate wrapped in a fine linen cloth. Linen is highly absorbent so the biscuits will remain dry. Do not put in a tin or under a bowl or they will go soggy quickly. Use fine linen to prevent linen fibre getting on the biscuits.


Macadamia Lemon Slices without icing

Pear apple pie

Get organic
450g wholemeal spelt flour
1 heaped tbsp honey
2 eggs
125g butter

1 kg ripe yellow pears
500g apples
1 tbsp water
150g almonds

50g icing sugar
pear schnapps

Do
Put flour in a large bowl.
Add honey in the middle and eggs.
Mix together with some flour into a paste.
Cut in butter. Mix.
Knead together into a pastry. Add more flour if sticky, more butter if not smooth. Cool.

Peel pears and apples and core them. Slice into a large pot. Slice the apples very thinly, pears more chunky.
Add water and cook at a medium temperature on the stove with the lid on until soft. Use apples which break down into a mash quickly. The pears should keep their shape. Turn of heat.
Finely grate 100g almonds with a hand grater.
Blanch 50g whole almonds.
Add to the apples. Mix carefully.

Butter a 28 cm round spring form.
Cut pastry into 3 pieces for the pie (2 equal, one smaller).
Roll out one piece for the bottom, make 3 cm sides with the small piece. Save the other piece for the top.
Cover the bottom of the pie shell with greaseproof paper and put a few weights on it (e.g. nuts or metal spoons).
Bake on second shelf for 10 minutes at 190°.
Remove from oven, remove paper and weights.
Fill the pie with the pear-apple mixture.
Roll out the remaining pastry and cover the pie with it.
Press down the edges using a patterned object (e.g. knife tip, lemon zester) to seal the pie.
Bake a further 20 minutes.
Loosen the pie from the bottom and sides of the form with a knife after 30 minutes and remove from form . Cool.
Sieve icing sugar. Mix in pear schnapps until a sticky mass forms. Paint this on the pie with a spoon and smooth over. Use lemon juice as an alternative to alcohol.

This is more a pear pie than an apple pie so it is important to use apples that break down into a mash quickly when cooking them, e.g. rubinola. Pears give off quite a lot of juice when cooking so the ground almonds are necessary to soak it up. The whole almonds give a pleasant surprise.
>> Apple pie

Nut ring with currants. (Sand cake)

Get
200g blanched almonds
100g currants
100g macadamia nuts
250g butter
4 heaped tbsp honey
8 eggs
350g wholemeal organic spelt flour
1 tbsp pear schnapps
butter paper

Do
Preheat the oven to 190°C.
Grind 150g almonds with a hand mill. Wash and dry currants and roll them in a little flour to keep them separate. Chop the remaining almonds and the macadamias.
Separate the eggs. Beat the whites stiff. Add 1 tbsp honey and beat again until very stiff. Set aside.
Beat the butter smooth. Add the remaining honey and beat together. Add egg yolks one at a time and beat well each time. Beat until smooth.
Add a little flour to the egg yolk mixture and mix it in. Add alternately flour and almond meal beating each time. When the mixture becomes too thick, add some of the beaten egg white alternately with the flour and almond meal.
Lightly mix under the egg white foam and the remaining flour and almond meal. Lift under the chopped nuts and the currants. Lightly mix under the schnapps.
Butter a 28cm baking ring form and powder the surface with a little flour.
Add the mixture evenly and press down lightly. Flatten the surface.
Bake in the oven on the second shelf from the bottom for 40 minutes. Then cover the cake with a piece of greaseproof paper and turn off the oven. Leave the cake in the closed hot oven for a further 20 minutes.
Remove from the form and cool.

Tip
An alternative to schnapps is rum, e.g. Bundaberg rum.
Image 2: Part of Vallotton, Felix, via Zeno

Baked honey marzipan

get
500g insecticide-free almonds
3 tbsp good quality honey
a little spelt flour

do
Pre-heat the oven to 190°C.
blanch the almonds, dry them in the sun and grate them finely with a hand grater. Add the honey. Mix and knead to a thick mass of marzipan. Cool for at least 30 minutes.
Sprinkle very little flour on a linen tea towel to prevent sticking. Turn a rolling pin in the flour so it becomes dusty.
Place the marzipan on the tea towel and roll it out. It should not be too sticky. Roll it out quite thinly, as much as possible given that it is more sticky than pastry, but avoid mixing too much flour into the marzipan. Stamp out biscuit shapes and collect the off-cuts for the next batch.
Place the marzipan shapes on a buttered baking tray and bake on the bottom shelf of the oven for 12-15 minutes until slightly golden.
Cool.
Store in a paper-lined tin.

Baked honey marzipan is a simple recipe and depends greatly on the quality of its ingredients. The result is easy to chew sweet nuts. Make sure the honey you use is one you really like. I prefer it to be mild but aromatic for this recipe with almonds, such as organic coastal Australian heath honey
Image: Flegel, George, still life with parrot and mouse, 1610, via Zeno

Honey biscuits with apricots

Get:
200g soft organic butter
150g organic honey
2 tsp ground cinnamon
2/3 nutmeg, grated
150g chopped dried unsulphured apricots
200g chopped blanched almonds
450g organic spelt flour

Do:
Preheat oven to 190°c.
Beat butter and honey smooth with a wooden spoon.
Add cinnamon and nutmeg. Beat.
Mix in apricots and nuts.
Add 400g flour and knead into a dry dough. Add more flour if sticky. Cool for 15+ minutes.
Sprinkle a little of the remaining flour on a tea towel (linen). Roll out half of the pastry quite thin. This will further crush some of the nuts. Turn the pastry once or twice so it does not stick to the cloth.
Stamp out biscuits. Press down hard to cut through the fruit and nuts. (Alternatively make the pastry into a roll and cut off round discs).
Butter a baking tray.
Place the biscuits on it and bake in the oven for 15 minutes on the second shelf from the bottom.
Repeat until all the dough is used up.
Store in a tin.

Tip.
Make biscuits of different sizes for different occasions. Small ones are good portable food. Big ones for home use.

How to blanch almonds

Almond biscuits

get
450g wholemeal flour (spelt flour)
2 tbsp honey
1 egg
1.5 heaped teasp ground cinnamon
250g butter
450g organic almonds

do
Blanch almonds: add to a pot of boiling water for a few minutes. Pour out hot water and add cold water. Rinse twice in a sieve. Rub almonds repeatedly between the hands and remove skins. Wash from time to time to assist with separation of almonds and skins.
Mix honey and egg in the middle of the flour in a large bowl.
Add cinnamon, butter flakes. Grate 300g almonds and add to the mixture.
Knead to a pastry. Add extra flour if sticky.
Cool in fridge.
Roll out thin.
Using cookie cutting tools cut out shapes. Place a whole or half an almond on each cookie, pressing lightly.

Bake at 190°c for 8 minutes on a baking tray in batches. Cool.
Store in a tin lined with greaseproof paper in a cool place.

Also delicious as filled cookies (as shown in the second picture).

Lemon slices

GET
300 g organic wholemeal spelt flour
1 heaped tbsp organic honey
1 organic free range egg
130g butter

200g organic almonds, blanched and finely grated
2 lemons
2 tbsp honey

50 g organic icing sugar

DO
Put flour in a large bowl
Add honey and egg in the middle
Mix to a thick paste
Add flakes of butter
Knead to a pastry. If it is sticky, add more flour, if not smooth add more butter
Cool for an hour.

Mix almonds with grated lemon rind (zest), juice of 1.5 lemons and honey to make a thick spreadable paste.
Roll out half the pastry into a large thin rectangle on a linen cloth. Turn it over as you go to facilitate rolling it thinly.
Place on a buttered baking tray (e.g. 40 x 30 cm). Cut the edges to fit
Spread the lemon-almond paste evenly on the pastry
Roll out the other half of the pastry to the same size and place carefully on top.
Bake at 190°c for 15 minutes on the second shelf from the bottom.
Mix 0.5 lemon juice with icing sugar. Paint it on the hot pastry.
Cool
Cut into slices (about 40 rectangular biscuits)
Remove from baking tray and store in a tin.These biscuits are very tangy and light. The recipe seems quite simple and it is. Most of the time is spent rolling out the pastry thinly. This involves rolling it on a tea towel, squaring the edges, turning it over and rolling again. You need to turn it and roll it a few times before it is large enough and thin enough. Carefully turn it on the backs of your hands.
Arranging the top pastry on is also tricky. If necessary, cut it into 2 pieces.
These lemon slices last well in a tin, but are generally eaten very quickly.
>Check also the alternative jucier variety out.