Lebkuchen

I have not been around for the last 5 days or so as I was out of town.With Summer ending (although I am not quite ready yet), we planned a vacation to OBX and it was absolutely fantastic there. The weather scared us a bit initially with Hurricane Bill and later Danny near the islands. Luckily, the weather cooperated and we went around! I will post the pictures soon. I know I have to post the Bushkill falls trip pics as well. Once I ease back into my routine, I will post the pics and some pending recipes too! For now, I am posting some of my Germany trip pics.

Germany, A beautiful country famous for great musicians like Beethoven, for the black forest cuckoo clocks, for Volkswagen and Porsche, for the Autobahn, has a distinctive cuisine. When you think of German food, Sauerkraut and beer cross the mind.But, there is much more to it than just these!
The Germans have a tradition of five meals a day. The day starts with Frühstück (Breakfast), which is followed by a second breakfast, a few hours later –Zweites Frühstück.At midday is their dinner, Mittagessen which is usually a hot meal.In the afternoon, comes their snack time-Kaffee which is more than just coffee!The day concludes with a light supper called Abendrot.I wonder if they still follow this tradition!
When I was making Lebkuchen, I was recollecting my trip to Germany in ’04.My food there primarily consisted of French fries and ate Lebkuchen once. The cookies were very delicious. I have heard that the cookies do not contain ginger although the recipe that I used does contain a small quantity of powdered ginger.
Here are some of the pics of my trip. I would have loved to share more but the ‘Devil’ seems to be in almost all the pics: D. Thought will spare you some fright!

Heidelberg Castle



Castles you can see alongside Rhine.You have to excuse me for the picture quality.We took it while we were cruising.:)



This Cuckoo clock is the size of a small house.On the hour, the dolls (couples) come out dancing.
The partial head that you can see is of my DH's:D


Cologne Cathedral



Decoration is an important aspect in making Lebkuchen. The decorations were made with inscriptions, made into heart shapes cookies, or even Christmas cards with angels cooing!In the story written by Gottfried Keller, ‘Romeo und Julia auf dem Dorfe’ ( A Village Romeo and Juliet), the heroine gives her lover a Lebkuchen heart with an inscription “A sweet almond kernel is in this heart, but my love for you is sweeter than the almond”

Adapted from: Better homes and Gardens New baking Book

Makes 40 cookies; The recipe from the book yields 48 cookies. They used square cookie cutters.

1 egg
¾ cup light brown sugar
½ cup honey
½ cup molasses
3 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp ground cloves
½ tsp ground ginger
¼ tsp ground cardamom
½ cup chopped almonds
½ cup mixed candied fruits and/or raisins
1 recipe lemon glaze



Beat the egg on high speed. To this, add brown sugar, by beating on med speed until fluffy. Add molasses and honey to it and mix well

Sift the dry ingredients-flour, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, cardamom. Combine the dry ingredients with the egg mixture. Combine well using hand. The dough will be stiff and tough to handle. Add almonds and the candies mix. Refrigerate the dough in a bowl covered for 8 hrs or until the dough is easy to handle.

Preheat the oven to 350F.Line a baking sheet with al foil and grease it.

Remove the dough from the bowl and divide the dough into 2 halves. Roll the dough into a 12X8 inch rectangle. Since I had the round cookie cutters, I made them into circles instead of squares.
Cut 2 inch circles. Place them carefully on the baking sheets.

Bake them in the oven for 10 min. Remove the cookies and cool them on the baking sheet for a minute or so.

While warm brush with lemon glaze and decorate with candied fruit. You can store it in an airtight container for up to 7 days for the flavors to mellow. It tastes better when stored for several days.

For the glaze:
1 ½ cups confectioners’ sugar
1 tbsp butter, melted
1 tbsp lemon juice




Combine all of them by adding 3- 4 tsp of water such that it forms a drizzling consistency.

This goes to AWED German, guest hosted by Lakshmi Venkatesh, started by DK of Chef in You.

Jyoti, Sushma and Mythreyi passed me some wonderful award(s)/scrap again!Will post it in the next couple of days!

Have fun now:)
Shri