Sinterklaas Recipe Gevulde Speculaas From The Mrs

SPECULAAS COOKIES OR SPICY SINTERKLASS CAKES

Steps:

• In a large bowl, dissolve the brown sugar in milk. Combine the flour, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, baking powder and salt. Stir the dry ingredients into the sugar and milk. Mix in 2 tablespoons of almonds and candied citron. Cut in the butter until it starts to form a dough, then knead on a lightly floured surface until smooth. Cover dough and chill for about 1 hour for easier handling.
• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Dust a wooden speculaas mold lightly with cornstarch. Firmly press the dough into the mold. Run a knife around the edges to trim off excess dough. Gently lift dough out of the mold or tap out onto a cookie sheet. Press remaining almond slivers into cookies to match the designs.
• Bake for 15 minutes in the preheated oven, just until the edges begin to darken. If your cookies are more than 1/2 inch thick, bake at 300 degrees F (150 degrees C) for up to 30 minutes. Cool cookies on wire racks to crisp. Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to a month. The flavor will get better with age.

GEVULDE SPECULAAS

Steps:

• Mix cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, nutmeg, mace, allspice, cloves, and ginger together in a bowl to make speculaas spice mix.
• Pulse almonds in a food processor until finely ground. Add 3/4 cup white sugar, egg, 1 teaspoon almond extract, and 1/2 teaspoon lemon zest. Pulse until mixture forms a ball.
• Combine speculaas spice mix, flour, brown sugar, orange zest, 1/2 teaspoon lemon zest, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Cut in butter with a pastry blender until dough resembles coarse crumbs. Add milk, vanilla extract, and 1/4 teaspoon almond extract; mix until dough forms a smooth ball.
• Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Line a 9-inch springform pan with parchment paper.
• Divide dough into 2 pieces. Roll out into circles on a lightly floured work surface. Press 1 circle over the bottom and 1 inch up the sides of the lined pan. Spread almond mixture on top. Cover with second circle and seal edges over filling.
• Mix 2 tablespoons white sugar, water, and 1/4 teaspoon almond extract in a small bowl to make a thick paste. Brush paste over top of the dough. Arrange slivered almonds in a decorative pattern on top.
• Bake in the preheated oven until golden brown, about 20 minutes. Let cool before removing the outer ring of the springform pan, about 30 minutes.

SPECULAAS HOLLAND COOKIES FOR SINTERKLAAS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• For the dough stir together 1 1/2 cups flour with 1/3 cup flour,baking soda,salt,cinnamon,groud cloves,nutmeg.
• Next add the 3/4 cup brown sugar,mix well.
• Next cut in 1 1/2 sticks of butter and add the blanched almonds and milk.
• Knead everything together into a stiff dough,if its too stiff add 1/2 tablespoon of milk.
• Roll dough out on a floured surface to about 1/4 inch thickness.
• Cut with cookie cutters into any shape you'd like.
• Lay out on lightly greased cookie sheet,bake about 20 minutes.

SINTERKLAAS RECIPE: GEVULDE SPECULAAS FROM THE MRS.

Steps:

• Preheat the oven up to 150° Celcius. Put the flour, the speculaaskruiden, the sugar, the butter (in small pieces) and the milk in a bowl and knead until you have a dough. At this point you could choose to roll the dough into some foil and put it into the refrigerator to let it soak up all the herbs, but I have to confess I mostly am too impatient for that, so I skip that step. Now you split the dough in two equal parts. The first part you roll onto a greased oven plate in whatever shape you want, could be a square, a heart.. Smear the almond paste on top of the dough, but leave some space at the edges. Then add the second part of the dough on top of this and close the sides, enclosing the almond paste. Now you can decorate with the sliced almons and cover with the egg yolk. Put it into the oven and bake the speculaas for about 30-45 minutes (check if it's golden brown). Then get it out of the oven and make sure it cools off and gets a bit harder before you start cutting it (but not too long, because it's delicious when it's still warm :-)) Bon appetit! * Speculaaskruiden is a Dutch mixture of 8 parts cinnamon, ground,; 2 parts nutmeg; 2 parts cloves; 1 part cardamon; 1 part white pepper and 1 part ginger ground, ** Almond paste is something you can buy here already made at the store, but you could make it yourself too. For that you need: 100 gr white almonds ground 100 gr granulated sugar 0,5-0,7 egg grated peel of a half lemon Put in a bowl the almond ground, the granulated sugar and lemonpeel. Add enough but not too much egg, to make it one whole mass but not too sticky on the outside. Roll it in plastic foil and put it in the refrigerator.