Marzipan cake with ginger and lime for 2017

At Midnight New Year´s Eve it is tradition to enjoy marzipan cakes (kransekage) together with champagne/sparkling wine, when the bell will ring it´s 12 strokes.

This year I have been inspired by a recipe on coconut top cakes with the flavouring of ginger and lime. In 2017 I will actually bake these coconut top cakes. Now the big question is, how the taste of ginger is coming around, too weak or too strong. As I am regular juicing my own juice with ginger, I have noticed that my taste buds for ginger taste can take more and more ginger. Hopefully my good friends in Horsens will survive !!!

The advantage of baking your own marzipan cakes is, that you decided on both the sweetness level as well as the taste of these cakes, if you want to twist the taste.

Marzipan cake with ginger and lime - home-made: - 16 pieces

• 225 g marzipan
• 55 g icing sugar
• 55 g almond flour
• 20 g egg white
• 1 teaspoon freshly juiced ginger juice
• 1/4 teaspoon organic lime zest
• Decoration: egg white + icing sugar - optional

1. Heat the oven to 220'C (conventional oven).
2. Stir the icing sugar, ginger juice and lime zest together with the egg white, so any lumps are removed.
3. Stir in the almond flour.
4. Knead the marzipan together with this sugar-almond-egg white together
5. Divide the marzipan cake mass into 16 pieces of equal size.
6. Form the marzipan cake mass into a round sharp.
7. Bake the marzipan cake mass at 220'C for 7-8 minutes.
8. Cool down the marzipan cake.
9. Decorate the top of the marzipan cake with icing sugar - optional.
10. Let the icing sugar dry.
11. Enjoy !!!!

Suggestions for home-made marzipan cake for celebration of the upcoming New Year of 2017

Christmas was removed from my home and kitchen yesterday, so now it is time to prepare for New Year´s Eve tomorrow, where marzipan cake (kransekage) is so tradtional to eat here in Denmark, as we step into a new year at Midnight. The marzipan cake is served together with sparkling wine/champane/bobbles, if you really would like to enjoy this combination make sure, that the sparkling wine is sweet, as the combo of dry sparkling wine and sweet marzipan is not creating any magic together !!!

If you would like to bake your very own marzipan cakes, I will already now share my entire collection of various suggestions on marzipan cake (known as kransekage in Denmark), which I have created during the "life time" of Kitchen of Kiki in this blog post. It will give you time to go shopping for the needed ingredients as well as baking them for New Year's Eve tomorrow and perhaps clear out the last Christmas marzipan left-overs.

I find, that the major advantages of making your own marzipan cake is, that you are in control of the overall  sweetness in the final cake, so you can make the cake more or less sweet according to your sweetness preference, instead for "just living with" the sweetness in the cakes, which you buy, which I find to be too sweet !!!

If you would like to have  more softness in your marzipan cake, you should freeze them after baking. The only drawback is, that I find freezing to reduce the overall flavour profile of the cake.

The "classic" type of marzipan cake is the white version of these zebra marzipan cake. The white version is made from plain marzipan, while the dark version is made from marzipan containing cocoa.

Another good tasting marzipan cake could be these marzipan orange cakes or with an extra little twist in of orange flower as here marzipan orange cakes with orange flower. A third suggestion giving similar looking cakes are marzipan cakes with clementine and Cointreau.

Another excellent taste twist on "kransekage" is pomegranate marzipan cake combining the freshness of pomegranate with the sweetness of marzipan.

As a colourful farewell to 2016 these baked marzipan confect are an option. The only drawback is, that the forest fruit marzipan (purple looking marzipan) is loosing colour during the baking !!! However, you do not need to worry about this topic, as Odense Marcipan has withdrawn this specific marzipan product from their product range.

In 2013 liquorice marzipan was the "new black flavour" within the marzipan world, as it so many other food items here in Danmark, so therefore I created these liquorice marzipan cake. Also in 2014 I made liquorice marzipan cake.

Another fantastic flavour combination would be this marzipan cake with raspberry and lime, which you share with your sweet heart.

In 2015 I made this fantastic marzipan horn.

I will not be making any of the above mentioned suggestion for New Year's Eve, as I will trying out a new recipe to mark the transition into 2017, so look by tomorrow on New Year Eve day for the marzipan creation of 2016 :-)

Farewell to Christmas Calendar 2016

I hope that you as I have enjoyed our kitchen journey through this busy month of Christmas reading and hopefully getting inspiration for your own kitchen creations from my daily Christmas Calender posts for 2016, as I have enjoyed the time spend time making them in my little kitchen.

I keep myself entertained during the dark and grey Winter time creating my very own Christmas Calendar just like the ones on TV ! For me it is a way for keeping my mood up during a long, dark, gray and rainy Winter season with days having around 7 hours of sun light in case, that the sun actually shows it´s face ! as it keep me busy instead of hiding under my duvet like a little moody and sleepy brown bear !!!

So I  baked different stuff and made Christmas sweets, which I have been using as stocking fillings for a good colleague at work as well as serving all these goodies at both and filling up all the empty tins of my mother. My mother prefers these brown cakes, as they are softer to chew than both these giant pepper cookies (my personal preference due to great taste of pepper) and Christmas biscotti.





Reviewing your visits to my Christmas Calendar 2016, I have made a TOP 5 over the most popular Christmas Calendar Daily entries according to your preference:

1. Brown cakes
2. Brown cake liqueur
3. Gingerbread cake with liquorice twist
4. Apple ginger cake
5. Apple cake with walnuts

Looking into this TOP 5 list I will concluded, that together we have enjoy a great Christmas afternoon tea, which was also the theme of Christmas Calendar 2016.

I will already now promise you, that I will make a new Christmas Calendar in 2017. If you have an idea, please feel to leave a comment. You are also more than welcome to share your opinion on the Christmas Calender 2016 at the same time.
I think, that I as many other bloggers appreciate your comments, as we when know, that someone actually is reading our blogs !! So do not be shy, but make my day by leaving a comment :-)

Christmas lunch 2016 for "The Wonderful Women" 2016

The annual Christmas lunch for "The Wonderful Women" took place this afternoon for a bigger group this year - GREAT :-)

This time we went for our usual tapas selection from Osteriet with company in form of two home-made breads: saffron bread with Nigella seeds and durum bread with beer and walnuts.

As tradition demands we started the Christmas lunch with a bobbling Christmas glögg cocktail.

The dessert part of this Christmas lunch was a selection of sweets:

• Brown cakes
• Giant pepper cookies
• Christmas biscotti
• Marzipan with cherry
• Marzipan with liquorice and orange
• White chocolate truffle with lemon curd

The tradition also describes, that we have to play the gift play (pakkeleg in Danish) using a specific card game, so not dices as normal. All participants bring between 2-8 gifts, and in the card game you either end up with most of the gifts or not gifts at all. As the gifts can be everything between soap, paperbacks, ugly Christmas decorations or left over Christmas food, it is not good to get all the gifts !

As usual we spend some great hours in good company getting up to date with each others lifes :-)

SWEET GREEN

I think for the very first time in my kitchen I have been a green healthy looking juice, which I actually like, and which I can drink as a soft drink. I actually find this juice to be too sweet in the taste, so you could easily reduce the amount of apples, if you prefer less sweet juices.

SWEET GREEN: 6-8servings

• 300 g fresh spinach
• 2 cucumbers
• 2 lime - without peel
• 40 g mint - only the leaves to reduce bitter taste
• 1200 g apples - without core

1. Clean all the ingredients.
2. Juice everything together.
3. Store cold, can be stored 2-3 days in the refrigerator.
4. Enjoy

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Merry Christmas to all of you

I wish you a merry Christmas during your visit in my little kitchen :-) I hope you will enjoy your stay here, being either a short browse or a long stay.

Today is the day of farewell to this year Christmas Calendar 2016, which I hope have brought you joy during a perhaps stressful Christmas time. I have for sure got a kitchen full of Christmas goodies, when making all the many blog posts for this year´s Christmas Calendar.

Thank your for dropping by and have wonderful Christmas together with your family :-)

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Pink risalamande

In December Ris à l´amande is THE Christmas dessert in Denmark. And at work it will be served every Friday at lunch, starting from the Friday before the first Sunday in Advent. And some of these dessert portion will actual contain whole almonds, where the lucky finders will be able to pick up a small present in form of Christmas cookies, candy and a mandarine. Even though I have working many years, where I have been working at my present work place, I think I only twice have gotten a portion of ris à l´amande with a whole almond in-side, whereas some of my colleagues have almost a weekly "hit rate" on the whole almond.

This year I have been twisting my "classic" risalamande" into a pink version. Another tiwst this year is, that I have been roasting the chopped almonds. This actually increase the taste of almond in the final dessert.

Pink risalamande (Traditional Danish rice pudding with warm cherry sauce) - 4 persons:

• 2 dl porridge rice
• 6 dl water
• 2 dl milk
• ½ vanilla pod
• 1tabelspoon sugar
• 75 g almond - without skin, chopped and roasted
• 2-2½ dl dairy whipping cream - 38% fat
• Amarena cherries

1. Cook the rice and water in the EasyRice cooker in the microwave oven - 15 minutes - 800 W.  Do NOT cook the rice porridge with the milk in the EasyRice cooker as you will damage your Tupperware plastic thing.
2. Take the EasyRice cooker out of the microwave oven.
3. Add the milk together with vanilla corns as well as the vanilla pod in the Mircroplus pot. Heat it up to the boiling point.
4. Mix the warm milk with the rice in the EasyRice cooker and leave it for 10 minute. Also add sugar.
5. After 10 minutes cold down the rice porridge.
6. Store the rice porridge cold for 3-4 hours or night over.
7. Whip the cream.
8. Remove the vanilla pot from the rice porrigde
9. Mix cold rice porridge, almond splits and syrup from Amarena cherries.
10. Gentle mix in the whipped cream. 
11. Let the rest for another 1-2 hours.
12. Serve the risalamande with 4-5 Amarena cherries and some of the syrup.
13. Enjoy and merry Christmas :-)

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Christmas citrus juice

I think it is time for some refreshing juice after eating plenty of cakes and sweet treats during the month of December.

December is a month full of various citrus such as orange, clementines and grapefruit, so these citrus fruits are used for this juice. It is a juice, which you could enjoy during the upcoming Christmas holidays.

I juice the citrus fruits wihout peel, as the peel gives bitterness to the final juice. If you would like to have some bitterness in the juice, you could juice one, two or more of the citrus juice with the peel on. In case you juice with citrus peel, it is important, why you use organic citrus fruit or citrus fruit without surface treatment of the citrus fruit.

Christmas citrus juice: - 2 servings

• 1 red grapefruit - without peel
• 2 oranges - without peel
• 4 clementines - without peel

1. Juice all the citrus fruit together.
2. Store cold, can be stored 2-3 days in the refrigerator.
3. Enjoy.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Christmas chocolate cake

A chocolate cake was also be turned into a Christmas version. I have used a recipe from the magazine "Isabellas" (issue 7/2015), and the only modification is, that I have not coated the chocolate cake in layer of dark chocolate.

The taste is very rich with it´s Christmas spices and use of dried fruits and nuts.

Christmas chocolate cake: - 1 cake

• 300 g sugar
• 4 eggs
• 220 g (cake) wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon cloves
• 2 tablespoons cocoa powder
• 1½ dl dairy whipping cream, 35-40% fat
• 100 g butter
• 100 g dark chocolate with orange flavour - roughly chopped
• 50 g dried apricot - medium chopped
• 50 g date - medium chopped
• 40 g pickled ginger - finely chopped
• 40 g walnuts - medium chopped
• 40 g pistachio nuts - medium chopped

1. Heat up the oven to 180'C.
2. Add the butter and dark to a cooking pot. Melt the butter and chocolate together uver medium heat.
3. Whip the sugar and egg together into a foamy mass in a medium size mixing bowl.
4. Add into the flour, baking powder, spices, cocoa powder, whip everything together.
5. Add in the whipping cream little by little, while whipping.
6. Add in the melted butter-chocolate, while whipping.
7. Add into the chopped fruit and nuts, stir in by hand.
8. Cover a 2 l baking form with baking paper.
9. Fill the dough into the form.
10. Place the form in middle of the oven, bake at 180'C for 50-70 minutes.
11. Check the cake mass after 40 minutes, if it is baked.
12. Cold down the down on a rack, before the cake is sliced.
13. Enjoy the cake together with a nice cup of tea.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Christmas kringle

As a modification to the Christmas apple stick, I would made a version without apple. This was actually a good decision, as some of the guest for my Christmas coffee were not to keen on baked apples.

Christmas kringle: - 2 cakes

Dough:

• 300 g wheat flour
• 100 g butter
• 20 g fresh yeast
• 25 g sugar
• 2 g salt
• 1 egg
• 100 g milk

Filling:

• 100 g butter - soft
• 100 g sugar
• 100 g marzipan - roughly grated
• 50 g almond - roughly chopped
• 50 g sucat - roughly chopped
• whipped egg for glazing

1. Add all the dough ingredients into the mixing bowl of the stand-alone mixer.
2. Knead the dough for 5 minutes on speed 2.
3. Cover the mixing bowl with a tea towel, and let the dough raise for 45-60 minutes.
4. Meanwhile make the filling.
5. Add butter and sugar into mixing bowl, stir into a homogeneous mass by hand.
6. Afterwards add in the marzipan, chopped almonds and sucat, stir everything together.
7. Heat up the oven to 220'C.
8. Divide the dough into two portions. Place each dough portion on a piece of baking paper.
9. Roll each dough portion into 15 x 25 cm.
10. Divide the filling into 2 two portions.
11. Place the filling portion in the middle of the dough. And spread out.
12. Cover the filling with rest of the dough.
13. Move the kringle with baking paper to the baking tray.
14. Glaze the dough with whipped egg.
15. Bake the kringle at 220'C in the middle of the oven for 20 minutes.
16. Bake the kringle, until they are golden.
17. Cold down the kringle on a oven rack.
18. Slice the apple sticks, when they are cold.

Christmas coffee for fantastic women of Vejle 2016

It this time of the year, when it is time again to invite some fantastic women for the annual glögg evening, which also usual are keen to taste some of my many Christmas creations.

And as usual we had an evening, where my kitchen living area was full of good talks and great laugther, while the fantastic women did their best to eat me of my kitchen !!!!

The liquid part of the "menu" this time not the usual warm glögg, but instead of a Christmas glögg cocktail served together with the usual coffee and Christman tea with a small glass of brown cake liqueur, which will assist the local "helping mouths" in enjoying the following "creations" from the Christmas Calender 2016:

• Cinnamon orange scones with clementine curd
• Hazelnut cake with chocolate and cherry
• Christmas apple sticks
• Christmas kringle
• Brown cakes
• Giant pepper cookies
• Christmas biscotti
• Marzipan with cherry
• Marzipan with liquorice and orange
• White chocolate truffle with lemon curd

Besides from helping me with eating plenty of Christmas calories, I also got some lovely hostess gifts, thank you so much for these great gifts :-)

And yes, ladies of Vejle you will be invited again for gløgg evening in 2017 :-)

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Christmas apple sticks

Since I first tried to bake these Ester's apple sticks in Autumn, I have known, that I wanted to make a Christmas version of them full of cinnamon, sucat and marzipan.

Christmas Apple Sticks: - 2 cakes

Dough:

• 300 g wheat flour
• 100 g butter
• 20 g fresh yeast
• 25 g sugar
• 2 g salt
• 1 egg
• 100 g milk

Filling:

• 100 g butter - soft
• 100 g sugar
• 100 g marzipan - roughly grated
• 50 g almond - roughly chopped
• 50 g sucat - roughly chopped
• 1 apple - sliced into thin boat shapes.
• chai sugar
• whipped egg for glazing

1. Add all the dough ingredients into the mixing bowl of the stand-alone mixer.
2. Knead the dough for 5 minutes on speed 2.
3. Cover the mixing bowl with a tea towel, and let the dough raise for 45-60 minutes.
4. Meanwhile make the filling.
5. Add butter and sugar into mixing bowl, stir into a homogeneous mass by hand.
6. Afterwards add in the marzipan, chopped almonds and sucat, stir everything together.
7. Heat up the oven to 220'C.
8. Divide the dough into two portions. Place each dough portion on a piece of baking paper.
9. Roll each dough portion into 15 x 25 cm.
10. Divide the filling into 2 two portions.
11. Place the filling portion in the middle of the dough. And spread out.
12. Place the apple boats on top of the filling.
13. Sprinkle the apple pieces with chai sugar.
14. Cover the filling and apple with rest of the dough.
15. Move the apple stick with baking paper to the baking tray.
16. Glaze the dough with whipped egg.
17. Bake the apple sticks at 220'C in the middle of the oven for 20 minutes.
18. Bake the apple stick, until they are golden.
19. Cold down the apple sticks on a oven rack.
20. Slice the apple sticks, when they are cold.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Hazelnut cake with white chocolate and cherry

I have been looking forward to try out this recipe from the weekly magazine "Søndag" (issue 29/2016) for quiet some time. And I found it to be fitting perfect into this theme of Christmas afternoon tea. Instead of fresh cherries I have used Amarena cherries, which is very fitting in this season of Christmas.

The taste and texture is great. The taste of jasmine tea in the cream topping is very delicate, I had some issues in tasting the jasmine tea flavour, however some of my work colleagues could not identify the flavour of jasmine. 

Hazelnut cale with white chocolate and cherry: - for 8-12 persons

• 4½ egg whites
• 200 g sugar
• 200 g hazelnuts - medium chopped
• 1 tablespoon of cocoa
• 100 g while chocolate - finely chopped
• 2½ dl dairy whipping cream, 35-40% fat
• 1 tablespoon of jasmine tea
• approx 40 Amarena cherries

1. Heat up the oven to 175'C.
2. Whip the egg white stiff.
3. Add in the sugar and whip until the mass is very stiff.
4. Add in the chopped hazelnuts, and mix everything gentle together.
5. Fill the mass into a spring form, where the bottom layer is covered by baking paper.
6. Place the form in middle of the oven, and bake the bake at 175'C for 30 min.
7. Check, that the cake is baked, before removing it form the oven.
8. Cold down the cake.
9. Sprinkle the top of the cake with cocoa powder.
10. Add the jasmine tea and dairy whipping cream into a cooking pot.
11. Bring the cream to the boil.
12. Remove the cream from the heat, and let the jasmine tea infuse the cream for 5-10 minutes.
13. Pour the cream through a sieve in order to remove the tea leaves.
14. Add the cream and chopped white chocolate into a mixing bowl, stir until the chocolate is melted.
15. Cover the mixing bowl with a lid, and place the cream cold in the refrigerator for min 4 hours or night over.
16. Whip the cream, until it has a consistency as whipped dairy cream. 
17. Fill the whipped cream into pipping bag.
18. Pip the cream in form of small tops on the top of the cake.
19. Decorate each cream top with Amarena cherry.
20. Store the cake cold, until it could be served for the guests.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Christmas glögg cocktail

Another way of enjoying mulled wine could be to serve a cocktail made from mulled wine and sparkling wine.

I always like to serve a glass of sparkling wine, when I am having guests coming around. It gives that extra luxury feel, and the talk between the guests always start running very fast.

Christmas cocktail: - 1 drink

• 3-5 cl glögg extract
• sparkling wine

1. Fill  the glögg extract into a champagne glass.
2. Fill up the rest of the glass with sparkling wine.
3. Cheers - wish you a merry Christmas.

Chirstmas Calendar 2016 - Cinnamon orange scones

It is about time, that I bake some scones for this Christmas Calendar of 2016 with focus on afternoon tea. These scones could be served with butter, clementine curd and tea/coffee.

I really the taste of the scones, which was fantastic. However, I was not to happy about the texture of the scones dough, so I would next time use this recipe on classic scones as starting point.

Cinnamon orange scones: - xx scones

• 350 g (cake) flour
• 100 g butter - diced into smaller pieces
• 2 teaspoon baking powder
• 50 g sugar
• 75 ml milk
• 1 egg
• 1 organic orange - both the zest juice approx 75 ml orange juice
• 50 g sucred orange peel (sucat)
• 1½ teaspoon cinnamon
• milk or egg for glazing

1. Heat up the fan oven to 200'C.
2. Add all the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl.
3. Add the butter pieces and rub the butter into the flour mix, until it look like fine breadcrumbs,
4. Whip the milk, orange juice and egg together and add it the dry ingredients. Combine it into a homogeneous looking mass using a eating knife.
5. Leave it to rest for 10-15 minutes. 
6. Press the scone dough into a height of 3-4 cm. 
7. Use a small cutter or glass to cut out the scones, which is placed on a baking tray covered with baking paper.
8. Glaze the scones with milk or whipped egg.
9. Bake at 200'C for 12-15 minutes.
10. Cold down on a baking rack.
11. Serve together with butter and clementine curd.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - White chocolate truffle with lemon curd

The final sweet treat for the Christmas of 2016, which time is form white chocolate - lemon curd truffle coated in white chocolate. So if we do not get a White Christmas, when I can at least serve White Christmas marzipan sweets.

I have found this recipe in the magazine "Isabellas" (issue 06/2016), and I have made no modification to it.

White chocolate truffle with lemon curd: -approx 25 pieces

• ½ dl dairy whipping cream
• 200 g white chocolate
• 200 g almond flour
• ½ dl lemon  curd
• 400 g white chocolate
• decoration viols

1. Heat up the dairy whipping cream.
2. Chopped the white chocolate (200 g), add it to a mixing bowl.
3. Pour the cream over the white chocolate.
4. Place the mixing bowl in a water bath.
5. Stir until the white chocolate in melted.
6. Add into the almond flour and lemon curd.
7. Stir everything together.
8. Place this chocolate mass cold inthe refrigerator for 2-3 hours or night over.
9. Use two tea spoons to form the truffle mass into ball shape. You can use your hands for the last finishing touch. 
10. Temper the white chocolate.
11. Cover the truffle mass in the melted white chocolate, one piece by the time,so the truffle mass does not melt in the melted chocolate.
12. Sprinkle the truffle balls with decoration viols.
13. Lets the chocolate dry, before the truffle is stored in air tight containers in the refrigerator for later use.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Marzipan with liquorice and orange

Christmas is getting closer, and so are the guests, which I have invited for Christmas evening coffee, so I need to make some more marzipan sweet treats. This time I am using an recipe from a special Christmas feature from the weekly magazine "Søndag".

Marzipan with liquorice and orange: - 16 pieces

• 2 organic oranges - only the zest
• 200 g marzipan
• 1½ teaspoon liquorice powder
• 20 g unsalted pistachio kernels - medium chopped
• 125 g white chocolate

1. Knead the marzipan, orange zest and liquorice powder together.
2. Shape the marzipan in a thin roll, which is cut into 16 pieces.
3. Store the marzipan pieces cold for 2-4 hours.
4. Temper the white chocolate.
5. Cover the marzipan pieces in the melted white chocolate.
6. Sprinkle the marzipan pieces with chopped pistachio.
7. Lets the chocolate dry, before the liquorice-orange marzipan sweet treat is stored in air tight containers for later use.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Marzipan with cherry

It is time to make some "konfekt" sweet treat with marzipan as main/important ingredient. The flavouring part is cherry, which is another traditional fruit in connection with Danish Christmas. I have been used sweet pickled cherries from Sellenberg, which I brought at the Christmas fair at CLAY.

Marzipan with cherry:  - approx 30 pieces

• 3 tablespoons of sweet pickled cherry
• 300 g marzipan
• 150-175 g dark chocolate
• 40 g freeze-dried raspberry

1. Add the marzipan and sweet pickled to a mixing bowl, where you knead it together.
2. Divide the marzipan mass into 30 pieces, which is rolled into ball shape.
3. Store the marzipan balls cold for 3-4 hours or night over in the refrigerator.
4. Temper the dark chocolate.
5. Cover the marzipan balls in dark chocolate.
6. Drizzle freeze-dried raspberry on to the dark chocolate.
7. Lets the chocolate dry, before the cherry marzipan sweet treat is stored in air tight containers for later use.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - clementine curd

Instead of the more traditional lemon curd I have been making clementine curd using this recipe on lemon curd as starting point. Clementine is in season in connection with Christmas, so I though this twist to curd would be very fitting to this year´s Christmas Calendar.

If you look in later this month you can see, that I have been using this clementine curd for.

If you notice, that your curd is not firm enough in the glasses after the cooking, you can empty the glasses and give it a new cooking up to have more denaturation of the egg protein, as this will give thickness/firmness. However, it is very important, that the curd is not boiling as this will give an unpleasant grainy texture.

Clementine curd: - 2 glasses

•         3 eggs
•         200 g sugar
•          5 organic clementines – zest and juice
•          50 g butter – cut into smaller pieces

1. Start by adding boiling water to the storage containers/glasses.
2. Take the zest from the clementines as well as squeeze the clementines for their juice.
3. Whip eggs and sugar together in a bowl, before pouring this mass into a small cooking pot.
4. Afterwards add in the clementines zest and juice.
5. Heat on the clementine curd mass on low heat, stir very well in the mass, heat the mass until it thickens. The clementine curd must not boil.
6. Remove the cooking pot form the heat and stir in the butter and let it melt.
7. Pour the clementine curd into the prepared containers/glass and place them in the refrigerator.
8. In case you add no preservation to the clementine curd, the shelf-life of it is approx. 1 week, when stored cold in the refrigerator.

Christmas fair at CLAY

Last Wednesday evening my mother and I went drove to Middefart to experience the Christmas fair at CLAY.

Ceramic by Line Skovlod

Ceramic by Anitta Due

Besides from a few ceramics displaying their work it was also possible for both taste and buy cherry products from Selleberg.










I went away with some cherry products for use in my kitchen in connection with Christmas as well as a new ceramic cup for drinking tea made by Line Skovlod.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Glögg extract

It is time to make some glögg extract (mulled wine extract), and in this case you need to do some planning, as the process involves 3 days of infusion of the extract in the refrigerator, so it is not an easy fix. A faster version would be this mulled white wine, which requires a night over infusion with the spices.

It is also the first time, that I see the use of vanilla pod in glögg extract, all the other spices are the classic Christmas spices. I have found this recipe in either "Alt for Damerne" or "Femina", I do not recall.

This glögg extract can be heated up with raisins and almond pieces to be served warm as traditional glögg. Another option is to heat it up and pour into a cup of black tea or to be served as Christmas cocktail, which is the purpose I am intending to use this glöog extract for. 

Glögg extract:

• 350 g sugar
• 1 bottle of red wine
• 2 dl port wine
• 2 dl orange syrup
• 1 organic lemon - only the zest
• 3 cinnamon sticks
• 5 cardamon kernels
• 3 star anise
• 4 black peppercorns
• 3 pieces of all spice
• 10 cloves
• 1 vanilla pod - corn and pod

1. All the ingredients into big cooking pot. Bring it to the boil, and let it simmer without lid on.
2. Let the liquid reduce slightly.
3. Pour the liquid and all spices into a large mixing bowl.
4. Place the bowl in the refrigerator.
5. Let glögg extract be infused in the refrigerator for 3 days.
6. Prepare the storage glasses by adding boiling water to them. Empty the glasses
7. Sieve the glögg extract and pour the liquid in to storage glass.
8. Store the glögg extract cold until use.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Christmas biscotti

It is time to be baking again in my little kitchen, this time it is Christmas version of biscotti. I have found this recipe in the weekly magazine "Feminda" (issue 46/2016), and I have made no modification to it.

Christmas biscotti: - approx 80 biscottis

• 150 g marzipan - diced into small pieces
• 300 g (cake) wheat flour
• 200 g sugar
• 1 teaspoon cardamon
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon cloves
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 3 eggs
• 150 g whole almonds

1. Heat up the oven to 175'C.
2. Add wheat flour, sugar, baking powder and spices into a mixing bowl. Stir everything together.
3. Add eggs and marzipan, and knead everything together.
4. Cover a baking tray with baking paper.
5. Divide the dough into two pieces. Shape the roll into a roll of 35 cm and 5 cm wide.
6. Bake the roll in the oven at 175'C for 20 minutes.
7. Remove the rolls from the oven, and let them cool down slightly.
8. Cut the roll into slices of 1 cm with a shape knife.
9. Place the slices on the baking tray again.
10. Bake the biscotti at 175'C for another 10-15 minutes.
11. Cold down on a rack.
12. Store the biscotti in airtight containers.
13. Enjoy together with coffee/tea and a glass of brown cake liqueur.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Giant pepper cookies

I need to fill more of my many cookies tins, so today it is time to bake a giant version of the classic pepper cookies (pebernødder). The good thing about the giant version is, that it does not take forever to roll the pepper cookies into ball shape.

I have found this recipe in the weekly magazine "Søndag" (Julen 2016 issue).

Giant pepper cookies: - approx 35 cookies

• 250 g (cake) wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon carbamate
• 1 teaspoon cardamon
• ½ teaspoon ginger
• ½ teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon freshly grained pepper
• ½ organic lemon - only the zest
• 125 g sugar
• 75 g cold butter - diced into small cubes
• 50 g almond - grained into flour
• 2 eggs - whip into homogeneous mass

1. Add flour and all the spices into a mixing bowl, and mix everything together.
2. Add in the lemon zest, almond flour and sugar.
3. Add the butter pieces and rub the butter into the flour mix, until it look like fine breadcrumbs.
4. Add in the eggs, and form the mix into a dough without kneading it too much. The dough should be more pressed together.
5. Store the dough cold in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
6. Divide the dough into 4 portion, which is placed on cling film and roll into roll with a diameter of 3 cm.
7. Cut each roll into pieces of 2 cm, and roll the pieces into ball shape.
8. Cover the baking tray with baking paper.
9. Heat up the oven to 200'C.
10. Bake the pepper cookies at 200'C for 10-15 minutes, until they are golden in colour.
11. Cold down on a rack, before storing the pepper cookies in airtight containers.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - raspberry flavoured marzipan roll

It is time to make some sweet treats with marzipan. I am starting off with an easy type of marzipan sweet treat, which does not involve any coating in any kind of chocolate, so no messing around with tempering chocolate.

I have found this recipe in the weekly magazine "Søndag" (issue 47/2016). I could not locate the mentioned raspberry dust in any of the local supermarket, so instead of I milled freeze-dried raspberries into some very fine powder using my excellent kitchen helper bamix.

Raspberry flavoured marzipan roll: - 1 big roll or 4 smaller rolls

• 200 g marzipan
• 1 tablespoon freeze-dried raspberry
• 1 teaspoon raspberry flavour
• 1 tablespoon almond flour (milled almonds)
• ½ teaspoon red food colour
• 1 tablespoon freeze-dried raspberry - milled into for powder for dusting of the marzipan

1. Knead the marzipan together with freeze-dried raspberry, almond flour, raspberry colour and flavour.
2. Divide the marzipan into 4 portions, which is rolled into 4 rolls.
3. Cover the marzipan roll with the raspberry powder.
4. Store the marzipan rolls cold in airtight container.
5. Enjoy :-)

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Apple ginger cake

It is always nice to enjoy some cake for your afternoon coffee/tea. This time I have been baking this apple ginger cake for my colleagues at work in order to say "thank you" to the "elfs" (nisser). For the last three years I have been hanging up a Christmas stocking at work as decoration. The most existing part is that every day during these years some "elfs" are putting various fills into my Christmas stocking :-). And this years more "elfs" are active !!! So today it is time for my colleague to enjoy a piece of cake for their afternoon coffee as "thank yor" to the "elfs" from my side.






Apple ginger cake:

• 300 g apples - peeled, cored and cut into smaller pieces
• 1 tablespoon of sugar
• ½ teaspoon of cinnamon
• 190 g (cake) wheat flour
• 60 g oat flakes - blended into flour
• 30 g almonds - blended into flour
• 85 g sugar
• 1½ teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons ground ginger
• ½ teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 tablespoon home-made vanilla sugar
• pinch of salt
• 2 eggs
• 170 g buttermilk
• 70 g rapeseed oil

1. Heat up the oven to 185'C.
2. Mix 50 g of the apples pieces with 1 tablespoon sugar and ½ teaspoon of cinnamon. Set a side in a small bowl.
3. Add wheat, oat and almond flour into a mixing bowl together with sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, vanilla sugar and salt.
4. Add eggs, buttermilk and oil into another mixing bowl and whip it together by hand.
5. Add the liquid phase into the dry part, and stir by hand into a homogeneous mass. 
6. Afterward add most of the apples.
7. Cover a bread form with a sheet of baking paper. Fill the dough into the form. Top the dough with the cinnamon coated apples pieces.
8. Bake at 185'C for 50-70 minutes, until the cake is baked.
9. Cool down the cake, before you slice it.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Christmas pickled nuts

These pickled nuts are great served together with cheese. The Christmas part of these pickled nuts is the use of cinnamon and orange.

I have found the original recipe in the weekly magazin Sndag (issue 51/2013). However, I have made various modifications, so using the ingredients available in my kitchen instead of buying the actual ingredients mentioned in the recipe.

Christmas pickled nuts: - 3 smaller glasses

• 1 organic orange - zest and juice
• 100 g walnuts
• 50 g almonds
• 3 dl water
• 1 tablespoon apple vinegar
• 3 tablespoons honey
• 1 stick of cinnamon

1. Start by boiling the nuts in the water for 2-3 minutes.
2. Drain the water from the nuts.
3. Add orange juice, orange zest, apple vinegar, honey and cinnamon into a cooking pot, and bring them to the boil.
4. Add in the boiled nuts. Let the nuts simmer for 5 minutes.
5. Prepare the storage glasses by adding boiling water to them first.
6. Divide the nuts between the glasses and divide as well the liquid between the storage glasses.
7. Store the pickled nuts in the refrigerator.
8. Serve together with cheese.

Christmas Calendar 2016 - Gingerbread cake with liquorice twist

Another great cake for some Christmas afternoon tea full of the many fantastic Christmas spices with a touch of liquorice (it is only at touch, so my friends in Horsens could relax reading this blog post).

I found this recipe in the magazine Isabella (issue 6/2016). I have made a few modifications, as I would not find all the needed ingredients in my local supermarket, and I did not want to spend another 1 hour going to a second supermarket to see, if they had the mentioned ingredients in the original recipe.

I found it quiet intriguing, that the recipe contains both baking soda and baking powder, so I talk with one of my colleague at work, who is baker, for what reason two types of baking powder was used. The use of baking soda is used as baking powder, when used in recipes with buttermilk, which is not the case here.
However, baking soda also gives a more dark colour in chocolate cake, so the amount of cocoa powder can be reduced. And this cake, where is used plenty of brown spices and sugar, so I think the baking soda in this cake is used to give a more dark colour in the final cake.

Gingerbread cake with liquorice twist: - 2 smaller cakes

• 1,75 dl water
• 2 teaspoons of baking soda
• 260g (cake) wheat flour
• 2 teaspoon of baking powder
• 2 teaspoons of ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
• ½ teaspoon of nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon of liquorice powder
• 1 pinch of salt
• 110 g butter - soft
• 90 g sugar
• 100 g dark syrup
• 50 g liquorice syrup
• 2 eggs

1. Heat up the oven to 180'C.
2. Bring the water to boil, pour into a glass and add the baking soda into the glass.
3. Mix flour, baking powder, ground ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, liquorice powder and salt together in a mixing bowl.
4. Add butter and sugar into a second mixing bowl, where it is whipped into a airy mass.
5. Add the syrups and water-baking soda into the butter-sugar mass, while the whipping is continued.
6. Afterwards add in the flour and spice mix into the dough, and whip add.
7. Finally add in the egg, and whip again.
8. Pour the cake dough into 2 small or 1 big form.
9. Bake the cake at 180'C for 30-40 minutes.
10. Check with a pin, that the cake is baked, prior to removing it from the oven.
11. Let the cake cold down, before you slice it.
12. Enjoy a slice of cake together with a nice cup of tea.