Cherry Marzipan White Chocolate Cookies

My husband and I had a weekend away, and one of the things we did was visit the Pike Place Market. There are usually lots of people, but it is fun to look at the vendors and the items they offer. We stopped at the Woodring Northwest booth, which offer honey and preserves and other interesting things. They had White Chocolate Marzipan spread, and I was fascinated. It is similar to Nutella, and I wanted to use it in some cookie recipe.

This recipe was found by my husband, and I thought that it would be a good starting point. Instead of adding the white chocolate marzipan spread instead of other ingredients, I was inspired by a cookie where you added a swirl of Nutella, so that was my goal. I did use dried cherries, and I didn’t add sliced almonds, as I didn’t seem to have any on hand. I really need to sort through my baking ingredients!

The dough is very thick, so I mixed the spread into the dough. I figured that the dough would be different with the addition of the spread, so I wanted to chill the dough before baking. I made the dough, refrigerated it during the day and then baked them up. The cookies are thinner and a little lacy, but I didn’t have any significant issues with the dough. The spread adds a nice marzipan flavor, even without added almonds. I liked the dried cherries and think that there should be more cherry things in the world. These are great, and it was fun to find a workable recipe and try something new. 

Cherry Marzipan White Chocolate Cookies
3/4 cup butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla 
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
2 cups flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup old fashioned oats
3/4 cup white chocolate chips
3/4 cup dried cherries, chopped
2/3 cup white chocolate marzipan spread

In a large mixer bowl, add the butter, sugar, and brown sugar; beat on medium until combined. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Stir in the vanilla and almond extract.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, and oats. With the mixer running on low, gradually add the flour mixture to the dough. Stir in the dried cherries and white chocolate chips.

Drop spoonfuls of white chocolate marzipan spread onto the dough and mix/swirl the spread into the dough. It won’t be fully incorporated, but that’s ok. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for several hours.

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with silicone baking mats.

Remove the dough from the refrigerator and remove the plastic wrap. Shape the dough into 1-1/4” mounds on the prepared baking sheets.

Bake for 12-15 minutes, until browned along the edges. Allow to cool on the baking sheet for 10 minutes before removing them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Recipe from Lovely Little Kitchen. Additional inspiration from Creations by Kara

German Almond Paste Cookies

When I was looking for holiday recipes this year, I found quite a few cookies that were from different European countries. Most of them sounded fantastic so I have included a number of those recipes to this year’s baking. This recipe, for Almond Paste Cookies, is German in origin. I love anything with almond paste, but you might not be all that familiar with it. It is common in Europe, but less so here.

This recipe called for marzipan originally, and if you were in Germany that would be what you’d want to use. In the States, marzipan is a little different, and almond paste is a better choice. It is also softer and easier to work with. There is a difference in the quantities of sugar between almond paste and marzipan, but American grocery stores seem to ignore this. I have even seen marzipan in the almond paste display box! Yes, they are close, but they are not the same.

Grating the almond paste is a bit tricky, I used my food processor, but it was still a challenge. Other than that, these come together very easily. The dough is sticky, and I wasn’t quite sure how big to shape the cookies, so each cookie weighed 20 grams. I baked them for 12 minutes and they looked great. They wanted to stick to the silicone mat when they were warm, but I had no problems removing them once they cooled a couple of minutes. These have a wonderful almond flavor, with the subtle addition of cinnamon. These aren’t as sweet as some other holiday cookies, but sometimes you just want a little less sugar.

German Almond Paste Cookies
200 grams almond paste or marzipan
80 grams powdered sugar
110 grams flour
100 grams ground almonds
1 egg, divided
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons amaretto
1/4 teaspoon salt
Slivered/sliced almonds

Place the almond paste in the freezer for 30 minutes. Remove from the freezer and grate the almond paste.

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a nonstick baking pan with a silicone mat.

In a large mixer bowl, combine the grated almond paste, powdered sugar, flour, ground almonds, egg white, cinnamon, amaretto, and salt. Mix the ingredients on low until a dough forms. Shape the dough into small balls, about the size of a walnut, 1-1/2 inches. Press down each ball of dough with a fork or the palm of your hand.

Whisk the egg yolk with a small amount of water and brush over the dough. Sprinkle with slivered almonds.

Bake for 12-14 minutes, until golden. Allow to cool on the baking sheets for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely. Once cooled, sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Recipe from Cinnamon and Coriander

Hazelnut Marzipan Bars

Each year for Christmas, my husband makes a traditional British Christmas cake, which is a fruitcake. His fruitcake is a little different each year, depending on which dried fruits are used and whether he adds nuts. He doesn’t add any candied fruits, which is what you often come across in American fruitcake. This year he used hazelnuts in the cake batter.

After the cake is baked (and is doused with alcohol for a bit) it is covered with jam, a layer of almond paste, and then covered with royal icing. Since he used hazelnuts in the cake, he decided that he wanted to make his own hazelnut paste. Hazelnut paste isn’t too complex, just hazelnuts, egg, and sugar for the most part. The recipe made much more than was needed for the Christmas cake. I wanted to find a cookie recipe that used the remaining hazelnut paste.

Most of the recipes that use almond paste are amaretti, and I have made those before. I found several variations of this recipe online, a cookie base with a marzipan topping. You could certainly use almond paste and chopped almonds if you don’t have hazelnuts on hand. I used a 9” pan, instead of the 8” pan that the original recipe called for, and the bars are plenty thick. I reduced the amount of chopped nuts in the recipe here to ½ cup, as the 1 cup in the original recipe was a lot. You’ll want to cut these bars small as they are very rich and very gooey.

Hazelnut Marzipan Bars

1 cup butter, softened

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon hazelnut extract

2 cups flour

8 ounces hazelnut or almond paste

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg

1/2 cup chopped hazelnuts

Preheat the oven to 350. Line an 9-inch square pan with foil and spray the foil with nonstick cooking spray.

In a large mixer bowl, beat the butter and brown sugar on medium until fluffy. Add the egg, vanilla and hazelnut extract and mix on medium to combine. With the mixer running on low, gradually add the flour, stirring until the dough comes together. Pat the dough evenly into the prepared pan.

Bake for 20 minutes.

While the base is baking, make the topping: in a large mixer bowl, beat the hazelnut paste, brown sugar and egg until combined.  When the base comes out of the oven, spread the topping on the base and then top with the chopped hazelnuts.

Bake for about 20 minutes, until the marzipan topping is browned and set. Allow to cool completely before cutting into bars.

   

Recipe from Just About Baked

Chewy Almond Marzipan Bars

At Christmas, we buy marzipan at the British food shop that is near our home. They make their own marzipan, and my husband puts a layer of marzipan on the Christmas cake underneath the royal icing. It’s always hard to know how much marzipan you’re going to need, and this year we overestimated how much we would need. We were left with two packages of marzipan. My husband asked me if I could use it in recipes, and I said I certainly can.

When I started baking, I would look at so many different recipes. I would typically avoid any recipe that called for marzipan or almond paste, since it is an expensive ingredient! Having a lot of marzipan that needs to be used is an exciting proposition. I did some searching and came across several recipes that looked good. I knew I hadn’t made bar cookies in a while so I opted to make these Chewy Marzipan Bars. (It seems like the “Almond” in the recipe title is unnecessary, as marzipan is made from almonds!)

I typically grind up blanched almonds in the food processor to make almond flour, but for this recipe I bought some almond flour at the store. Much easier! I toasted the slivered almonds in the oven for about 10 minutes. I didn’t want them too browned as I knew they would brown while the bars were baking. They bars are chewy and soft, and they smell divine! The bars are chewy, but the slivered almonds on top give the bars a nice crunch. I’m really happy that I tried this recipe.

Chewy Almond Marzipan Bars

1¼ cups flour

½ cup almond flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

¼ teaspoon salt

½ cup butter, room temperature

⅔ cup sugar

⅓ cup marzipan

1 egg

½ teaspoon almond extract

1 tablespoon milk

½ cup slivered almonds, toasted

Powdered sugar, if desired

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Line a 9” x 13” pan with foil and spray the foil with nonstick cooking spray.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, almond flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside. In a large mixer bowl, beat the butter and sugar on medium until combined. Add the marzipan and beat on medium until the mixture is smooth. Add the egg and almond extract; beat on medium until the mixture is fluffy.

With the mixer running on low, gradually add the flour mixture. Beat just until the dough comes together. Remove the bowl from the mixer and do a final mix of the dough with a spatula.

Press the dough evenly in the prepared pan; it will be a fairly thin layer. Brush the dough with the milk and sprinkle with the slivered almonds. Press the almonds into the dough.

Bake for 17-20 minutes, until the edges of the bars are barely brown. Remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack.

Once the bars are cool, lift them from the pan and peel away the foil. Cut into bars. Sprinkle with powdered sugar if desired.

Recipe from Sweet and Savoury Pursuits

Cherry Marzipan Streusel Cake

Cherry and almond is one of the most classic combinations out there. We grow quite a few cherries in this state and I took advantage of some of the fresh local produce to make this cake. It had been a bit of a difficult week and I wanted to make something great. Cherries were in season and I had marzipan at home, so this cake was my choice. It was a little warm in my house when baking this, but luckily it wasn’t that hot.

The blog where I got this recipe gives another recipe for homemade marzipan. I’ve not tried making my own but that’s a great idea since marzipan is so expensive to buy. I’m usually torn between buying at the grocery store for $8 or heading to Ikea, where it is a lot cheaper, to stock up. I tend to buy lots of other things at Ikea when I go, and it’s a bit of an inconvenient trip. Luckily, I had stocked up not too long ago. I do think I will try to make my own one of these days!

Pitting cherries is cumbersome and fairly messy, but it’s a lot easier when you have a cherry pitter. I’m not usually a fan of uni-task tools, but the cherry pitter is a good investment. It makes pitting the cherries so much quicker! I used a thin metal springform pan and I had a little trouble getting the cake to bake in the center. I really should have used one of my better quality pans. The last few cakes I have made in this pan have had the same issue, so I’m blaming the pan! This cake is not super sweet, and the cherries are wonderful. I love almond flavor and wish that flavor was more distinct, but I enjoyed this cake a lot.

Cherry Marzipan Streusel Cake

2 cups fresh cherries, pitted and halved

½ cup butter, room temperature

1 cup sugar

⅓ cup marzipan, diced

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 egg

½ cup buttermilk

1½ cup flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

  

½ cup flour

½ cup sugar

⅓ cup marzipan, crumbled

4 tablespoons butter, cut into small pieces

Powdered sugar

 Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9 inch springform pan.

Pit and halve the cherries and set aside. In a large mixer bowl, beat the butter and sugar together on medium until light. Add the marzipan and vanilla and beat until combined. Add the egg and beat until incorporated.

   

In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. With the mixer running on low, stir in half of the buttermilk. Add half of the flour mixture and stir until just combined. Add the remaining buttermilk and flour mixture and again stir until just combined. Spoon the mixture into the prepared pan. Top with the halved cherries.

   

Make the streusel topping: in a medium bowl combine the flour and sugar. Add the marzipan and butter and use your fingers to work the mixture until it resembles sandy clumps. Top the cake with the streusel.

   

Bake for 45-55 minutes, until a thin knife inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool the cake in the pan for 10 minutes and then remove the sides of the pan and allow the cake to cool completely on a wire rack. Sift powdered sugar over the cake before serving.

Recipe from The Daring Gourmet