Advent: Festive German Bakes to Celebrate the Coming of Christmas

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Why would I save it until Advent? Why give myself a brief 24 days to read, relish and reconnoitre the ingredients. Why would I not enjoy it now, during November and alongside Nigel Slater’s Christmas Chronicles, as virtual immersion in a month-long Continental Christmas Market before actually baking the goodies in the book and enjoying them as part of a relaxing December? Chocolate-coated walnut marzipan, excerpted from Advent: Festive German Bakes to Celebrate the Coming of Christmas by Anja Dunk. Crumble the yeast (or sprinkle if using dried) into the tepid milk and stir to dissolve. Pour the yeasted milk into the flour mixture and, using your hands, bring the ingredients together into a rough dough. Tip the dough on to a floured surface and knead for about 10 minutes until it becomes more elastic. Form it into a ball and nestle it into the bottom of the bowl. Cover the bowl with a tea towel and set aside in a warm spot to rise for 1-3 hours until almost doubled in size. (Alternatively, put the flour, sugar, salt and citrus zests into the bowl of a free-standing electric mixer fitted with a dough hook. Add the butter and egg. Pour in the yeasted milk and knead for 5 minutes until the dough is elastic. Cover the bowl and set aside, as above.)

Anja Dunk’s Stollen Bites | Anna Jones Anja Dunk’s Stollen Bites | Anna Jones

The recipe recommends a sharp, smooth jam so I bought some damson jelly to go in the middle, but in all honesty, I’m not sure I could’ve told the difference between that and regular strawberry or raspberry. Best yet, the biscuits tasted even better in the days after baking – good news, because I’m pretty sure I made enough to feed a small army. The process was a bit fiddlier than your average biscuit – you have to roll out the dough, cut heart shapes, blob jam in the middle and cover with a slightly bigger heart on top. My efforts weren’t the most finessed – as shown by bits of jam pouring out after baking – but it still tasted delicious. I couldn’t find any ground hazelnuts, star anise or cloves, so I had to ‘grind’ them myself, and with only a hand-held blender to help, it took ages. And then, instead of being able to just bung everything in a processor, there was rubbing the butter into the flour, and kneading (for another age, it seemed) to get the mixture together and pliable. The advent season – which we are three-quarters of the way through – is steeped in tradition and rituals and, just like the astronomical seasons, much of it is centred on light. The advent wreath is traditionally adorned with four candles and is lit at mealtimes, providing precious light and warmth during the shortening days. But I got there in the end, made sure my little sausages of cookie dough were far enough apart on the baking tray so they didn’t spread into each other in the oven, and was pleased with the final result.Cut the marzipan into 1cm/3/8in squares and, using a fork held horizontally with the tines pointing upwards to balance the marzipan on, dip each square carefully into the chocolate, Put the butter and sugar into a large bowl and beat with a hand-held electric whisk until light and fluffy. Add the egg yolks and whisk again until combined. Add the grated marzipan, flour, ground almonds, cinnamon and baking powder, then stir until well mixed. I have a massive apology to make here. In Monday’s post, I listed Advent by Anja Dunk as one of my Advent books, the small volumes I wrap and give myself on the Sundays of Advent. That was written at my desk in the office, where I do most of my writing and without all of the books actually being present in front of me. Add the icing sugar along with 1 tablespoon of vodka and blitz again until a smooth paste forms. You may need to add a bit more vodka depending on how fresh the nuts are. Cut out a round piece of paper just larger than the cake. Fold it into four and cut an intricate snowflake design out of it. Unfold the piece of paper and lay it on top of the cake. Dust the top with icing sugar before carefully removing the paper. You should be left with a beautiful delicate snowflake on top of your cake.

Advent by Anja Dunk | Cookbook Corner | Nigella Lawson

In one bite-sized biscuit, they swept me directly to cold snowy cobbled streets with people’s breath hanging in clouds under the glow of street lamps. There was just something about them that seemed so old-fashioned that was hard to put my finger on – the vodka somehow brought a mysterious feeling of cold into your mouth. Once cool, put one cake on to a plate, spoon the jam on top and spread it out evenly. Place the second cake on top. Now food writer Anja Dunk has collected together a whole slew of festive German bakes in her new cookbook, Advent.These little sweets came about one autumn when we found the ground on our usual path to school scattered with walnuts. After dropping the boys off I rushed home, scooping up as many nuts along the way as I could carry. On the principle that it’s never too early to start thinking ahead, really, and that Christmas is always on us before we know, how about Have Yourself a Happy Hygge Christmas? Christmas is about the small things in life, much as hygge is, and establishing what you want from Christmas and then being able to say no to the excess is important. The book has hints and tips that hopefully will help you enjoy what is, too often, a frantic season. Baking as a vegan is often pretty hit or miss, but this was a definite win – probably because few of the ingredients had to be changed, it was just subbing out the butter for a dairy-free alternative and using golden syrup instead of honey. The biscuits weren’t soft or crumbly like shortbread or cookie (that’s down to the rye flour) – but tasted more like gingerbread. Stollenkonfekt is something that has become popular during my lifetime. It’s basically mini bite-sized versions of the real thing. I like to make these moreish buttery confections with Quark and baking powder for ease, but these would also work with yeasted dough.

Advent by Anja Dunk | Waterstones Advent by Anja Dunk | Waterstones

Lay out small foil chocolate cases on a baking sheet. Give the mixture a good stir through again, then spoon it into a piping bag fitted with a 1cm star-shaped nozzle. Pipe the mixture, with a swirling motion, into the foil cases, lifting the nozzle up at the very end to create a peak. Put the flour, salt and butter in a mixing bowl and, using your fingertips, work the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Add the icing sugar and mix it through. Now add the egg yolks and vanilla extract and bring everything together into a dough with your hands. Knead for a few minutes. The Great British Bake off has introduced us to all these goodies. I’m looking forward to trying some of them 👍

Add the egg and bring everything together into a dough with your hands. (Alternatively, simply put all the ingredients into the bowl of an electric free-standing mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and mix until an even dough is formed.) There must be thousands of Lebkuchen recipes,” says the London-based cook, food writer and artist, whose mother is German and father is Welsh. “Just like we do in the U.K., everyone has a family Christmas pudding recipe and it’s the same (in Germany).” Heat the cream in a saucepan over a medium heat, stirring from time to time to avoid it scorching on the bottom. Take it off the heat just before it comes to a boil. Add the chocolate and butter or coconut oil, and stir with a wooden spoon until both are dissolved. Mix in the Kirschwasser and beat for a minute until smooth and glossy. Refrigerate for 45 minutes so it stiffens up slightly. Put the mixed peel, raisins and currants into a bowl, pour over the rum and set aside to infuse while you prepare the dough. Cosy Happy Hygge: Setting up a rhythm to life and rituals to enjoy it to make for a more balanced life that handles waves and storms better. August is like a pause before real life begins again in September, so it’s a second chance to set up rituals and rhythms that boost happiness and work for you.

Advent, Anja Dunk: We put the ultimate festive baking

Rather than ice this, I’ve played around with paper-cut snowflakes as icing sugar templates and the results are beautifully festive; a doily, too, works just as well. Place the walnuts in a food processor and blitz for about 2 minutes until finely ground, then scrape down the sides of the processor and blitz again for a couple of minutes until the oils are released from the nuts and the mixture clumps together.To make the dough, put all of the ingredients into a large bowl and mix using your hands. Knead for a couple of minutes until a supple, silky dough is formed. Divide the dough in half. On a floured surface, roll each half out as thinly as possible. So long as it fits on the baking sheet it doesn’t matter what shape it is, although I aim for a rough oval.