Lebkuchen time!
[NOTE: Regulars here may remember that most years I put up a family Christmas recipe. And here it is again.]
This recipe was brought over from Germany sometime in the mid-1800s, and was my favorite of all the wonderful treats cooked by my great-aunt, a baker of rare gifts. She and my great-uncle were not only exceptionally wonderful people, but to my childish and wondering eyes they looked very much like Mr. and Mrs. Santa Claus.
The name of the treat is lebkuchen, but it’s quite a different one from the traditional recipe, which I don’t much care for. This is sweet and dense, can be made ahead, and keeps very well when stored in tins.
Flora’s Lebkuchen:
(preheat the oven to 375 degrees)
1 pound dark brown sugar
4 eggs
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
4 oz. chopped dates
1 cup raisins
1 tsp. orange juice
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. almond extract
1 tsp. lemon juice
Sift the dry ingredients together (flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon).
Beat the eggs and brown sugar together with a rotary beater till the mixture forms the ribbon. Add the orange juice, lemon juice, and extracts to it.
Add the dry mixture to it, a little at a time, stirring.
Add the raisins, dates, and walnuts.
Grease and flour two 8 X 8 cake pans [NOTE: In previous years I sometimes said 9 X 9, but 8 X 8 is actually much better and makes for a far moister product.] Put batter in pans and bake for about 25 minutes (or a little less; test the cake with a cake tester at 21 or 22 minutes to see if it’s done yet). You don’t want it to get too dark and dry on the edges, but the middle can’t still be wet when tested.
Meanwhile, make the frosting.
Melt about 6 Tbs. of unsalted butter and add 2 Tbs. hot milk, and 1 Tbs. almond extract. Add enough confectioner’s sugar to make a frosting of spreading consistency (the recipe says “2 cups,” but I’ve always noticed that’s not exactly correct). You can make even more frosting if you like a lot of frosting.
Let cake cool to at least lukewarm, and spread generously with the frosting. Then cut into small pieces and store (or eat!).
Enjoy!
I’d love to give this recipe a try but I’m early stage diabetic. Nevertheless my sweet tooth prompts me to wonder if applying a technique from sourdough bread making might be helpful. That’s in using a cast iron dutch oven, which might enhance it even more. As many know, cast iron is unexcelled at providing even temperatures and the domed lid cycles the moisture that rises back onto the bread providing a moist environment. Though I’m not an accomplished chef, I would think that the same principle would apply here.
This article offers a few secrets that may be of value; “Lebkuchen Cookies”
https://www.abeautifulplate.com/lebkuchen-cookies/
Wishing all happy holidays and a Merry Christmas.
I lived in German when I was in the US of A good green army over 50 years ago, spent three years there and loved the food and the people in my part of Bavaria and the Lebkuchen purchased at the Nurnemburg Christkindlesmarkt every year. I still have strange feelings about those folks who were ever so nice people yet 30 years before that time they were so ever eager to praise the Nazi’s and the third Reich. Very complicated stuff with what happened there ‘once upon a time’.