Almond Cookies Matches

© All rights reserved, Thorsten Kraska, 2010

It's November and it is getting closer and closer to christmas. And christmas is cookies time. And fun. Here is a very easy recipe based on an almond piped cookies. By using a different piping nozzle you can turn them into cookies matches by glacing the tip of the cookies with red color icing or into burnt matches by using chocolate.

Almond Cookies Matches
(depending on size)

70g almonds (grounded)
100g powder sugar
1 egg yolk
2 tablespoons milk
2 tablespoons Amaretto
60g softened butter
160g all-purpose flour
0.5 teaspoon baking powder

Red Icing:
100g powder sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
a few drops red food coloring

Toast the grounded almonds in a pan until golden. remove immediately from heat and let cool on a plate. Mix sugar, egg yolk, milk and amaretto until the sugar is dissolved . Add butter and mix until well blended. Add almonds and mix. Mix flour and baking powder, then add it to the butter mixture. Mix until blended. Don't overmix.

Fill dough into a piping bag (round piping nozle with a diameter of 8-10 mm). Pipe cookies onto a baking paper with a lenght of 8 to 10 cm. Place the cookies on baking paper in the fridge for 1 hour. Meanwhile pre-heat oven to 210°c. Take cookies out of fridge and bake for about 10 minutes. Take out of the oven and let cool completely.

For the icing mix the ingredients. The mixture should not be running. Dip the tips of the cookies into icing and place them on a rack. If you like melt some chocolate on low heat. Dip tip of cookies into chocolate for burnt tip of the matches.

Decorating: Make a small box which looks like a match box. Put some cookies into the box.