Five delicious Christmas biscuit recipes from Austria

In Austria, baking biscuits is an integral part of the Christmas tradition. Many people kick off their pre-Christmas season with baking. Instead of coffee and cake, biscuits and tea are usually served during Advent. Along with this, lively Christmas carols are played and the anticipation for Christmas Eve grows. Would you also like to try some typical Austrian biscuits? No problem, because we have collected the five best recipes of the most Austrian of all Christmas biscuits for you. Have fun baking and snacking!

Preparation:Put the butter, flour, nuts, a packet of vanilla sugar and 70 grams of icing sugar in a bowl and quickly mix the ingredients to form a dough. Then wrap it in cling film and leave it to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, you can preheat the oven to 170 degrees and line a baking tray with baking paper. After half an hour, cut off a piece of the dough and form a finger-thick roll.

Cut three to four cm long pieces from each and shape them into half moons. Place the shaped biscuits onto the baking paper. Repeat this process until all the dough has been used up. Now bake the biscuits for about 12 minutes. After baking allow the biscuits to cool well. Meanwhile, you can mix the remaining icing sugar and the second packet of vanilla sugar together and sprinkle over the Vanillekipferl.

Heat the egg whites and fine crystal sugar over a water bath until the sugar has completely dissolved. Do not whip the mixture, but stir very gently. Then mix the grated almonds with the flour and cinnamon and stir into the egg yolks. Put the mixture in the fridge for at least two hours. However, if you have more time, you can leave the dough to rest overnight. In the meantime, you can work on the glaze: Mix the egg whites, icing sugar and salt.

After resting, take the dough out of the fridge, preheat the oven to 160 degrees and line a baking tray with baking paper. Then roll out the dough evenly to a thickness of about 4mm. Then cut out small stars and brush them thinly or thickly with the prepared icing, depending on your taste. Place the cinnamon stars in the oven for about eight to ten minutes. After cooling, the Zimtsterne are ready to eat!

Line two baking trays with baking paper. Then preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Now it's time for the dough: To do this, cream the soft butter with the icing sugar until fluffy and beat the two eggs into the bowl one after the other. Then slowly and carefully fold the flour into the mixture with a wooden spoon. Now fill the mixture into a piping bag with a serrated nozzle and pipe

80 small half moons onto the prepared tray. Bake them in the preheated oven for about 10 minutes until golden. Then remove the biscuits from the oven and leave to cool completely. Now spread apricot jam onto one biscuit and top with a second, then dip both ends into the melted dark chocolate. Allow the chocolate to set and: enjoy!

To make the shortcrust pastry, mix the flour, egg yolks, vanilla sugar and cold butter together in a bowl and quickly knead into a dough. Wrap the dough in cling film and leave to rest in the fridge for an hour. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees bottom and top heat and line two baking trays with baking paper. Now roll out the dough to a thickness of about 3mm and cut out small circles with a diameter of 3cm. Place the biscuits onto the baking tray. The next step is to prepare the meringue.

Sprinkle the pinch of salt into the egg whites and gradually add the fine crystal sugar. Beat with a mixer until stiff peaks form. Now place the mixture into a piping bag with a nozzle of your choice and pipe a small blob onto each circle of dough. Then place the biscuits in the preheated oven for about 10 to 15 minutes. Allow the biscuits to cool completely and use the apricot jam to stick two pieces together at a time. Afterwards, you can not only admire your works of art, but also taste them right away!

Mix the flour, sugar, butter, almonds, cinnamon and salt in a bowl. Then knead the mixture quickly into a dough and leave it to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes. Preheat your oven to 180 degrees and line two baking trays with baking paper. After the resting time, roll out the dough to about 2mm thick. Cut out a total of 80 circles with a diameter

of 3cm and place them on the baking tray. Bake the biscuits in the oven for ten minutes.After the biscuits have cooled, stick two circles together using apricot jam, glaze with chocolate icing and place an almond on top. If you haven't already nibbled during baking, you can enjoy the delicious biscuits now!