Advent Calendar Day 13

Clementine Clove Linzer

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Hello and welcome to day 13 of the recipe advent calendar! Today we’re making a recipe that just tastes like Christmas! Clove oranges have to be one of the most festive smells, they’re zesty, spicy and fresh and these are just the biscuit version! Around Christmas time it’s hard not to over-use all of the spices but I rarely see clove used alone, it always seems to be mixed with cinnamon and nutmeg but these biscuits really give clove some time to shine! If clove isn’t your thing feel free to substitute it for any spice you like or you can just leave the biscuit dough plain.

I’ve used circle and tear-drop cookie cutters to make these adorable little orange segments but they also look super cute as regular sandwich biscuits or jammy dodgers, the cutters I used are linked here.

Linzer cookies don’t keep for long! I’d say these will keep for a maximum of 3 days once filled before they become soggy, however all of the elements will keep for at least a month so you can easily prep the jam and bake the biscuits ahead of time and then assemble them right before you serve them.

Clementine Linzer

Clove Sablé - Makes 20 biscuits

140g room temperature unsalted butter

100g icing sugar

20g egg yolk (1 large yolk)

1tsp vanilla extract

200g plain flour

Pinch Salt

1tsp ground cloves

Clementine Jam (you can substitute for store-bought marmalade)

250g clementines/any baby oranges (about 3)

100g caster sugar

1/2tsp citric acid OR 20ml lemon juice

To Assemble

Approximately 50g white chocolate (optional)

Icing sugar

Method - Clove Sablé

1. Cream the butter and icing sugar, you don’t want it really pale and fluffy, just starting to get lighter.

2. Add the egg yolks and vanilla and mix.

3. Add the flour, salt and ground cloves and mix to combine.

4. Give it a quick kneed by hand to ensure there aren’t any lumps.

5. Form into a flat rectangle, clingfilm and refrigerate for at least 2 hours or overnight.

Method - Clementine Jam

1. Start by boiling the clementines, place them in a pan filled with water, bring to the boil and leave to simmer for one hour.

2. When they’re done and cool enough to handle, pour away the water and remove the little nubbin at the top (does this have a name!?) and the seeds.

3. Roughly chop or blend, it can be as chunky or as smooth as you like.

4. Add back into a pan with the sugar and citric acid and cook on a medium heat stirring occasionally.

5. Let it gently boil for at least 15 minutes or until it thickens and reaches 104°C/ 219°F before removing it from the heat.

6. Remove from the heat and leave to cool until needed.

   

Method - Baking & Assembly

1. Pre-heat the oven to 160°C(fan)/320 °F and line two trays with baking paper.

2. Roll the dough to about 3mm thick and cut circles with a 8cm cookie cutter.

3. Cut each circle in half and then cut out the segments from one of the halves.

4. Bake for 10-13 minutes until golden and crisp.

5. Melt the white chocolate and paint a layer on the underside of each biscuit (if you’re eating them straight away you can skip this step).

6. Add a small amount of clementine jam to the base biscuits.

7. Dust the tops with icing sugar BEFORE sandwiching them with the bases.

8. Once filled these will keep for 3 days, but unfilled both the jam and biscuits will keep for a month in an airtight container (for the biscuits) or the fridge (for the jam).

   

I’ll be back tomorrow for day 14 of our advent calendar! Please tag me in any of your bakes, I’d love to see them. If you’re enjoying the advent calendar please share it with your family and friends!