Jam of cranberries, orange blossom, cloves and cinnamon peeking through a double cookie window of chestnut flour, butter and mascarpone.
Course Cookies, Dessert
Cuisine Mediterranean
Keyword Cranberry Orange Jam Linzer Holiday Cookies
Prep Time 40 minutesminutes
Cook Time 30 minutesminutes
chill 20 minutesminutes
Total Time 1 hourhour30 minutesminutes
Servings 24servings
Equipment
Baking sheet and parchment paper
linzer cookie cutters
Rolling Pin
Ingredients
Cranberry Jam Filling
12ozWhole Cranberries
1/2cupOrange juice
1tbspOrange zest
1/2tsp Orange Blossom Water or Vanilla Extract
1/2cupSugar
1/2tspWhole Cloves
1/4Cinnamon Stick
1/2tspSalt
Cookie Ingredients
16tbspUnsalted Butter room temperature
8ozMascarpone or Cream cheese room temperature
3/4cupSugar
3tbspChestnut flour or ground almonds
3 1/2cupsAll purpose flour more for dusting
1tbspOrange zest
1tspSalt
1/4cupPowdered Sugarfinal dusting
Instructions
Cranberry Jam Instructions
In a saucepan or small pot, over medium heat, combine cranberries, orange juice, orange zest and sugar. Place the whole cloves and 1/4 stick of cinnamon in a tea infuser and drop the infuser into the cranberry ingredients. Bring to a slow simmer. Simmer until the liquids reduce and the consistency thickens, about 15-minutes.
With the back of a spoon, press the cranberries as they simmer to release their juices. Cool. Remove the spices in the infuser.
With a hand mixer or immersion blender, on slow speed, whisk the cranberry mixture so that is it spreadable.Unused jam can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for a week, or frozen.
Cookie Dough Instructions
In a separate bowl, combine flours, all purpose flour and nut flour, with salt, whisk together and set aside.
In the bowl of a stand mixer or food processor, place the butter, mascarpone, orange zest and sugar and cream butter enough to blend the sugar into the butter mixture.
Slowly whisk in the flour mixture to form dough ball and is no longer sticky to the touch.
On a lightly floured surface, transfer the dough. With a rolling pin, roll out the dough enough to form a round disc. With a large section of plastic wrap, cover the dough completely and place in the fridge for about 20-minutes.
Preheat the oven to 325. Place parchment paper onto a baking sheet or several baking sheets, as needed.
Take the dough out of the fridge, on a floured work surface and roll the dough to about 1/4-inch thickness.
Press out the shapes with a cookie cutter or a round glass. Then go back with a smaller cutter or smaller round glass, press out a window in the center of half of the cookies you have cut out. This will become the window for the top cookie where the jam can be seen through.
Place cut cookies on prepared cookie sheet and bake until they just begin to change color, firm to the touch, but not brown. About 10-12 minutes. Cool.
Assembly
Spread the jam on the bottom cookies, in an even layer. Place the top cookie with the window, over the bottom cookie that now has jam. Lightly dust powdered sugar across the top of the cookies. Cookies are now ready to serve, or store in an airtight container in the fridge.