Baking form – 24 cm
• 100g almonds
• 250g plain flour
• 250g cold butter diced
• 130g sugar
• Seeds of vanilla pod
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 2 – 3 pinches of ground clove
• 1 egg white
• Salt
• 6 tbsps currant jelly or jam
• Flour for the workspace
• Christmas cookie cutters
• Icing sugar
• Berry or cinnamon ice-cream
• Whipped cream
Roast almonds dry in a pan on your induction hob at setting No. 7, until you can smell the aroma. Place on a plate and allow to cool off. Grind 50g of almonds finely, and chop the rest coarsely.
Place flour and the finely ground almonds in a large bowl and make a well in the middle. Add small butter dice, sugar, vanilla pulp and spices evenly. Add egg white and a pinch of salt to the well. Knead the dough until it is even and smooth. Keep the dough in a covered bowl for an hour in your fridge.
Pre-heat the oven to 160°C CircoTherm®. Put parchment paper on the bottom of your springform baking tin. Remove 320g dough and press it into an even dough base. Bake for 15-20 minutes on tray level 2 until light brown. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Halve the rest of the dough. Roll out the dough to a 25 cm circle of 3mm height on parchment paper. Use the baking form to cut the dough circle to 24 cm and a smaller bowl (12 cm) to cut out a second circle in the centre. Remove the inner dough circle and the remains on the edges. Place the parchment paper with the dough on a baking tray.
Roll the rest of the dough to 3 mm and cut out cookies with different Christmassy cookie cutters. Place cookies on another baking tray with parchment paper. Sprinkle cookies with crushed almonds and push them in (just a little). Bake the dough ring for 15 minutes on tray level 1 and the cookies on tray level 3 until lightly golden.
Heat jam or jelly in a pot with 1 tablespoon of water. Stir until even. Spread four tablespoons jelly on the bottom of the wreath. Place the cutout dough-ring on top. Spread the rest of the jelly on the bottoms of the cookies and place on the top of the wreath. Sprinkle with icing sugar. Cut the crispy wreath in small cake pieces and serve with berry, or cinnamon, ice cream or whipped cream.