I first encountered these super tasty biscuits through a Romanian-German school friend. She would gift me a bag of home made biscuits each Christmas, or her mum would serve a spread of biscuits when I visited during the advent period, as is custom in Germany.
These ones, that I got to know as “Ischlar”, were my absolute favourite. So almondy I was sure they had marzipan in them (not so!)
It took me decades to finally find out that the recipe originates in Austria, where they are called “(Bad) Ischler Kekse” (Biscuits from Bad Ischl). I have seen recipes with apricot jam and redcurrant jam, but really any jam you like will work for the filling.
The recipe makes 36 filled biscuits (each made up from two single biscuits)
Ingredients:
- 150 g flour
- 120 g butter
- 75 g icing sugar
- 75 g ground almonds
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1 pinch of salt
- jam or marmalade for filling (I used a mixed berry jam I was given by a friend)
- chocolate for coating (120 g; I used dark chocolate around 62% with some added vegetable fat)
- sliced almonds for decoration
Preparation:
- Knead flour, butter, icing sugar, ground almonds, cinnamon and salt into a smooth dough
- Chill the dough for 30 min
- Roll to a few mm thickness
- Cut circles with approx. 3 cm diameter (can be larger, but you’ll get fewer biscuits!)
- Bake on a lined baking tray, 10 min at 160C (fan oven)
- The almonds will make the biscuits very soft when warm, so let them cool fully before processing
- Make stacks of 2 biscuits, held together with a thin layer of jam or marmalade
- Melt the chocolate and add some vegetable fat to thin it to the desired consistency for coating
- Dip the filled biscuits in the chocolate
- Decorate with sliced almonds (or chopped nuts, sprinkles, whatever you like!)
- Let the chocolate dry fully before transferring them into a tin / box for storage
Time:
This is a bit fiddly, no two ways about it. But it’s well worth it! I’d say a 1 1/2 h for making the biscuits (including waiting while the dough chills, and waiting for the biscuits to cool), then another 30 min or so for filling and dipping in chocolate, and a few hours to dry. So let’s say 2 hours of work / prep, and then you can leave the chocolate to dry overnight.
Carbs:
That depends a bit, based on how much jam (and what jam) you use, and how much chocolate for the coating.
The biscuits themselves are around 220 g carbs total (or 7 g per biscuit). In my recipe, I didn’t use up all the chocolate and went for small amounts of jam, so I’d say around 11 g of carbs per biscuit.
Nuts and Squirrels 