Nizzagebäck with Praline / Praline-Filled “Spritz” Biscuits

“Spritzgebäck” is a typical German biscuit, often eaten during advent / Christmas time. “Spritz” in this context means it’s “piped” or “squirted” (keep your minds out of the gutter, people). It’s characterised by its extremely buttery flavour and crunchy, crumbly texture.

This particular Spritzgebäck is chocolate-flavoured, has two layers, is filled with praline, and then dipped in melted chocolate. Chocolate overkill? You bet.

Why it’s called “Nizzagebäck” and if it has anything to do with Nice / Nizza, I have no idea. What I do know is it’s usually filled with jam instead, but I had some praline left over, and it’s absolutely yummy.

This recipe makes 28 (double) biscuits.

Ingredients:

• 250 g butter or margarine
• 100 g icing sugar
• 300 g flour
• 80 g milk chocolate
• 2 egg whites
• jam or praline
• 100 g dark chocolate and vegetable fat for coating

Preparation:

• Mix butter, icing sugar and egg white
• Melt milk chocolate and stir it in the mix
• Add the flour
• Transfer the dough into a piping bag / syringe, and pipe shapes onto a lined baking tray. These will spread out a little bit, but not too much, so leave some space between them, but you don’t need to overdo it
• Make sure your shapes are in (mirror image) pairs so you can stick them together
• Bake at 160C (fan oven) for 8 minutes
• Note: These are quite thin and can turn from not quite done to overcooked in an instant, so watch them closely!
• Let the biscuits cool
• Stick together two pieces by filling them with praline or jam (they will be a bit fragile, so don’t press too hard)
• Melt the chocolate and add melted vegetable fat to get it to the desired consistency for coating
• Brush the chocolate onto the biscuits, or dip them
• Let the chocolate dry, and transfer them into a tin. They won’t last forever without going a bit soft, so eat them quickly. This should not be an issue!

Time:

This is a bit fiddly with the cooling, filling and coating. Say around 1 1/2 hours if you’re doing them for the first time, plus drying time for the chocolate.

Carbs:

Total (without filling and chocolate coating): 380 g (approx. 12 g per biscuit)

Depending on your filling and how much chocolate you use, you’ll probably end up with 15-18 g carbs per biscuit, to be fair they are quite large!

If you need to watch your carbs, consider filling them with diabetic-friendly jam, using cocoa and a bit of milk instead of chocolate for the dough, and leaving off the chocolate coating.

Ischler Kekse – Almond-chocolate-jam biscuits

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.