Deliciously sweet and nutty Vegan Cinnamon Stars Recipe - created in the style of the traditional German Christmas Biscuits 'Zimtsterne'. Created with an almond and hazelnut base and with flavours of warming cinnamon and zesty lemon.
Ingredients
For the cookies
- 200 g powdered sugar (icing sugar)
- 2 tbsp ground cinnamon
- 8 tbsp cold water
- 1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
- 150 g ground almonds
- 200 g ground hazelnuts
For the coating
- Icing sugar
- A little water or soy milk
- cinnamon
Instructions
- In a large bowl, combine all ingredients for the cookies. The dough should be firm and a little sticky, but you should be able to handle it with your hands. If it's appearing a little too wet, simply add in a little more powdered sugar.
- On a non-stick surface roll out the dough to about 1cm thickness. Ideally use a baking sheet or baking mat - or kitchen foil, so that you can easily remove the cutouts from the surface afterward.
- Use a small star-shaped cookie cutter to cut out the stars. Gently place them on a separate baking sheet and let them dry for about 4 hours. This step is important so that they firm up in their shape before being baked - if you skip this step, they might crumble.
- Once the 4 hours have elapsed, place the cookies in the preheated oven at 250 degrees for 3-5 minutes. This is a hot and quick baking process. Keep an eye on the cookies to ensure not to burn the corners of the stars.
- Place the stars on a cooling rack and prepare the coating by combining 5 Tbsp of powdered sugar with 1/2 tsp cinnamon and 1/2 water (or plant milk). Add in little drops of liquid whilst stirring until you get a smooth paste. If you run out of the coating, create a little more. The amount you need varies depending on how big your stars are and how many you cut out.
- Gently coat the cookies by either dipping them into the coating mixture or piping the coating onto them (which often turns out as the neater option!
- Place the cookies back onto the rack to dry the coating and once they're completely dry you can transfer them into a cookie tin.