Wachauer Busserl (Wachau Hazelnut Kisses)

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Two baking trays
• •Parchment paper
• •Fine sieve for dusting powdered sugar
• •Mixing bowl
• •Cling film

Instructions

1. 1

   Toast the hazelnuts

   Spread the ground hazelnuts on a dry baking tray and toast them in a 160°C oven for six to eight minutes, stirring once halfway through. Watch them carefully. You want them fragrant and barely golden, not dark. Toasting deepens the flavor and removes excess moisture so the cookies stay sandy and short instead of turning dense. Let them cool completely before you use them.

   If you're grinding whole hazelnuts yourself, pulse them in short bursts. You want a coarse, sandy texture, not hazelnut butter. A tablespoon of flour from the recipe pulsed in with the nuts helps absorb the oil and keeps things dry.
2. 2

   Make the dough

   Combine the flour, cooled toasted hazelnuts, powdered sugar, vanilla sugar, salt, and orange zest in a large bowl. Toss the cold butter cubes through the dry mixture, then work everything together with your fingertips until it looks like coarse breadcrumbs. Add the egg yolk and press the dough together until it just holds. Don't knead it. This is a short dough, closer to Mürbteig than anything elastic. The less you handle it, the more tender the cookies will be.

   Cold butter is not a suggestion. If the butter softens, the dough gets greasy and the cookies spread instead of holding their shape. If your kitchen is warm, chill the cubed butter in the freezer for ten minutes before you start.
3. 3

   Rest the dough

   Flatten the dough into a disc, wrap it in cling film, and refrigerate for at least thirty minutes. The dough needs to firm up so you can roll it without it crumbling apart in your hands. It also gives the flour time to hydrate and the butter time to resolidify, which means cleaner edges and better texture after baking.

4. 4

   Shape the Busserl

   Preheat your oven to 170°C. Line two baking trays with parchment. Scoop rounded teaspoons of dough and roll them into balls about the size of a large cherry. Place them on the trays with two centimeters of space between each one. They won't spread much, but they need room to breathe. Press your thumb firmly into the center of each ball to create a deep well. If the edges crack, pinch them back together gently. The well needs to be deep enough to hold a good spoonful of jam.

   Dip your thumb in powdered sugar before pressing. It keeps the dough from sticking and gives you a cleaner impression.
5. 5

   Fill and top

   Spoon a small amount of sour cherry jam into each well, about half a teaspoon. Don't overfill or the jam will bubble over and burn on the tray. For the walnut-topped version, skip the jam and press a walnut half gently into the thumbprint instead. I usually do half and half because I can never choose, and a mixed tin looks beautiful.

6. 6

   Bake the cookies

   Bake for twelve to fourteen minutes. The cookies are done when the edges turn the palest gold and the bottoms are lightly browned. The centers will still look slightly soft. That's correct. They firm up as they cool. If you wait until they look fully done in the oven, they'll be dry by the time they reach the tin. Pull them out while you're still slightly nervous about it.

   Gretel always said Weihnachtsbäckerei should be pale, not tanned. If your cookies are browning too much, your oven runs hot. Drop the temperature by ten degrees and add a minute.
7. 7

   Cool and dust

   Let the Busserl cool on the tray for five minutes, then transfer them to a wire rack. They're fragile when hot, so use a thin spatula and move gently. Once completely cool, dust them with powdered sugar through a fine sieve. The sugar should settle like snow on the edges and around the jam. Don't dust while they're warm or the sugar melts into a sticky film instead of sitting clean and white on top.

Chef Tips

• •Use real Vanillezucker. Austrian baking depends on it. You can buy it in packets or make your own by burying a split vanilla pod in a jar of powdered sugar for a week. Vanilla extract dissolved in sugar is not the same thing. The flavor is rounder, less sharp, and it disappears into the dough the way it's supposed to.
• •Sour cherry jam, Weichselmarmelade, is the traditional filling and the tartness cuts through the rich, buttery dough beautifully. If you can't find it, a good quality apricot jam (Marillenmarmelade) works, and it's what Gretel often used because she could get Wachau apricot preserves from a shop in London. Avoid anything too sweet. The jam needs to push back against the butter and nuts.
• •These cookies improve with age. Store them in a tin with a sheet of parchment between layers. After three or four days, the butter softens into the hazelnuts and the orange zest blooms. By the second week they're perfect. This is why Austrian families start their Weihnachtsbäckerei in late November.
• •If you want to be traditional about it, make a mixed tin: half with cherry jam, half with walnut tops. Present them dusted with powdered sugar on a small plate alongside a cup of coffee. This is good Austrian home cooking at its best.

Advance Preparation

• •The dough can be made up to two days ahead and refrigerated. Let it sit at room temperature for ten minutes before shaping, or it will crack when you try to roll it.
• •Baked Busserl store beautifully in an airtight tin for up to three weeks. They actually taste better after a few days of resting. Layer them between sheets of parchment so they don't stick.
• •Unbaked, shaped Busserl (without the jam filling) can be frozen on a tray, then transferred to a freezer bag. Bake from frozen, adding two minutes to the baking time, and fill with jam after baking.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 22g)