Pepernoten, Speculaasspices and Self-rising flour

Only a few more days and it's Sinterklaas: the 5th of December. I promised Natalia to post a recipe for pepernoten, so here it is!! Pictures will follow tonight!!

Pepernoten (recipe adapted from Hollandbymail)
125 grams flour
125 grams self-rising flour (recipe below)
100 grams butter
80 grams brown sugar
2 tbsp water
1/8 tsp salt
1 egg yolk
1 tsp speculaasspices (recipe below)
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground aniseseeds

Knead all the ingredients into a dought and shape it like a ball. Let this ball rest in a cool place for an hour, for example in the fridge.

Preheat the oven at 160 degrees Celsius o2 320 degrees Fahrenheit. Butter the baking sheet. Make little balls out of half of the dough, the balls should have the size of a marble. Put the little balls on the baking sheet, equally spaced from each other. Half the ball should fill an entire baking sheet with pepernoten.

Push every little ball down just a bit. Put the baking sheet in the middle of the oven and bake the pepernoten untill they are ready and goldenbrown, this will take about 20 minutes. Let the pepernoten cool. While the first batch of pepernoten is baking, you can make the second batch.


Speculaasspices
8 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp ground nutmeg
2 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp white pepper
1 tsp powdered ginger
1 tsp cardemom

Put all the spices into a bowl and mix them well. Keep the speculaasspices in glass yar that closes very well to keep the flavours.



Self-rising flour
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp baking powder

Mix to combine.

Recipes still to come this week:

• Linzer Sables for TWD (pg. 134-135 of Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan)
• Lemon Ricotta Cookies with Lemon Glaze