Linzer Hearts

Sarabeth's Bakery: Recipe 4

Made October 14th.  Making these linzer hearts was not difficult, but it did take time.  Sarabeth warns you of this.  First you have to toast and de-skin the hazelnuts, then turn them into flour, mixing with all the other dry ingredients. Then you make the dough and refrigerate for 1-2 hours.  Next, you roll out the dough and stamp it with the cookie cutter, which of course, does not have to be a heart, but I had a heart shaped cutter and used it.   Once you have your baking sheets full of hearts, they need to go in the refrigerator again for another half hour.  Bake, cool completely, and make into sandwiches with jam in the middle.  Then, the real shocker, is that Sarabeth says to let the cookies stand for 8 hours, or overnight, before eating so that the jam can set.  Well, I didn’t want to wait that long and lo and behold, the jam ran out the sides of the cookie upon first bite.  So I thought she was right, you should wait.  But then when I had a cookie the next day the jam also got smooshed out of the cookie, albeit of a thicker consistency.  On day three, the jam escaping the cookie was less of an issue, though it still happened.   The cookies were a bit on the thick side, but that is only because my rolling pin skills are not that advanced yet.   These cookies are good, there is no question.  But are they good enough to warrant all that time?  Am I going to want to make these cookies again?  No, probably not.  I am more likely to try another recipe that might produce more impressive results.  These are easily the best Sarabeth cookies I have made so far, so I don’t want to knock them too much, but I would have liked dough that had a bit more zip to it brought about by spices I presume. As for the jam, I made a good choice with the relatively thick Mediterranean Organic Raspberry jam.