Day 3: Biberli, or Swiss Gingerbread with Almond-Kirsch-Filling

Biberli is what happened to me when I let the kids decide what I should bake next. They chose a recipe I had never heard of before, with no picture, and with a name that didn't tell me anything at all: Biber is German for beaver, -li is a suffix that the Swiss love to add after all possible words, it seems.

But good that they did, because these gingerbread cookies are absolutely gorgeous, with a soft almond-kirsch-filling wrapped in crispy, spicy gingerbread crust.

And after a quick look at the best dictionary in the world I found out that the name for this type of cookies the most likely comes from a dialectal variant of Pimpernuss, or bladdernut (!), that was used as a spice in Biberli. Speaking of which: instead of the spices in this recipe, you can use a ready-made gingerbread spice mix.

This is what you need for the dough:

• 120g honey


• 50g sugar


• 30g butter


• 1 tsp cinnamon


• ½ tsp ground cloves


• 1 pinch of the following: dried orange peel, ginger, cardamom, coriander


• 1 pinch of salt


• 100g all-purpose flour


• 100g rye flour


• 1 tsp potash (or baking soda)


• 1 Tbsp kirsch or similar

..and for the filling:

• 1 smallish egg white


• 100g ground almond


• 40g sugar


• 1 Tbsp kirsch or similar

…and for the wash:

• a bit of milk


• 1 Tbsp honey


• 1 tsp cornstarch


• 1 Tbsp water

Combine honey, sugar, spices and butter in a saucepan. Heat until sugar has melted, then remove from heat. Dissolve potash in the kirsch. Place flour in a baking bowl. Add salt and the honey mixture and the potash-kirsch-mixture. Work the dough with your hands until it’s smooth. The dough looks and smells awful – don’t be scared, that’s normal :) The greenish colour comes from the rye and the weird smell from the potash (baking soda doesn’t smell that strong!). Let the dough rest 2-3 hours in the fridge.

For the filling, just combine all ingredients until you get a somewhat firm paste.

Roll the dough into a long rectangle about 8 cm wide. Work the filling into a long roll – it should be as long as the dough rectangle is. Place the filling roll in the middle of the dough. Pull both sides gently towards the middle, so that the filling stays fully covered. Press the seam together and turn the roll so that the seam faces down (see the picture below).

Now, use a sharp knife to cut small triangles out of the roll, like when baking cinnamon rolls the Finnish way. Brush the Biberli with milk and bake in a preheated oven (175 C) about 15 minutes, or until they start to gain some colour. In the meantime, prepare the liquid for the second wash: combine cornstarch, cold water and honey in a small saucepan. Bring to the boil and remove from heat. Once the cookies come out of the oven, brush them with the warm honey mixture. Let cool completely, then either enjoy – or store!

I’ve noticed that this kind of Lebkuchen (or gingerbread) tastes a bit bitter on the first day. Miraculously, the taste improves a lot in one or two days!