Spitzbuben Cookies

Place flour, baking soda, sugar and vanilla sugar in the food processor. Pulse to mix. Add cold butter pieces, egg white and almonds and pulse until crumbly. Transfer to a working surface, knead very briefly to form a ball. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate for about 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 180ºC (360ºF). Line two baking trays with baking paper.

Sprinkle a little flour on the working surface and roll half of the dough about 4 mm (0.15 inch) thick. Place the rest of the dough in the fridge.

Cut out stars using a star cutter with a diameter of 6 cm (2.3 inches). Place half of these stars on the baking sheet. Use a smaller star cutter to cut another little star in the middle of the remaining stars.

Bake for about 12 minutes or until slightly golden. Take out of the oven, let sit on the tray for about 3 minutes, then leave them on the baking paper but remove from the tray. Place on a wire rack together with the baking paper and leave cool completely.

In the meantime, add any dough cut out back and roll then cut the rest of the pastry. Line the trays with new baking paper and repeat the process until all the dough is used.

When all the cookies are cold, mix the icing sugar with 1 or 2 tablespoons lemon juice until you have a thick paste. Either spread this paste on the cookies with hollow centers or transfer the paste into a small pipping bag and line the margins of the cookies. Sprinkle with some granulated sugar and leave to dry.

When the cookies are dry, place the jam into a small pan and heat up a bit. Brush the whole stars with some jam, place a hollow star on top and press very gently. Fill the hole of the star with some more jam and leave to set.