Brunsli

Brunsli are another popular traditional Swiss Christmas Cookie that I have known, loved and made my whole life. This recipe was my Grandmother’s so it is cherished! They are gluten and dairy free - made with ground almonds, or almond flour, sugar, a little icing sugar, cocoa and egg whites.

Brunsli are a soft, chewy delicious cookie. As with the Mailanderli, the fun is in the rolling out the dough and pressing out the one traditional shape – Brunsli are traditionally made using the flower cookie cutter. But really, they taste great with whatever shape you choose!

Again, as with the Mailanderli, it's best to weight the ingredients – most Swiss ingredients in recipes are listed by weight. I have included the Imperial measurements as I measured each as I was making them but I really recommend that you weight your ingredients!

Everyone loves these cookies so much – they are a real treat and they herald the Christmas holidays in our home.

This recipe makes about 40 cookies depending on the cookie cutter you use. Indulge in making these and share them with those you love!

As always, when you make this recipe, I would love to see your creation so please post a photo of your Brunsli goodness and tag my IG account #RenataCollective or leave a comment with your thoughts!

Prep Time: 10 minutes to make the dough / Chill Time: Overnight / Bake Time: 10 minutes / Makes – about 40 cookies depending on the size of your cookie cutters.

Ingredients

250 g /2¾ Cups Ground Almonds / Almond Flour
250 g / 1¼ Cup Sugar
40 g / 1/3 Cup Icing Sugar
40 g / XXXX Unsweetened Cocoa
2 Egg Whites

How It’s Made

Whisk the ground almonds, sugar, icing sugar and cocoa together in a medium-large bowl.
Add the egg whites and mix (with a wooden spoon is best) to a smooth dough.
Cover the bowl with a kitchen towel and let the dough sit on the counter for an hour.
When you are ready to roll your cookies, prepare your baking sheets and work surface.
Line a cookie sheet with parchment or a silicon sheet.
Pull 2 pieces of waxed paper out of the roll – about 12” each piece. Lay one piece down and sprinkle with a very small amount of flour (gluten free flour is you want these gluten free) so the dough doesn’t stick. Put a quarter of the dough of the floured surface and cover the dough with the other piece of waxed paper. If you have height sticks (see photos – these are from Switzerland but you can get rolling pins with very cool rings that fit onto it to even your rolling to the same thickness) insert these on either side of the dough between the pieces of waxed paper. Roll out the dough to a thickness of ~ 7 mm / ¼ inch either with a steady hand in rolling or with the height sticks. Brunsli need to be 1/4” in thickness and not thinner than this.
Remove the top piece of waxed paper and cut out the shapes. Carefully remove each from the dough and place on the baking sheet. Gather the remaining dough and start again – rolling and cutting out shapes and putting them on the cookie sheet. Finish this one quarter of dough before you start the next.
Work with the rest of the dough until you have used it up rolling and cutting our shapes.
Press a fork lightly on each cookie so you can see the indents from the fork tines. Sprinkle each cookie with a bit of sugar.
Put the cookie pan in the fridge to chill overnight.
Next day, preheat your oven to 350°F.
Bake for 10 minutes on the middle rack of the oven. The cookies should be easily movable on the cookie sheet. Do not be tempted to bake them longer than 10 minutes – they need to be chewy and baking them longer will make them hard.
Remove from the oven and let the cookies cool. (It doesn’t hurt to taste a cookie when it is slightly warm! So good!)
Store the cooled cookies on your counter in an airtight container, like a pretty tin lined with waxed paper or parchment paper.
En Guete! Enjoy!