A festive sweet treat, spitzbuben are jam sandwich cookies commonly found around Christmas time in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. They’re very similar to Austrian linzer cookies — they’re made up of two simple sugar cookies with a little window cut out in the top cookie that exposes the jam and is topped with a dusting of powdered sugar. The difference between linzers and spitzbuben is that spitzbuben doesn’t include ground almonds or hazelnuts making them an easy cookie for bakers of all skill levels.
If you’re curious about what “spitzbuben” means, it roughly translates to “rogues,” “rascals,” or “mischievous boys,” which would make for a great origin story, but the origin is unclear. What is clear is that the recipe was developed somewhere around the Swiss-German-Austrian borders which is why these elegant and delicious Christmas cookies are most commonly found in those countries, but they’re simple enough in flavor and texture that anyone would enjoy them.
## Make Them Your Own
__Shapes:__ These cookies have a smooth yet crispy texture which makes them great cookie cutter cookies. These are made with a round cookie cutter for the outer cookie and a heart-shaped cookie cutter for the inner cut out to make an adorable Valentine’s Day treat, but you can use whatever shapes you’d like. As they’re traditional German Christmas cookies, you can stick with round cookies with holiday cut-outs like a Christmas tree, stars, or snowflakes.
__Jam:__ The other thing that makes these cookies great and adaptable to different tastes is that the buttery flavor that pairs so well with different types of jams. This recipe calls for strawberry and apricot jam, but you can use other jams like raspberry jam. You can even use an orange marmalade or a lemon curd. Whatever your jam is, you can use it.
Satisfy your sweet tooth with this easy-to-make recipe for German Spitzbuben Cookies.
1. Info for German Spitzbuben Cookies
- Cook Time: 1 hr 30 min
- Total Time: 1 hr 30 min
- Servings: 15
- Calories: 216.68 kcal
2. Ingredients for German Spitzbuben Cookies
- 200 gr. butter, at room temperature
- 125 gr. powdered sugar
- 1 egg white
- 1 tsp. lemon juice
- salt
- 350 gr. all-purpose flour
- strawberry jam
- apricot jam
- powdered sugar, for garnish
3. Directions:
- With an electric mixer, cream together the butter and sugar in a large bowl.
- Add the egg white, lemon juice, a pinch of salt, and the flour. Continue mixing until the ingredients are completely combined.
- Form a dough ball, cover it with plastic wrap, and refrigerate it for one hour.
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
- With a rolling pin, roll out the dough to a 1/4-inch thickness. Using a cookie cutter of your choice, cut out an even number of cookies. Do another smaller cut out in the center of half of the cookies, reserving the other half of the cookies as the base of the sandwiches.
- Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Place the cookies on the baking sheet and bake cookies for 8 minutes.
- Spread jam on the cookies that don’t have cut-outs and place the tops on them to form a sandwich.
- Sprinkle with powdered sugar and serve.
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