Chocolate hazelnut sandwich cookies are traditionally called “paratroopers”, a cookie of my childhood, that literally melts in your mouth. Well, my dad loves baking and eating cookies, so here is his way of doing it.
Whisk 4 egg whites until firm. Add the 150gr of icing sugar and continue to whisk for a few minutes. If you want you can add some lemon juice or drop of lemon essential oil. Fold in 150gr of finely grounded roasted hazelnuts and a 1 tbsp of breadcrumbs.
Use two teaspoons to spoon the mixture onto trays covered with nonstick baking paper. Put in the preheated oven at 120°C. When they get brownish, lower the heat to 50°C and leave them to dry for an hour.
In the meantime make the filling. Mix 50gr of butter with 50gr of icing sugar. Add one whole egg and 50gr of melted dark chocolate.
Now stick the cooled cookies together with the chocolate filling.
Mind you, this is a traditional recipe, the original chocolate hazelnut sandwich cookies were made with raw eggs. In case you are not comfortable with it, use two egg yolks instead of a whole egg for the filling, and make sure to precook them.
Kaiserschmarren – something what I call “quick version of pancakes”. This is traditionally Austrian dish, named by their Emperor Franc Joseph I. in translation it means Emperors crumbs. My son loves eating them for breakfast, with milk, as eating cereals.
Basically you should prepare same mixture as for the pancakes, just a little bit thicker. You can use any type of flour, this time my chose is chickpeas flour and I have replaced cow’s milk with rice milk. As this you get gluten and lactose free dish. The good thing is that you do not have to worry about tearing pancakes, this “mess like” dish is perfect solution for busy mornings.
In a bowl put flour (250gr), 3 eggs, pinch of salt, vanilla essence, 1 tbsp. of brown sugar and milk (250ml). Mix all well, and add the melted butter (30gr). For an extra taste you can add cinnamon and orange and lemon zest (or replace with a drop of orange or lemon essential oil).
Heat some butter in a large pan, pour in the mixture. When starts getting coloured on the bottom, start cutting, tearing and mixing the crumbs. You cannot fail, there is no specified shape of crumbs. Just keep mixing them, turning and cutting until all get nice golden-brown colour.
Make sure to use flat wooden spatula, to be able to cut the crumbs.
Serve Kaiserschmarren with milk, jam, compote, Greek yogurt or whatever your kids like.