During Christmas in Switzerland, you’ll see many traditional Christmas cookies (aka Guetzli) show up in the grocery stores, bakeries and Christmas markets. These cookies are often delivered by Samichlaus on 6 Dec in the classic burlap sack. Families also bake these at home and deliver cookie plates to friends, like in other lands.
Like most treats, home-baked are always more delicious and a fun activity during the holidays, especially if you want to experience a little Swiss culture. So here are recipes for 6 popular Swiss Christmas cookies and tips for success.
Pre-made dough
Most Swiss groceries sell pre-made dough for popular Christmas cookies, like Zimtstern and Mailänderli. You simply need to roll, cut and bake. I’ve tried these pre-made doughs and they taste good, definitely better than the store-bought cookies because they are freshly baked.
If you are in a hurry and don’t want a messy kitchen, absolutely use these pre-doughs. Another benefit is that they sell gluten-free versions as shown below.
Special ingredients for Swiss cookies
These cookies all use mostly the same ingredients: flour, sugar, butter, & eggs. Three of these cookies use ground nuts, which are sold at every Swiss grocery. If you don’t have ground nuts, you can make your own with a food processor or use almond flour (though this finely ground flour won’t make for the same toothy texture). If you are allergic to a particular nut, just use a different one.
The only ingredient that might stump you if you don’t live in Europe, is vanilla sugar, which is used instead of vanilla extract, which is not sold here. Vanilla sugar is sold in (expensive) packets, as shown below. But you can easily make your own by placing a split vanilla pod into a jar of sugar and waiting a few weeks. You could also use vanilla paste (the little jars below) which you can find in some Swiss groceries.
Air drying cookie dough
Two of these recipes ask you to air dry the cookie for several hours before baking. I found this technique both shocking and annoying when I set out to bake my first Zimtstern that I intended to eat within the hour.
To honor these traditional recipes, I tried the air-dry. While the cookie was good and no one got sick, I must say that I find the air dry entirely unnecessary, possibly dangerous. It makes for a drier cookie that hypothetically lasts longer. But frankly, those are two things I don’t need. So I’m happy to bake them right away and eat a bunch of soft cookies over a few days. But the Swiss have been doing this for many, many years, so you should certainly try the air dry if you feel so inclined.
Rolling sticks for cookies
The one piece of equipment you might not have are rolling sticks (aka Teighölzli), which help you get a uniform thickness across the dough. Each recipe calls for a specific thickness. So you select sticks that are the right thickness, set them on either side of the dough and rest your rolling pin on the sticks as you roll. This is most helpful for the very thin 2mm dough, which could easily get too thin. Obviously you can free roll if you don’t have the sticks.
Rolling sticks are usually sold in a pack with three sizes: 2mm, 5mm and 10mm (aka 1 cm). You can buy Teighölzli pack for about CHF 12.
Now to the recipes…
1. Zimtstern • Cinnamon Stars
These star shaped cookies are my older son’s favorite and generally beloved in Switzerland. They even lend their name to the Swiss Christmas song, “Zimestern han i gern” sung to the tune of Jingle Bells.
The Zimtstern cookie is mostly ground almonds held together loosely by sugar and egg whites. You’re supposed to let them air-dry for a few hours (or overnight) then bake them briefly with a egg white icing. This method seems strange and disturbing to someone outside the culture, so feel free to just bake them right away if that makes you feel better.
These are always cut into a star shape. We like the smaller stars best but it’s nice to have a variety. Many stores will sell nested star cookie cutters so you have an option for sizes.
For icing, most recipes have you mix egg white with powdered sugar, then bake the cookies briefly to set the icing. I’ve also mixed powdered sugar with a bit of milk and used that instead.
[mv_create key=”6″ thumbnail=”https://swissfamilyfun.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/cookies-zimtstern-cutting.jpg” title=”Recipe: Zimtstern • Cinnamon Star Cookies” type=”recipe”]
The Basler Brunsli cookie (akak “little brown”) is almost the same as Zimtstern just with the addition of chocolate and cocoa powder. They come from Basel and a often cut in the shape of a bear, which luckily I had in my cookie cutter box.
These were our new favorites and definitely going into the rotation! We loved them so much, we ate lots of them raw and only half of them survived the 2 hour air-dry. After baking, the cookie was happily still a bit soft, but strangely not quite as delicious as the raw dough.
[mv_create key=”7″ thumbnail=”https://swissfamilyfun.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/cookies-brunsli-single.jpg” title=”Recipe: Basler Brunsli • Swiss Chocolate Almond Cookies” type=”recipe”]
The Vanillakerferl is a delicate crescent-shaped vanilla flavored cookie, made with ground almonds. In German, it’s also called Vanille Gipfel and Vanille Hörnchen. This was my husband’s favorite cookie of the bunch. It’s basically the same as a Mexican wedding cookie or Russian tea cake.
Every recipe warned me how difficult these were to form, that the dough just falls apart. But I didn’t have any trouble forming the cookies and I didn’t even chill the dough first. I did have trouble rolling them in the powdered sugar when several broke in half. But that just means more for me to eat and not share.
[mv_create key=”8″ thumbnail=”https://swissfamilyfun.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/cookies-vanillekerferl-single.jpg” title=”Recipe: Vanillekipferl • Swiss Vanilla Crescent Cookies” type=”recipe”]
A Spitzbube cookie is two thin shortbread cookies with jelly sandwiched between. There are all sorts of special cookie cutters for this cookie with cutouts on the top piece so the jelly shows through. The one shown on the left allows you to change out the shape in the middle of the circle. Many use a face cutout, calling back to the meaning of the word Spitzbube = “naughty boy.”
You should roll these quite thin (2mm) so the cookie to jelly ratio is not unbalanced.
During cutting, I wondered why I couldn’t just free cut the middle without having the cutter affixed to the circle. Well, the dough is so thin that it just breaks unless you have the circle cutter holding it together at the same time you cut out the middle shape.
I used a raspberry jam because I didn’t want to buy a special jelly just for these cookies. But everyone agreed the jam was a bit too sweet. Current jelly is more traditional and gives more contrast to the sweetness of the cookie.
[mv_create key=”9″ thumbnail=”https://swissfamilyfun.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/cookies-spitzbuben-single.jpg” title=”Recipe: Spitzbuben • Swiss Jelly Sandwich Cookies” type=”recipe”]
The Mailänderli is a butter cookie often flavored with lemon zest. It is traditionally cut into a flower shape and brushed with egg yolk, which gives it the classic yellow color you’ll see on all the store-bought Mailänderli.
The Swiss adore Mailänderli and wax poetic about it. But honestly, this is my least favorite cookie of the ones here. I find the yellow egg wash unappetizing and it’s not as sweet and soft as an American style sugar cookie. But if want a less sweet, slightly dry cookie, by all means, make a Mailänderli.
[mv_create key=”10″ thumbnail=”https://swissfamilyfun.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/cookie-mailanderli-single1.jpeg” title=”Recipe: Mailänderli • Swiss Sugar Cookies” type=”recipe”]
Sablé cookies come from France but appear all over Switzerland during Christmas. It’s a buttery shortbread cookie that benefits from a light (or heavy) sprinkling of coarse sanding sugar.
I had fun with the checkboard pattern that I free-styled in the pics below. But later, I found a better method where you roll each color to 1 cm, the cut strips and layer them together. That way the checkboard is very even, unlike mine below. You can do other designs like spirals, so get creative.
[mv_create key=”11″ thumbnail=”https://swissfamilyfun.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/cookies-sable-single.jpg” title=”Recipe: Sablé • Swiss Shortbread Cookies” type=”recipe”]
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Lastly, I’ll leave you with a couple funny Swiss German ads about a mom and her daughter making cookies together. Even if you don’t understand what they are saying, I’m sure you’ll still laugh.
