Buckwheat Flowers

Flowers are the main symbol of spring and, as such, deserve to be celebrated at this time. So I decided to pay them an homage in the kitchen by baking flower-shaped cookies made of buckwheat flour with almond flakes and dried cranberries.

You Will Need:

• 100 g dried cranberries
• 1 orange (squeezed)
• ca. 550 g buckwheat flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 packet (1 tsp) baking powder
• 80 g brown sugar
• cinnamon (to taste)
• a pinch of salt
• 100 g almond flakes
• 150 ml vegetable oil
• ca. 250 ml cooking cream
• additional buckwheat flour for rolling out the dough
• marmalade (optional)

Notes: The above amount yielded about 80-90 cookies. I used the marmalade to "glue" the cookies together (the marmalade serves as an adhesive of sorts), which of course reduced the number of cookies (at least numerically). You can, but don't necessarily have to do this. Some people just find these cookies tastier when they're "filled" with marmalade. If you do decide to do this, I would recommend you use a forest-fruit marmalade/jam because it really nicely complements the dried cranberries.

How To Prepare:

1. Soak the cranberries in orange juice. Let them sit for about 5 minutes.
2. Sift the buckwheat flour. Throw away what is not able to pass through the sieve. Add the baking powder and baking soda to the flour.
3. Add sugar, cinnamon and salt to the flour mixture and mix well.
4. Chop up the almond flakes. I recommend that you actually lightly beat them with a beat cleaver while they are in a plastic bag. Add them to the dry mixture.
5. Add oil and cooking cream to the mixture and knead.
6. When the dough has become compact, add the cranberries and orange juice and continue kneading until everything blends together.
7. Leave the dough to sit in the refrigerator for 15-30 minutes. This will make it easier to roll out and to form the cookies.
8. Heat up the oven to 175°C.
9. Dust your working area with flour. Roll out the dough to about 3 mm thickness and cut with cookie cutters. I used flower-shaped ones, although any shape will do.
10. Cover the baking tray with baking paper.
11. Bake cookies for 8-10 minutes at 175°C.
12. If you prefer, once the cookies have cooled down, "glue" them with marmalade/jam (spread marmalade on one cookie and press another cookie onto that one - the marmalade serves as an adhesive here).
13. Enjoy!