These beautiful, tender linzer cookies with raspberry jam filling are perfectly sweet (i.e. not TOO sweet) and particularly enjoyable during the holiday season.
You’ll have friends and family waiting in the wings while you assemble them! No wonder they’re our new Christmas tradition!
The Perfect Holiday Cookie
For the past few years, we’ve all looked forward to these festive little cookies around the holidays. They’ve had my dad Bill declaring almond flour to be the most underrated baking ingredient. (We also use almond flour in our osmanthus cake.)
The almond flour makes for the most tender crumb, and they bake for juuust long enough to set them. Along with the moisture from the jam, the result is a cookie that’s slightly soft instead of crunchy. Delicious with a cup of tea, coffee, or milk.
The glossy window of red jam is also about as festive as can be during the holiday season! I just love them, and they’re now the only cookie I will go to the trouble of making every year.
A New Christmas Cookie Tradition
There are a lot of Linzer Cookie recipes on the internet, and many seem quite devil-may-care for this Type A gal, considering what a Linzer cookie entails.
The first time I made them, I didn’t really have my head screwed on straight. It was 2020. I had spent the vast majority of December—oh who am I kidding, September, October, November, AND December—padding around in a long robe or nightgown of some sort. I thought…how about some Christmas cheer with some Linzer cookies!
What came out was…less than ideal. (Though perhaps it matched the tone of the year.) I didn’t realize that you had to dust the lids of the cookies BEFORE you put them on the jammed base cookies. I ended up with powdered sugar covering up the jam windows!
The next year, I vowed to make them right. While the powdered sugar part went well, the baking times and temps were a little off, and I felt the cookies were too sweet.
And so I went in 2022 and 2023, tweaking and refining our own version. After some experimenting, I landed on the perfect linzer cookie in my book, and they’ve become a family request! While not every cookie on the Christmas cookie plate feels worth the calories, these definitely are.
The Order of Operations
I don’t know about you, but if a single cookie requires me to roll out dough for what is essentially a sandwich of two cookies, and they each require a different protocol—spread jam on half the cookies, sprinkle powdered sugar on the other half— I think I want my hand held a little bit.
This is that hand-holding recipe.
So you don’t get anything confused, here are the steps:
- Make the dough and chill it.
- Cook the raspberry jam and strain it.
- Roll out the cookies, cutting bases and lids. (The lids have a cutout in the center—you can use any very small cutter you have. We use the round bottom of a piping tip.)
- Dust the lids with powdered sugar.
- Spread the bases with raspberry jam.
- Make your cookie sandwiches.
Et voilá! Behold your linzer cookie work of art!
What Jam to Use
We think raspberry jam is the ideal choice for Linzer cookies, but you can use any favorite berry jam, or even apricot jam. Raspberry is always our top choice though. Strawberry jam can veer a little sweet, and apricot is nice, but the pale orange color doesn’t always feel as festive.
You may be tempted to buy seedless jam. I’m not a big fan of the taste or texture of the ones that I’ve tried, so I take the extra step to de-seed the jam by pressing it through a sieve after reducing it. I used St. Dalfour jam in this recipe.
What size cookie cutters can I use?
Because you’re essentially eating 2 cookies in each sandwich, I prefer to use a small cutter. We use a fluted 2½-inch circle, a plump yet small 2¾-inch star, and the round bottom of a frosting tip to cut out the cookie “windows.” Tiny hearts also look great cut out from the center of a linzer cookie.
We like this vintage plump star cookie cutter because something with longer points would probably break a bit too easily—and those tips can burn in the oven.
This recipe makes 4 dozen sandwich cookies of this size. If you use larger cookie cutters than that, know that the yield will change.
Linzer Cookies Recipe Instructions
Make the cookie dough:
In a dry skillet, toast the almond flour over medium-high heat for 2-3 minutes, stirring constantly until uniformly and lightly toasted. Do not walk away from this process. It will happen quickly, and you don’t want burnt almond flour! Remove from heat, and let cool slightly.
In a large bowl, whisk together the almond flour, all-purpose flour, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or a large bowl with a hand mixer), whip the room temperature butter and sugar on medium speed for about 3 minutes, until the mixture is pale yellow and fluffy.
Scrape the sides of the bowl, and with the mixer on medium speed, add the eggs one at a time, followed by the vanilla extract. Scrape down the sides of the bowl again, and continue beating until the mixture is well-combined.
With the mixer off, add about a quarter of the dry ingredients. Turn the mixer on low, and continue to add the dry ingredients a little at a time. Stir until the mixture is just incorporated and the dough is relatively uniform, scraping the bottom of the bowl as needed.
Divide the dough roughly in half, and press each half into a smooth, firm disc. Wrap each one tightly in plastic wrap, and chill for 2 hours or overnight.
Prepare the jam:
Empty all the jam into a small saucepan. Bring to a simmer.
Simmer for 20 minutes to thicken the jam, stirring often, until it’s reduced by about 25%. Sieve the jam (if it has seeds) through a fine-mesh strainer into a bowl, using a spoon or stiff rubber spatula to push it through the sieve. Scrape the bottom of the sieve as you go; the jam has a tendency to cling to it. Discard the seeds. Allow the jam to cool, covered.
You’ll know the consistency is right if the jam slowly oozes to the edges of the cookie during assembly. This ensures the cookies stick together. If needed, you can reheat the jam and reduce further to get it to the right consistency.
Roll, Cut, and Bake Cookies:
Prepare 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Aluminum baking sheets work best for these thin cookies (dark non-stick ones will cause them to bake faster and possibly burn). Preheat the oven to 350°F/175°C with two racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven. We’ll bake two pans of cookies at a time.
Note:
If you’re late on preheating the oven, chill any cookies you’ve cut in the refrigerator until ready for baking.
Take 1 disc of dough out of the refrigerator, and set it on a lightly floured work surface (we prefer to do this right on our stone countertop). The dough needs a few minutes to warm up before rolling. Once the dough starts to roll without cracking, you’re ready to go. Roll the dough out evenly to a ¼-inch (6mm) thickness.
Dip your cookie cutter in flour, then cut out as many cookies as you can.
Use a floured metal spatula with a thin edge to transfer the cookies to a baking sheet, spaced about 1 inch/2cm apart. The cookies will expand slightly, but not much.
Bake for 6-7 minutes, rotating the pans 180° once halfway through. This will yield a tender, perfectly blond cookie. If you bake them for a couple of minutes longer, you’ll get a crisper, more toasted cookie, but bear in mind, the moisture from the jam softens them regardless.
So you’ve just put a batch of cookie bases into the oven. Now it’s time for the lids. Roll up any scraps you have, and press them into a smooth disc. Transfer back to the plastic wrap and put in the fridge while you get the other cold dough disc out of the refrigerator. Repeat the same steps to roll and cut out cookies, but this time, also use the larger end of a pastry piping tip to cut out a small circle in the center of each cookie.
Carefully remove the center (these can go into the scrap pile of dough), and transfer your linzer cookie lids to a parchment lined baking sheet.
Bake for 6-7 minutes, once again rotating the pans 180° halfway through.
Repeat these steps with all of the cookie dough, pressing any dough scraps together and re-rolling as needed.
As the cookies come out of the oven, transfer them to a wire rack or cutting board to cool, and place more cookies on the baking sheets to bake, until you’ve baked all the cookies.
Keep track of the number of lids and bases you have—ideally, you’ll end up with the same number! You may want to jot this down on paper to make sure you don’t lose track as I do just about every year.
It’s not a problem if you have more bases, as you can make a sandwich cookie without the decorative cutout, but it is a problem if you end up with a surfeit of lids, as it becomes very fussy to spread the jam. Though if you’re like our family, someone is always waiting in the wings to gobble up the rejects!
Tip!
In case you wondered, if the sheet pan is still a little warm when the next batch of cookies go on, you’ll still get good results.
Assemble the cookies:
When all the cookies have cooled, arrange the lids on a sheet pan and dust with powdered sugar using a fine-meshed strainer or a powdered sugar shaker if you have one. Dust to your desired coverage.
Spread about 1 teaspoon of jam onto the bottom of a cookie base (you’ll want the “nice” side of the cookie facing out). Try to keep the majority of the jam in the center of the cookie.
Take a cookie lid and gently tap it to get rid of any excess powdered sugar. Then gently press it onto the cookie base with the jam.
The jam should slowly ooze up into the cutout and right to the edges of the cookie. Repeat with all the cookies, and enjoy!
Serving and Storage:
These cookies look best served in a single layer on a cookie platter.
They will keep well for about 1 week on the counter. If you won’t finish them within that time, you may want to refrigerate them. I’ve also found these to freeze well, and you can even munch on them straight from the freezer or let them come up to room temperature first!
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Recipe
Perfect Linzer Cookies
Equipment
- Rolling Pin
- Parchment paper
- 2 aluminum baking sheets
- cookie cutters (we used a 2½” circle, a 2¾” star, and the wide end of a pastry piping tip that measured just under 1” in diameter)
Ingredients
- 1 cup almond flour
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2½ sticks unsalted butter (1¼ cups, at room temperature)
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 26 ounces raspberry jam (about 3¼ cups)
- powdered sugar (for dusting)
Instructions
Make the cookie dough:
- In a dry skillet, toast the almond flour over medium-high heat for 2-3 minutes, stirring constantly until uniformly and lightly toasted. Remove from heat, and let cool slightly.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the almond flour, all-purpose flour, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or a large bowl with a hand mixer), whip the room temperature butter and sugar on medium speed for about 3 minutes, until the mixture is pale yellow and fluffy. Scrape the sides of the bowl, and with the mixer on medium speed, add the eggs one at a time, followed by the vanilla extract. Scrape down the sides of the bowl again, and continue beating until the mixture is well-combined.
- With the mixer off, add about a quarter of the dry ingredients. Turn the mixer on low, and continue to add the dry ingredients a little at a time. Stir until the mixture is just incorporated and the dough is relatively uniform, scraping the bottom of the bowl as needed.
- Divide the dough roughly in half, and press each half into a smooth, firm disc. Wrap each one tightly in plastic wrap, and chill for 2 hours or overnight.
Prepare the jam:
- Empty all the jam into a small saucepan. Bring to a simmer. Simmer for 20 minutes to thicken the jam, stirring often, until it’s reduced by about 25%. Sieve the jam (if it has seeds) through a fine-mesh strainer into a bowl, using a spoon to push it through the sieve. Discard the seeds. Allow the jam to cool, covered.
Roll, Cut, and Bake Cookies:
- Prepare 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Aluminum baking sheets work best for these thin cookies (dark non-stick ones will cause them to bake faster and possibly burn). Preheat the oven to 350°F/175°C with two racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven.
- Take 1 disc of dough out of the refrigerator, and set it on a lightly floured work surface (we prefer to do this right on our stone countertop). The dough needs a few minutes to warm up before rolling. Once the dough starts to roll without cracking, roll the dough out evenly to a ¼-inch (6mm) thickness.
- Dip your cookie cutter in flour, then cut out as many cookies as you can. Use a floured metal spatula with a thin edge to transfer the cookies to the baking sheets, spaced about 1 inch/2cm apart. Bake for 6-7 minutes, rotating the pans 180° once halfway through.
- So you’ve just put a batch of cookie bases into the oven. Now it’s time for the lids. Roll up any scraps you have, and press them into a smooth disc. Transfer back to the plastic wrap and put in the fridge while you get the other cold dough disc out of the refrigerator. Repeat the same steps to roll and cut out cookies, but this time, also use the larger end of a pastry piping tip to cut out a small circle in the center of each cookie. Carefully remove the center (these can go into the scrap pile of dough), and transfer your linzer cookie lids to a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 6-7 minutes, once again rotating the pans 180° halfway through.
- Repeat these steps with all of the cookie dough, pressing any dough scraps together and re-rolling as needed. Try to make an equal number of cookie bases and lids. As the cookies come out of the oven, transfer them to a wire rack or cutting board to cool, and place more cookies on the baking sheets to bake.
Assemble the cookies:
- Once the cookies are cooled, arrange the lids on a sheet pan and dust with powdered sugar using a fine-meshed strainer or a powdered sugar shaker if you have one. Dust to your desired coverage.
- Spread about 1 teaspoon of jam onto the bottom of a cookie base (you’ll want the “nice” side of the cookie facing out). Try to keep the majority of the jam in the center of the cookie. Take a cookie lid and gently tap it to get rid of any excess powdered sugar. Then gently press it onto the cookie base with the jam. Repeat with all the cookies
Serving and Storage:
- These cookies look best served in a single layer on a cookie platter. Enjoy with tea, coffee, or milk.
- They will keep well for about 1 week on the counter, but you may want to refrigerate them before that if you know they won’t be finished by then. You can also freeze the cookies in an airtight container to enjoy at best quality within 3 months.
