I still remember nibbling on some Berlin Bread that my grandmother made. She liked it as a hard version but if stored in an airtight container, your Berlin Bread stays soft and somewhat resembles Brownies. Learn more about this traditional and authentic German Christmas Cookie!
Video: How To Bake Berlin Christmas Bread aka Berlin Bread
Your Choice of Consistency
If you let your Berlin Bread get hard, you can dip it into some black tea and it tastes amazing. But I’m still more a fan of the soft version and therefore put the baked Breads in a tin box.
I especially enjoy the crunch when you bite a nut. In my recipe, I am using almonds but in Germany, most of the time we are using Hazelnuts. Finding Hazelnuts in Texas is very difficult and the almonds are just as delicious as them. I can imagine using Pecans or Walnuts, too.
German Ingredients for Berlin Bread
There are ingredients in my recipe, that you might not be familiar with. There is the Sugar Beet Syrup that you might have never heard of and the German Gingerbread Spice that is a mix of several spices. Don’t worry, you will find these ingredients at Amazon or on this blog:
German Gingerbread Spice
- Amazon: https://amzn.to/47OsrY9
- Recipe for DIY: German Gingerbread Spice Mix
Sugar Beet Syrup
- Amazon: https://amzn.to/3NdAJRs
Berlin Christmas Bread
Equipment
Ingredients
- 200 g Almonds whole
- 2 Eggs
- 2 tbsp Water
- 250 g Sugar
- 250 g Flour
- 1 tsp Baking Powder
- 3 tbsp Cocoa Powder unsweetened, optionally more tbsps
- 1 tbsp German Gingerbread Spice
- 1 tbsp Rum
- 225 g Sugar Beet Syrup
- 100 g Dark Chocolate
Instructions
- Pour some boiling water over the 200 g Almonds and let them soak a couple of minutes, then strain them and remove the skin from the nuts.
- Chop the 100 g Dark Chocolate.
- Preheat the oven to 340°F / 175°C.
- In a large bowl, whisk the 2 Eggs with the 2 tbsp Water, add the 250 g Sugar and continue whisking until it is foamy.
- Put the 250 g Flour,1 tsp Baking Powder, 3 tbsp Cocoa Powder, 1 tbsp German Gingerbread Spice , 1 tbsp Rum , and 225 g Sugar Beet Syrup into the bowl. Start mixing slowly, then add spead and mix until it is a silky, goey batter.
- Stir in the 100 g Dark Chocolate and then the 200 g Almonds.
- Pour the batter either on a prepared medium sized baking sheet or in a baking frame.
- Bake for about 30 minutes (more or less, depending on how thick the batter is spread).
- Let cool, then cut into slabs. Store in an airtight tin box to keep them soft or let them get hard and crispy.
I made this a few days ago. My mother was German (from the Rhineland) and her stepmother was originally from Bavaria. She came to England when she married my dad and every year at Christmas my grandparents would send us a parcel. The excitement was almost unbearable! Opa would put small pine branches on top so the smell of Christmas would waft out as soon as it was opened. Somewhere inside would be Berliner Brot cut into bars with almonds on top which Tante Marianna (our step grandmother) would make. My sister Ingrid would invariably pick some of the almonds off the top and hide those bars under the others! Tante Marianna would never divulge the recipe but I knew she put walnuts in the mix. I couldn’t get Zuckerrübenkraut here and molasses is also hard to find but I used black treacle which worked perfectly. I took some to my sister’s who said it tasted exactly as she remembered it! I told her not to pick out the almonds;)) Thank you soooooo much for this recipe which is the first time in over 50 years that I have tasted it. I will be trying out your other recipes which look wunderbar!
Thank you so much for sharing your memories with us. I can’t tell you how much I enjoy hearing all the stories about German food and heritage from all over the world. It is so interesting that so many of our family memories are related to certain foods and recipes.
All the Best to you and your family and the almond picking sister!
Barbara
Just to let you know, the first link for Sugar Beet Syrup (above the recipe) keeps taking me to cocoa instead. The second link takes me to Sugar Beet Syrup. These look and sound very good. We may have to give them a try. Danke!
Thank you for letting me know. I fixed it ❤️
This Berlin Bread do you suppose it could be made gluten free?
Hi Fred,
I honestly don’t know if that works but it’s worth trying. I guess you would use gluten-free flour? I believe (but don’t know) that if you can bake cookies with it, then it should work with this recipe.