Felt Food ·

World Dishes: German Cuisine (Christmas Cookies)

by Felicia Davenport

Welcome to the 2nd installment of World Dishes: A Felt Food Series to Explore Diversity.

Growing up Black and German, Christmas was simply the BEST. The Christmas season in Germany is iconic and I remember the excitement for the Weihnachten season (Christmas season in English) in beginning of every year as soon as school starts. My mother made the holiday special in every way. From the best quality crafts and activities, I try my best to emulate some of these traditions with my own small family today.

One of our most treasured traditions was baking Christmas cookies, or Weihnachtsplätzchen, with my mother and sister after Thanksgiving. The kitchen was filled with scents of vanilla, almond, gingerbread, and cinnamon throughout December. My sister and I would sneak to the refrigerator and grab pieces of cookie dough that my mother had resting. These cookies became a core part of who I am.

 

To celebrate the Christmas season, I wanted to share three of my favorite Weihnachtsplӓtzchen (Christmas Cookies) that are essential to my German Christmas:

  • Vanillekipferl – Crescent-shaped vanilla almond cookies dusted with powdered sugar.
  • Lebkuchen - Gingerbread cookies (these can be any shape you like – I used bell, snowflake, and Christmas tree designs from Cricut design space).
  • Spritzgabӓck - These delicious cookies are made with carbonated water and are often dipped in chocolate. The shape is instantly recognizable to every German. 

This tutorial will guide you through the process of creating these three types of cookies.

 

Materials Used

 

Measurements for Each Element

Vanillekipferl

This cookie has a distinct crescent shape. You can either freehand and cut them by hand or use a cutting machine.

  • Size: 75 inches x 2.5 inches
  • Quantity: 6 total cookies, requiring 12 total crescent shapes 

Lebkuchen

I used three distinct cookie shapes available in the design space of my cutting machine. However, you could easily do your own design by hand. Feel free to adjust the measurements also. My cookies were on the large side, but 3.5 inches is also suitable.

  • Bell Cookie and Frosting – Cookie (4.35 inches x 3.87 inches), Frosting (3.76 inches x 3.34 inches)
  • Snowflake Cookie and Frosting – 4.43 inches x 5.02 inches
  • Tree Cookie and Frosting – 3.88 inches x 4.51 inches

Spritzgabӓck

For this, I choose a straight squiggle design and an S-shaped cookie design. These shapes can be freehanded, but I used my cutting machine for precise shapes.  The shape here is not truly important as long as it is rectangular and S-shaped, as you will need to free hand cut the cookie ridges for traditional look.

  • S-shaped cookie – 2.7 inches x 3.5 inches
  • Straight squiggle cookie – 1.20 inches x 3.5 inches
  • Chocolate – about an inch by 1.5 inches. This does not need to be perfect. It will cover the ends of some or all of your cookies (you can decide – I opted for two uncovered, the rest covered)

Instructions

I used a Cricut Maker machine and their design space to find shapes or designs that resemble the cookie shapes I wanted to recreate. However, this can also be done by cutting felt by hand.

Vanillekipferl

1. Cut all your felt pieces to the measurement above. For hand-cutting, use a ruler to measure, felt pen to create the shape and scissors to cut. Or use a cutting machine. You will need two crescents per cookie to make 6 cookies, so 12 crescents.
2. Stack each pair of crescents (two per cookie) and pin them for stitching.
3. You will take your thread and needle and do a blanket stitch around the perimeter of the crescent felt stack.
4. As you complete the perimeter of the crescent cookie, you will leave an opening and take the doll stuffing and stuff it to your liking.

5. After your cookie is stuffed, you will close the gap by continuing to blanket stitch until you have a completed Vanillekipferl cookie.

6. Repeat for all cookies.
7. To create the powdered sugar effect, use fabric paint. You can either splatter paint with a toothbrush (see video) or apply dots directly from the nozzle.
8. Enjoy!

Your cookies will look like a variation of these:

Lebkuchen

1. Cut felt pieces as per measurements. Choose your preferred shapes or use a single design. You’ll need two cookie layers and one frosting layer per cookie. You will need two cookie layers and one frosting layer per cookie.

2. Once your cookie layers are cut, match the frosting layer with top cookie layer and pin to secure.
3. Use a straight stitch with white or cream thread to stitch the frosting layer to the top cookie layer.
4. Once attached, begin blanket-stitching the bottom layer
5. When you have almost completely stitched the perimeter of the cookie, you will take the doll stuffing and stuff the cookie to your likeness.
NOTE: For tight spaces and corners, I used the end of a paint brush to help push the stuffing to where we need it to go.
6. Once stuffed, you will complete stitching the perimeter of the cookie.
7. Repeat for each cookie.
8. Enjoy!

Your cookies will look like a variation of these:

Spritzgabäck

1. Cut all your felt pieces to size using the measurement guide above. You can hand-cut using a ruler to measure, a felt pen to create the shape, and scissors. You can also use a cutting machine with the above measurements to machine-cut the pieces.

2. This cookie is largely free-form. I chose to cut shapes that were roughly what I needed, but ultimately, they will look imperfect, which is the goal. These cookies are traditionally made using a meat grinder.

3. I chose to have some of my cookies chocolate-dipped, while others I left plain. You can choose any combination you like.

4. Match up your pieces and pin them. For plain cookies, place two brown felt cookie layers on top of one another; for the chocolate-dipped cookies, do the same with a small rectangle of dark brown felt pinned on one end of the cookie; front and back (as shown in the picture).
5. Once pinned, cut imperfect ridges along the outside of the cookie
6. When you have the trim, you like while keeping the layers pinned, begin stitching the cookies together using a blanket stitch.
7. Stitch along the perimeter until you are left with a small gap (for stuffing).
8. Use doll stuffing and the end of a paint brush to stuff the rectangular and S-shaped cookies.
9. Once stuffed to your liking, complete the blanket stitch perimeter.
10. Enjoy!
Your cookies will look like a variation of these:
I enjoyed staging the completed cookies in my children’s play kitchen for the holiday season. It makes me happy to see this part of my culture reflected in play.

I hope you enjoy this project as much as I did. Christmas is a special time, and this project will add the perfect Weihnachten touch to your littles ones’ imaginative play. Share your versions of Weihnachtsplӓtzchen on social media by tagging @The_Felt_Store and @TheWaySheFelt.

Happy Crafting!



 

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