Fun run.

Well we all had the day to test out our recipes. And mine turned out better than I expected. I mean, the process was really quite easy. So easy, I was able to make two and prepare the dough for my presentation on Wednesday. It's chilling in the fridge as I type. Some parts were dryer than others, but being it was my first time and all, there really weren't any disasters. Here's a little step by step if you're interested.

Start with the proper pans. Old school Danes did it by hand, and I think most still do. But I'm a new school semi-Dane, I use the pans.

Remember to spray the pan so the dough doesn't stick. And it would. This stuff is sticky.

  The dough is super simple: 455grams (1lb) of almond powder.

455g (1lb) of powdered sugar.

And 160g (or 4) egg whites.

Add about 40g of the egg whites into the almonds and mix. Add all of the powered sugar and continue mixing. Then gradually add the rest of the whites until the mixture is homogeneous.

Then pack it up in plastic and put it in the fridge to cool overnight. (Today I rolled it out flat and put it in the blast freezer for an hour. That seemed to do the trick.)

When it's nice and chill, you can roll it out into little sausage like rings. Even is the goal. That is, unless you're cool with leaning cakes.

Lay them in in each of the 16 rings and pinch together the ends. Bake in the oven at 205ºC/400ºF for about 10 minutes. I ended up putting mine in for closer to 15min. But it all depends on the oven.
After they're baked let them cool in the pan before you start building.

Start with the bottom and use the icing as mortar.

 Keep building...

...and voila! Kransekage.

Like I said, for the first go at it, I'm happy. But as my second batch was much more fragile and dry, I can tell I'll have to play around with cooking times and temps.

As for decoration, honestly I think they look best as is. Often people stick flags and flowers and little firecracker thingies on them. But they all look a bit tacky to me. I made up some marzipan flags last night. So I'll have them ready as examples, but I think clean is best.

So there you go. Now I need to practice explaining all of this in French. Oh mon dieu! I'll get back to you on that.

Bonne nuit!