''Spritzgebäck'' is a type of German and Alsatian-Mosellan

biscuit A biscuit is a flour-based baked and shaped food product. In most countries biscuits are typically hard, flat, and unleavened. They are usually sweet and may be made with sugar, chocolate, icing, jam, ginger, or cinnamon. They can also be ...

cookie A cookie is a baked or cooked snack or dessert that is typically small, flat and sweet. It usually contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of oil, fat, or butter. It may include other ingredients such as raisins, oats, chocolate chips, ...

made of a rich

shortcrust pastry Shortcrust pastry is a type of pastry often used for the base of a tart, quiche, pie, or (in the British English sense) flan. Shortcrust pastry can be used to make both sweet and savory pies such as apple pie, quiche, lemon meringue or chicken ...

. When made correctly, the cookies are crisp, fragile, somewhat dry, and buttery. The German root verb ' is cognate with the English ''to spurt''. As the name implies, these cookies are made by extruding, or "spurting", the dough with a press fitted with patterned holes (a

cookie press A cookie press is a device for making pressed cookies such as spritzgebäck. It consists of a cylinder with a plunger on one end, which is used to extrude Extrusion is a process used to create objects of a fixed cross-sectional profile by pu ...

) or with a cake decorator, or pastry bag, to which a variety of nozzles may be fitted. In the United States, the name ' is often shortened to ''spritz'' becoming known as the ''spritz cookie''.

References

Alsatian cuisine German cuisine German desserts Christmas in Germany Biscuits Christmas food {{Germany-dessert-stub

See also

References