Kids in the Kitchen: Linzer Piggy Cookies and The Taste of Snow Review

These yummy jelly-filled sugar cookies were inspired by a sweet juvenile fiction novel, The Taste of Snow, by Stephen Masse.  Masse summarizes:

When winter arrives in the Austrian Alps, eleven-year-old Nicole Kinders is ready for the taste of snow. Everything is beginning to show signs of holiday festivities, from the decorated shops in Innsbruck to the scent of cinnamon in the air. At the market stall on her way to school, Nicole gets a candy cane from Boznik, the shopkeeper. He tells her, "This, my dear girl, is a magic candy cane."

From that day extraordinary things begin to happen.

Some good.

Some bad. Extraordinarily bad.

Nicole finds herself losing the joy of holiday preparations, and realizes that the vexing secret she keeps is influencing every part of her life. Her hopes of having a magical Christmas take her on a journey beyond where any ordinary girl would choose to go.

When accepting the book for review, I had fully intended on reading it chapter by chapter to Sawyer at bedtime.  But with an intended audience of 8+ years of age, I just couldn’t get my 5 year old Sawyer into it.  Ironically, though, my 34 year old fiancé, Cliff, snatched it up and happily read straight through in just a couple nights.  Though it took this busy mama a little longer to get through, I was surprisingly pleased with the interesting, suspenseful story and heartwarming ending.  I especially loved the image-rich descriptions of the holiday sights, smells, and sounds of Austria.  The detailed description of the cookies and candies made me super-excited to see the recipe collection at the end of the book.  Here's how we put our own spin on the Linzer Pig Cookies recipe.
 

Easy Linzer Piggy Cookies

 

• sugar cookie dough (homemade or store-bought)
• berry jam or jelly
• flour
• powdered sugar (not pictured)
• large piggy cookie cutter (or other shape)
• small heart cookie cutter

If you’re not into mixing up your own sugar cookie dough, just grab some refrigerated sugar cookie dough and get to the fun of rolling and cutting it out.  We just kneaded some extra flour into it to make it less sticky and easier to work with.  Or use your own simple sugar cookie dough recipe.



Roll out the dough on a floured surface.  For every piggy cookie you cut out, cut out another piggy cookie but with a heart cut out of the center.



Bake them on an ungreased cookie sheet according to the sugar cookie dough package or recipe directions.  Allow them to cool completely.



Spread jam or jelly on the full piggy cookies.  And dust powdered sugar on the heart cut out piggy cookies. Sandwich the powdered sugar heart cutout piggy cookies on top of the jam-spread piggy cookies.  Eat and enjoy!

Have you ever made a recipe inspired by a book?  Have you ever had traditional Austrian Linzer cookies?



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