Gingerbread

Gingerbread is a sweet, spiced, long-life pastry that is baked from batters or doughs according to the guidelines for fine baked goods, with or without a wafer base.

Lebkuchen Grosser Wolfganger von Lebkuchen Gandl

Lebkuchen is a sweet, spiced long-life pastry, baked from masses or doughs according to the German guidelines for fine baked goods, with or without a wafer base.

Other names for it include: Pfefferkuchen (pepper cake), Gewürzkuchen (spice cake), and Honigkuchen (honey cake). In the Middle Ages, "pepper" was a collective term for spices, while the honey cake bears its traditional sweetener in its name. The dough is leavened with baking powder, baking soda, potash, or hartshorn salt.

What is in a Lebkuchen?

According to the guidelines, three things must be included: cereal products or starches, sugar or honey, and spices or flavorings. Added to this are almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, and other oilseeds, egg and dairy products, fruit preparations, and malt extract.

Fat is the exception. Edible fats and oils are not used in Lebkuchen; only brown Lebkuchen may contain small amounts, up to 3 kilograms of added fat per 100 kilograms of cereal products and starches. "Fine" brown Lebkuchen make do with 1.5 kilograms, while "finest" brown Lebkuchen contain none at all. A brown Lebkuchen is only called a honey Lebkuchen if at least 50 percent of the added sugar comes from honey.

And the spices? Commonly mentioned are aniseed, fennel, ginger, cardamom, coriander, nutmeg, cloves, allspice, and cinnamon. Incidentally, in the case of Pfeffernüsse (pepper nuts), Pflastersteine (cobblestones), and Alpenbrot (Alpine bread), the component "Pfeffer..." merely indicates strong spicing, not pepper as an ingredient.

Why is it called Lebkuchen?

No one knows for sure, and that is the honest answer. The Duden dictionary traces the word back to the Middle High German leb(e)kuoche and considers the first part possibly related to Laib (loaf), meaning the word originally meant "loaf cake"; the current form is based on folk etymology associated with leben (to live). The Duden itself states this as a conjecture.

A second common interpretation traces the name back to the Latin libum, meaning a flat cake or sacrificial cake. This, too, is only a conjecture, standing on equal footing with the first. The cake therefore likely has nothing to do with life, though perhaps something to do with the loaf.

How is Lebkuchen produced?

In five steps. First, mixing: the ingredients are chopped in a cutter, then stirred together and kneaded. Then comes the rest. Many manufacturers prepare a pre-dough, or "storage dough," which rests for several days, weeks, or months in a cool place in closed containers; this storage makes the pastry finer and airier and intensifies the aromatic flavor. What looks like extra effort is primarily just waiting.

Only after this is it leavened. Potash is the colloquial name for potassium carbonate, the additive E 501; it gets its name from the pots in which wood ash and water were historically evaporated. Hartshorn salt is ammonium bicarbonate and decomposes in the heat of the oven into water vapor, carbon dioxide, and ammonia. Compact, heavy doughs become airy and elastic with this, but they do not rise, which is exactly what a flat pastry needs. It is baked with the oven door slightly open so the steam can escape and no cracks form. Finally, it is glazed, coated, filled, and packaged.

In St. Wolfgang in the Salzkammergut, Barbara and Fritz Gandl run a Lebzelterei (gingerbread bakery) where every Lebkuchen is made by hand; in both the "Grosser Wolfganger" and the fruit Lebkuchen, honey appears before flour in the ingredients list.

Elisenlebkuchen and the tiers of the guidelines

Lebkuchen baked on wafers are made from masses spread or piped onto wafers and baked after the surface has dried slightly. The baking wafer itself is a thin sheet made of wheat flour or starches and water, baked between hot surfaces.

The guidelines build a ladder on top of this, and every rung has a number. Wafer Lebkuchen contain at least 7 grams of oilseeds per 100 grams of mass, at least half of which must be almonds, hazelnuts, or walnuts; oilseeds used for decoration do not count. "Fine" wafer Lebkuchen require at least 12.5 grams of almonds, hazelnuts, or walnuts per 100 grams of mass. The strictest level is the "finest" wafer Lebkuchen, which are known in the trade as Elisenlebkuchen: at least 25 grams of almonds, hazelnuts, or walnuts per 100 grams of mass, and no other oilseeds at all. At the same time, a maximum of 10 grams of cereal products or 7.5 grams of starches per 100 grams of mass is allowed. The higher the rung, the higher the nut content.

"Nürnberger Lebkuchen (PGI)" has been a protected geographical indication in the European register since 1996; the defined area is the Nuremberg city area, and only Lebkuchen baked there may carry the designation.

How to tell how much nut is inside by looking at the ingredients list

Turn the package over. The ingredients list sorts the ingredients by weight during processing, with the largest amount listed first; this allows you to trace the ladder of the guidelines. If hazelnuts and almonds appear before wheat flour, you are holding a top-tier product; this is the case with the Elisen Lebkuchen from Hatzel in our range. The same order also reveals the weighting in a spice blend, just as it does for curry or Lebkuchen spice.

In the "Grosser Wolfganger" from Lebkuchen Gandl, honey is in first place, and potash and hartshorn salt appear there as E 501 and E 503. In the fruit Lebkuchen from the same bakery, rye flour precedes wheat flour: in Austria, according to the Austrian Food Codex, Lebkuchen is mainly baked with rye flour, whereas the German guidelines do not specify a type of grain.

An apple in the tin

Lebkuchen belongs to the category of long-life baked goods and contains less moisture than other pastries. While other types of cookies last about three to four weeks, Lebkuchen can still be edible after three to four months. It is best stored in a cool, dry place in sealed metal tins.

And if it has become hard and dry? Slice an apple and place it in an airtight tin with the pastry. After a few days, the Lebkuchen will be soft again. A fresh orange or mandarin works too. A few days later, what had become too hard is back on the table, along with coffee and someone to share it with.

Lebkuchen from St. Wolfgang, from Selb, and a spice from Klingenberg

From Lebkuchen Gandl comes the Lebkuchen Grosser Wolfganger with honey in first place and the fruit Lebkuchen, filled with Powidl (plum jam), figs, candied orange peel, and rum; in addition to the orange Lebkuchen, the Lebkuchen trio, and the Lebkuchen mixture. The Elisen from the Hatzel Lebkuchen bakery in Selb, still spread today on the old hand-spreading machine used by Lorenz Hatzel, can be found under Hatzel Lebkuchen. Those who bake their own will find that the Klingenberger Lebkuchen spice from the Altes Gewürzamt features cinnamon blossoms in first place, followed by ginger, orange peel, allspice, black pepper, cloves, star anise, and mace, among others.

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