spiced almond cream cookies

If a gingerbread man and a macaron decided to start a family, these would be the children. They are ginger-spiced cookies filled with vanilla almond cream. Their spiced flavour makes them perfect for Christmas (and they're grain-free, fructose-free and dairy-free).

I use white almond butter and vanilla powder to make the almond cream filling. White almond butter is made with blanched almonds and has a slightly sweeter flavour than almond butter made with skin-on almonds. You can buy it (make sure it's 100% almonds) or make your own by processing blanched almonds in a food processor until you get a smooth cream. Or you could just use normal almond butter. Vanilla powder is simply vanilla pods ground into a fine powder. It's amazing stuff but it can be hard to find. You could scrape the seeds out of a vanilla pod and use that instead (even better), or use a dash of vanilla extract (keeping in mind that vanilla extract is often made with an alcohol base, so it will give a slightly different flavour).

ingredients

for the cookies:

• 1� cups ground almonds
• 2 tsp ground ginger 
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 egg
• 2 tbsp rice malt syrup
• 1� tbsp raw virgin coconut oil, softened

for the almond cream:

• � cup white almond butter
• 1 tbsp raw virgin coconut oil, softened
• � tsp vanilla powder
• 1 tbsp rice malt syrup
• Pinch of salt

preparation 

1. Preheat your oven to 170�C and line a baking tray with baking paper.

2. To make the cookies, combine the ground almonds, ginger and cinnamon in a bowl. Beat in the egg and then the rice malt syrup and coconut oil, stirring until well combined.

3. Pinch off pieces of the mixture, roll into balls and press down flat onto the baking tray. I wrap some baking paper around the lid of a jar and use that to press the balls down to get an even thickness across each cookie (make sure you wrap the lid in baking paper, otherwise the cookie mixture will stick to the lid).

4. Bake in the preheated oven for 10-12 minutes until browned. Depending on your oven, you may want to turn the tray around half way through to get even browning. Allow the cookies to cool completely before filling with the almond cream.

5. To make the almond cream, stir the almond butter, coconut oil, vanilla powder, rice malt syrup and salt together in a bowl. Spoon a dollop of the cream onto a cookie and place a second cookie on top, pressing down slightly.

6. If the weather is hot, it would be best to store the cookies in the fridge, as the coconut oil in the almond cream may start to melt.

Makes 10 cookie sandwiches (20 cookies) and enough almond cream to generously fill them.

NB: I use a 20ml tbsp. If you have a 15ml tbsp (if you're in the US or UK), you can measure out 4 tsp in place of each tbsp.