Just a few days ago I saw in the supermarkets all those Christmas cakes and sweets. Normally I don’t even look at them but this time I saw some special ones I liked a lot before going paleo: Dominosteine.
There is no English word for it but it’s a typical German and Austrian sweet in the Christmas time. I always liked ginger bread and I did some kind of it last year. So I wanted to change this year and thought these would be a new challenge.
The original one is made of three equal layers, one of ginger bread, a layer of apricot jelly and one of marzipan. Cut in cubes and covered in dark chocolate. So incredibly yummy!
It’s a praline invented in 1936 by chocolatier Herbert Wendler in Dreden to give poorer people a chance to buy a praline which normally is expensive. In WW II it was a great substitute for other sweets.
Today there is also a variation with rum.
I chose to do a kind of Dominostein with two layers of ginger bread or Lebkuchen. And I didn’t do jelly but took simply a jam I had and that didn’t came out well and was a little too liquid as a bread spread. The marzipan I bought is made with honey instead of sugar, so it’s a real paleo marzipan.
Did you know that the marzipan came to the Western world from Persia? But it is thought it arrived there from China in earlier times. And Lübeck is called the “city of Marzipan” as the ‘Lübecker Marzipan’ is known worldwide. And in Italy there is a kind of panforte with marzipan. Well, you see, I like marzipan..
The making of the Dominosteine is a little messy – especially the coating – but with the right trick it will be OK. And the whole work is more than worth! I love marzipan and dark chocolate together and for me it’s a kind of symbol for Christmas time.
- 350 g almond flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 tbsp ginger bread spices
- 1 pinch of salt
- 80 g raw honey
- 1 egg
- 3 tbsp coconut oil
- 300 g dark chocolate (80 % at least)
- Preheat the oven to 180°C and put parchment paper on a baking pan.
- In a bowl mix all the dry ingredients for the ginger bread dough. Add one after the other the wet ingredients and mix all well. The dough is a little wet and perfect to put straight on the baking pan. Spread it well so you have a thin surface. The dough will not raise and is this way perfect to work later.
- Put in the oven and have a look after 10 minutes if it's already done. It should be dry and soft and NOT crispy!
- Take it out and let it cool out.
- Divide in two equal parts and spread on both parts the jam. Roll out the marzipan to the same size as one part of the ginger bread parts. Carefully apply the marzipan on the top of one part.
- Now lay the other ginger bread part on the top of the first with the marzipan, jam up side down.
- Cut all in cubes.
- In a bain marie dissolve the chocolate. Now cover the cubes with the chocolate one by one.
- Put in the freezer and serve.
This recipe is the right amount for the dough to have two thin layer of ginger bread for both sides of the Dominostein. Who likes the original one needs only one layer (bottom) for the recipe and could do 120 cubes or make just half of this recipe.
You can use any kind of jam you like. It's always very tasty.
Marzipan made with honey instead of sugar is less sweet and has the same yummy taste. You find it in special shops and I found a great recipe for doing at home here.
For the coating I recommend to use a fork! Put a single cube on a fork, hold over the chocolate pot and spoon the warm, liquid chocolate over it. Let it run down and slowly slowly beat the fork at the edge of the pot so the chocolate can run down better. Than place on a parchment paper in order to better get off the Dominosteine later.
I served them ice cold. But they are great also with room temperature and don't melt away.
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