Viennese Biscuits

These delicious buttery Viennese biscuits are delicate and the rich dark chocolate and pistachio just make them moreish and addictive.

Super easy to prepare, don’t worry if you’re not an expert at piping, they’ll still look amazing once they are baked. And because they are so simple and delicious, they make a great recipe for Christmas edible gifts. 

If you like this pistachio biscuit recipe, you might also like my raspberry pistachio biscuit.

If you decide to give this recipe a try, let me know! Leave a comment below and rate it – it’s really helpful to me and the other readers. And don’t forget to take a picture and tag it #thegourmetlarder on Instagram. I love seeing what you come up with! 🙂

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RECIPE HIGHLIGHTS

• EASE: easy
• GREAT FOR: Christmas, afternoon tea, picnics and everyday baking
• TASTE & TEXTURE: a soft delicate texture with a sweet, buttery, orange and chocolaty taste
• SERVING: alongside a cup of tea or coffee
• QUANTITY: 20 biscuits
• TIME: 27 minutes

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INGREDIENTS

For this Viennese biscuit recipe all you need are these ingredients:

• Butter – adds structure and flavour. I use salted butter for most of my baking as it intensifies the flavours, but feel free to use unsalted if you prefer. Make sure it’s at room temperature before using.

• Powdered / icing sugar – adds refined sweetness and structure, as well as ensures that melt-in-the-mouth texture.

• Medium egg yolks – build structure and richness to the recipe. Make sure they are at room temperature before use.

• Pure vanilla extract or paste – adds flavour and enhances the other ingredient flavours in the recipe.

– Vanilla recommendations: pure vanilla extract or vanilla paste or vanilla pods.

• Plain or all-purpose flour – to build structure, as we do not use any other raising agents.

• Orange zest – adds that perfect citrus flavour. See the variations section for alternatives.

• Dark or milk chocolate – any good chocolate works well for adding that beautiful flavour.

Chocolate recommendations: bars – Lindt Excellence dark 70% bar 100g, Montezuma’s darkside 51% bar 90g, Menier dark cooking chocolate 100g, Green and Black’s Organic dark Chocolate 100g, 1kg bags – Callebaut dark chocolate, Callebaut milk chocolate, Callebaut white chocolate.

• Crushed pistachios – for that added flavour and decorative colour.

TIP: I highly recommend adding a good pinch of fine salt to your biscuit doughs. In a seemingly absurd or self-contradictory way, salt intensifies the mouths’ ability to taste sweetness. It is the sodium that sends signals to move glucose into the sweet taste receptor cells, thus triggering the cells to register sweetness. The result is that salt not only alerts our ‘salt sensitivity’, but also triggers our ‘sweet sensitive’ taste buds.

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WHAT VARIATIONS CAN I MAKE?

• Biscuit flavours – can easily be changed. Try some of these flavours:
  • Lemon and cardamom (add the zest of a lemon and 2 tsp of ground cardamomto the biscuit dough)
  • Dried cranberry and tahini (add 50g dried cranberry and 1 Tbsp of tahini to the biscuit dough)
  • Walnut and maple syrup (add 50g chopped walnuts and 1 tbsp of maple syrup to the biscuit dough)

And if you want to create a two-tone effect, add 1 tbsp cocoa powder to half the mixture and fill both mixtures next to each other in the piping bag.

• Decorate – with different finishes such as sliced almonds, crystalised orange, sprinkles or even powdered freeze-dried fruit.

• Fillings – can take these biscuits to the next level. Sandwich the biscuits together with some buttercream or even a little jam. A simple buttercream using 100g soft butter, 200g icing sugar and a little vanilla mixed together is all you need.

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NUTRITION

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STORAGE

These biscuits are best enjoyed on the day of baking, alternatively, store them in an airtight container for up to 3 days, they will soften as time goes by.

Freezing the baked biscuits – cool the biscuits completely after baking and place them in a freezer bag or airtight container. They will last up to 1 month. When you are ready to serve, allow the cookies to reach room temperature before serving.

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TOOLS YOU’LL NEED

Here is some kitchen equipment that I use and recommend for this recipe.

TIP: I highly recommend using metric measurements and a digital kitchen scale, rather than cup measurements. If you have ever ended up with dry, dense or crumbly baked goods, it might be because of inaccurate volume measurements, not all measuring cups are made equally. All my recipes on this blog are carefully developed so that you can easily recreate them in your own kitchen with success, using metric measurements. It is also a lot easier, less messy and you will get far better, consistent results. 🙂
If you are interested in understanding conversions, here you will find the best conversion chart.

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RECIPE TIPS

Piping nozzle size – is quite important. The biscuit dough is fairly firm, and you will want to use a large nozzle. I use a star shape, which has a 1.5cm opening which works well for me.

Make different shapes – you don’t have to stick to long finger shapes. Pipe S shapes or circles.

Melting chocolate – this method is called the double boiler method and it is super easy if you follow these tips: 1. Choose a saucepan that is not too big and a heatproof bowl that fits snuggly on top. 2. Fill the saucepan with enough water that it will not run dry while boiling. 3. Make sure there is a gap between the bowl and the water, they must not touch. 4. Keep the water to a simmer only. No water or steam must go inside the bowl with the chocolate, or it will seize up.

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