Prep
In a medium bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, salt and cardamon until it is thoroughly combined. Set aside.
In a separate large bowl, cream the butter and the sugar on medium speed until the color of the mixture lightens to a pale yellow and is soft, but not overly fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla extract into the butter/sugar mixture and mix on low speed until the mixture is combined and smooth.
Tip: Use room temperature eggs and butter to help everything mix together nicely.
Add the dry ingredients into the wet mixture and mix on low speed until the flour is mostly absorbed and the dough begins to come together. Then, add the almond meal. Do not over-mix the dough as it can toughen the final product.
Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and roll it with a rolling pin so the dough is evenly flattened. Place the dough in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours or up to 2 days.
Bake Day
When you are ready to bake, take the dough out of the refrigerator and preheat your oven to 350° F.
Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface to the thickness of about 1/8” or a little less. When rolling the dough, remember to turn the dough a quarter turn each time. Turning helps keep the dough in a uniform shape and also helps gauge if the dough is sticking to the table. If the dough is sticking, gently move your dough to the side, lightly flour the table and the dough, and then continue rolling.
Using a 2” cookie cutter to cut out your cookies and place them on a parchment-lined baking sheet about 2” apart. We chose to use a round, fluted shape, but feel free to use whatever shape and size you would like. Make sure you have even numbers of cookies, one for the top of the cookie sandwich, one for the bottom. On the half of the cookies that are for the top, use a small diameter cookie cutter to cut out a circle in the middle where the jam will peek through. If you do not have a small cookie cutter to cut out the middle of the top cookies you can use the wide end of a pastry tip.
Gather up the remaining dough into a single piece and repeat the process until you’ve used it all up. If the dough ever gets too warm and sticky during this process, pop your dough back into the fridge for 5–10 mins to firm up.
When all of your cookies are cut out, place them into the fridge for about 20 mins to firm up again before baking.
Bake the cookies for 15–20 minutes or until the bottoms are golden brown.
Let the cookies cool on the pan before moving them onto a cooling rack. Cool the cookies completely before assembling.
Jam Out
Before we can assemble our cookies, lets talk jam! Jams come in many different forms…
When buying store-bought jam there are three types you will typically find: jelly, jam, and preserves. Jelly is made from just the juice of the fruit cooked down. Jelly is usually smooth and firm. Jam is similar, but includes pieces of fruit with a consistency that ranges from loose to firm. Preserves has larger pieces of fruit in it ranging from chunks to whole pieces of fruit. Since we’re sandwiching this jam between two cookies, we suggest using using a jelly or jam that’s on the thicker side so it won’t run out of your cookies and we’d probably stay away from jams or preserves that have larger chunks of fruit in them.
If you are making homemade jam for these cookies and need to thicken your jam you can cook it down more. Make sure to keep it on low heat so that you don’t burn the fruit and sugars. You can also add a thickener like pectin to your jam. Certain fruits naturally have more pectin than others. Depending on which fruits you are using for your jam, you may need to add some additional pectin to get your desired consistency.
When it comes to flavor, apricot jam is traditional and pairs very well with the nuttiness of the spelt flour. But you can choose any flavor you would like to fill your cookies. In terms of visual presentation, a selection of jams adds a nice multi-color effect, which is how we chose to finish ours.
Assemble
To assemble your cookies, sift powdered sugar onto the top cookies. Turn the bottom cookies over so that the flat side is up. Spread a little less than a teaspoon of jam onto the cookie. Place the top cookies onto the bottom cookies and enjoy!
Tip: the more jam you use, the more will absorb into the cookie and soften them up. If you are planning on assembling the cookies and serving them at a later date use closer to ½ teaspoon of jam.
