The Norwegian Kransekake is made for special occasions like Christmas or 17. of may Norway’s national day. The Danes also have their version of this and use it as a wedding cake.

The towering cake is basically made from almonds sugar and eggwhites. This might seem simple enough. However, there are many details that go into making a good kransekake. For starters, you will need the molds which you can get a hold on trough Amazon. To get the consistency just right you also want to get a hold of an almond grater. This is important to get the texture of the cake just right. What you are aiming for is a mix of finely ground almonds and some larger chunks that creates some bite in the cake.

Kransekake Texture

The final texture of the cake should also be sticky, and not crisp or cracking. Some actually always freeze the kransekake to make sure the cake doesn’t dry out and remains moist. If you end up with a ring that snaps off as you break them, something has gone wrong. To enforce this soft texture we, like to add a bit of liquid glucose to the recipe.

another important element of this cake is to preheat the dough before it goes into the fridge to cool off. Some recipes try to solve this by kneading the dough until enough heat develops. We found that to be quite hard and uncontrollable and therefore choose to use the oven method described in the recipe.

Almonds

You have several options when it comes to how to prepare your almonds. If you don’t mind the almond skin. you can just go ahead and grind the almonds. If on the contrary, you prefer a smoother dough, as we do. We recommend peeling the almonds. This can be quite a lot of work depending on how high of a tower you are aiming for. But in our opinion, it is worth all the trouble. If you are feeling experimental you can, of course, peel just a portion of the almonds to get some skin in the dough.

Peeling almonds

There are many ways to get the skin of the almonds, but so far we found this method to work the best. Boil enough water to cover all the almonds. add one tsp of natron pr liters of water. This will help the almonds release from the skin. add the almonds to the water and wait for the water to boil. Keep the almonds in the boiling water for 1 minute. Quickly cool down under running cold water. Now all you need to do is to press the almonds between your fingers until they pop out of the skin.

it is also important to dry out the almonds again after peeling them. We like to spread them out on a baking tray and dry them in the oven at 50 degrees Celcius, fan on with the door ajar. The almonds are dry when they break in two with a snap. If they bend before breaking or feel soft, they need to dry out more before grating.

This cake can be a bit complex to make the first time around so don’t be afraid to ask us if you need help.