Bergisch Berliner Brot

No. The name is misleading: the bake comes from the Bergisches Land between Cologne, Düsseldorf and the Sauerland. It has nothing to do with the capital.

Apple butter works very well and is just as common in the Rhineland. Modern recipes often use brown farin sugar – but that noticeably changes colour and flavour.

The whole almonds and hazelnuts give bite to the otherwise very dense, Lebkuchen-like batter and make every bar look different.

Related, but not the same. The dough resembles gingerbread dough in consistency and shares its spices — cinnamon and clove — yet Berliner Brot is not baked in moulds or on wafers but flat on a tray. It also carries whole almonds and hazelnuts, which in gingerbread are usually ground, plus cocoa or chocolate. Its closest relative is Magenbrot.

Because the dough firms up as it cools. While warm, the sheet divides cleanly into narrow bars; cold, it breaks unevenly and the knife runs into the whole nuts. The glaze of sieved icing sugar and hot water is brushed on immediately for the same reason: on the warm surface it spreads thin and dries to a matt layer, whereas on cooled pastry it would sit in lumps.

A long time — it is a keeping pastry. In an airtight tin the bars last through the whole of Advent, the hard-baked version even for months. How it develops depends on the recipe: the apple syrup version stays soft for a long while thanks to its higher water content, the dry version grows firmer over the weeks. To soften it again, put a piece of apple in the tin.