INGREDIENTS

INSTRUCTIONS

Make dough 1. In a bowl with an electric mixer at low speed beat
together almond paste, granulated sugar, butter, and vanilla until
light and creamy. Gradually beat in flour and salt until just  combined
well. Quarter dough and roll out each quarter between sheets  of wax
paper into an 11-inch round (about 1/8-inch thick). Stack  rounds in
wax paper on a baking sheet. Chill rounds until firm, at  least 2
hours, and up to 3 days.  2. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F and line a
large baking sheet with  parchment paper.  3. Transfer 1 round, still
between sheets of wax paper, to a work  surface. Remove top sheet of
wax paper from round (keep remaining  rounds chilled) and replace it
loosely. Flip over wax-paper-enclosed  round and remove and discard
sheet of eax paper now on top (this  process prevents cookies from
sticking to wax paper). Working  quickly, with a 3-inch star-shaped
cutter cut out stars and arrange  about 1/2 inch apart on baking sheet.
(If dough becomes too soft to  work with, freeze or chill on wax paper
until firm.) With a 1/2-inch  star-shaped or round cutter cut and lift
out centers from half of  stars (about 15). Lightly beat egg whites and
lightly brush onto tops  of cut-out stars. Sprinkle sand or pearl sugar
over cut-out stars,  pressing sugar down lightly so that it adheres.
4. Bake cookies in lower third of oven until bottoms are pale golden
but tops are still pale, 10 to 12 minutes. Cool cookies on baking
sheet on a rack 5 minutes and transfer with a spatula to racks to  cool
completely. Make more cookies with remaining dough rounds in  same
manner, lining baking sheet with fresh parchment.  5. Arrange solid
stars, bottom sides up, on a work surface. In a small  heavy saucepan
boil jelly, stirring occasionally, 2 minutes and cool  10 minutes.
Transfer jelly to a pastry bag fitted with a #3 plain tip  (slightly
smaller than 1/8 inch).  6. Pipe about 1/4 teaspoon jelly onto center
of each cookie. Center  cut-out stars on top of solid stars, pressing
gentlyso jelly fills in  holes. Cookies keep, layered between sheets of
wax paper in an  airtight container at cool room temperature, 3 days.
Makes about 60 cookies.  Pure almond paste: available at some specialty
food shops and by mail  order from Dean & DeLuca, 800-221-7714  To
order GMA recipes or to subscribe yearly please call:  1-800-543-4GMA
Single recipes $3 / Yearly $14.95  Busted by Barb ob 2/21/98  NOTES :
This recipe calls for sand sugar or pearl sugar (both  sometimes known
as coarse or crystal sugar), both of which have  larger grains than
granulated sugar and are used for decorating baked  goods. Sand sugar
has slightly smaller and shiner grains than pearl  sugar. Sand sugar
and the star-shaped cookie cutters (3-inch and  1/2-inch) needed for
this recipe are available by mail order from New  York Cake and Baking
Distributors at 800-942-2539. Gourmet magazine's  Sara Moulton brought
in these awesome holiday cookies. Recipe by:  Gourmet magazine  Posted
to MC-Recipe Digest by "abprice@wf.net" <abprice@wf.net> on  Mar 23,
1998

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Nutrition (calculated from recipe ingredients)
----------------------------------------------
Calories: 3783
Calories From Fat: 1656
Total Fat: 188.5g
Cholesterol: 488.1mg
Sodium: 435.7mg
Potassium: 639.1mg
Carbohydrates: 468.3g
Fiber: 11.8g
Sugar: 135.4g
Protein: 54.3g