We are gathered here today to make fried cookies. Klejner (sometimes spelled Kleyner), a classic Danish cookie, that's served at Christmas. Little fried knots of dough for ringing in the holiday season in Denmark.
I should probably make it clear that I am not in Denmark. I'm in Canada, but I'm of Danish descent. And Irish. But I didn't know I was Irish until I started to research my ancestry because of the high potato levels in my blood steam.
How Danish am I you ask? Well I'm Danish enough to be able to say thank you, you're welcome and pass the klejner in Danish. And truthfully I can't really say "pass the" so I just use a waving hand motion to represent "pass the"
I inherited this recipe for Klejner from my farmor (Danish for paternal grandmother) Agnes.
Klejner
Klejner are really just twisted fried donuts and they're popular in a ton of other countries as well. The shape may be a little different, the name will definitely be different, but it's basically the same thing. Fried cookie dough.
And it's SIMPLE cookie dough at that. Flour, sugar, baking soda, vanilla, eggs, milk, butter. That's it. Maybe some cardamon if you're fancy.
- You just add your dry ingredients to your handy, dandy mixer and mix. If you don't have a handy, dandy mixer ... mix by hand.
- Throw in your wet ingredients: the vanilla, butter and milk and mix everything up until combined. You're creating a dough.
- If the dough is too sticky and really sticks to your work surface knead in some flour.
- Just sprinkle it over your dough and knead away. If you're using a stand mixer, mix away.
You want the dough to be dry enough so it isn't sticky, but not so floury that it'll crack when you roll it out.
It will look like the ball up above. Except your pastry board might be different. You might not even have a pastry board. Just be prepared for a few differences when you look down at your blob of dough.
As long as it doesn't crack or stick when you roll it out, you're good.
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The dough gets rolled out to ¼" thick (or even a little thinner) and then cut into 1" wide strips.
Once the strips are cut you cut them again into 3" lengths then use a paring knife cut a small hole, just off-centre in each strip.
NOW is the fun part. You turn every little strip of dough into a knot by pushing one end through the hole.
Repeat with all the dough until you have a big pile of uncooked knotty looking things.
Now whip out that deep fryer and heat it to its highest setting. If you don't have a deep fryer you can fry them in a pot. Yup. Like I said, they're fried cookies. The best kind of cookie as far as I'm concerned.
Just before serving them, sprinkle them with powdered sugar. At this point you can either admire them or eat them. Or give them away. Or eat them.
And that my friends is how you make a Danish Christmas Cookie.
Klejner
Ingredients
- 3 eggs
- ¾ cup sugar
- 4 cups flour
- 4 tablespoon milk
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- .25 lb butter softened
- ½ teaspoon cardamon (optional)
Instructions
- Mix together dry ingredients reserving ½ of flour
- Add in remaining ingredients and mix well until dough smooth.
- If needed, add the reserved ½ cup of flour to the dough.
- Roll dough out to a scant ¼" thick.
- Cut dough into 3" x 1" strips. I use a pizza wheel for this.
- Cut a slit in the centre of each strip of dough. The direction of the slit should run the length of the strip, not across it.
- For each strip of dough, pull one end through the centre cut slit and pull through to the other side. This will form a sort of knot.
- Deep fry until the dough begins to form a golden colour.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
They're one of my favourite cookies, because I grew up on them and we all have a soft spot for something we grew up on don't we? Also these cookies aren't overly sweet. In fact they aren't very sweet at all. If you want them sweeter add more sugar.
If you don't like sweet stuff at all, then just stick with potatoes.
Connie Vickery
Don't have a fryer. What kind of oil and what temperature should it be heated? Then I can make them and give the recipe stars!!!
Karen
Use vegetable or peanut oil if you can get it. Try to keep your temperature between 350 and 375. ~ karen!
Hettie
I'm not Danish (born in Glasgow, Scotland, grew up in Ontario, Canada), but I love fried dough, so I'll give them a go this Christmas. I wonder if they would work in an air fryer... Is that an irreverent suggestion?
Karen
Really the only reason to eat them is the grease, soooooo ... ~ karen!
Nancy
I knew there was a reason I liked you! Klejner was an event in my house. My Grammy, Agnes Olsen, and my mother would make these every Christmas. Grammy taught me to make Brun Kol and Ebelskivir too.
Karen
I've never made Ebelskivir, but my friend Andrea (also Danish) does! My grandmother's name was also Agnes, isn't that funny. ~ karen!
Nancy
Ebelskivir typically had a slice of apple in them. My Grammy didn't put anything in the center. She just made them like doughnuts. Served with granulated sugar on top. Yum
tuffy
Yup!
We grew up making these!
Love them!
This year I actually want to see if I dip them in butter and cook them in the oven if they turn out just as good?!
Nancy
Please share results.
Nina
Merry Christmas, Karen! Italians make these too, sans cardamom (although that sounds delicious). They're called chiacchiere, which means chatterbox, because they make so much noise when you bite into them. They're a favorite.
Annamay Adams
These are one of my favorites too! I am half Icelandic and half Irish. My Icelandic Grandmother made them all the time only difference being she would cut the dough in diamond shape. She actually would send us them every Christmas from Iceland to the US along with hand made knitted wool mittens and socks. She always put cardamom in hers and they were called Kleinur. Thanks for the memory and maybe I will make them this Christmas, my Mom is 92 and lives with me she'll get a kick out of these.
Karen
Oh yes, make them for her. :) That'll be fun. ~ karen!
Nancy Hunter
I, too, am half Danish on my father's side. My Grammy, Agnes, made these cookies for us as kids. She used cardamom in them. She also made us turnpankaer, Brun kol and ebleskiver. Oh the memories. My spelling is probably wrong on these but you get the drift. Love your blog.
Annamay Adams
This brought me right back to my childhood...my Amma (Grandmother) made Kleinur for us many times. I am of Icelandic 1/2 & Irish 1/2 descent. And who ruled Iceland before they won their Independence? Why Denmark! She cut hers a little different, diamond shape. When we kids opened that tin... the first thing you could smell was the cardamom! Happy Holidays!
Randy P
I'm of Polish ancestry, so obviously my annual bloodwork reveals a LOT of butter and carbs. In our tradition (also a Christmas delight) it's called Chruściki - bow ties or angel wings, heavily dusted with powdered sugar. I can pronounce it, but NOT with a mouthful of one. It's all good.
charlotte Lorenzen
Klejner is the oldest Scandinavian cookie dating all the way back to the Middle Ages before the stove was invented.
And like many other mentions; they should be cut in diamond shapes :)
Best regards a Dane from Copenhagen.
Jane Sorensen
Instead of sida it’s supposed to use Hjortetaksalt. I have some. What I don’t have is a deep fryer.
Kay L Bonikowsky
My German mother in law makes these every year and calls them "bunny ears."
Sabina
Hmmmm, this looks like a new recipe to try while I’m home on vacation next week :)
Anna Lee
My great grandmother originally came from Bern, Switzerland and we call these schlueff. We add cardamom, mace, lemon zest and juice and we have to use a curly slice for some reason. Ours are also about 5 to 6 inches long but that could be a greedy American distortion of the original. We eat them in the morning with coffee like donuts. Our recipes are all industrial size because great-grandma had four sons and a daughter. When she'd make them she'd hide them in the dryer because when the boys got home from school they'd smell them and start tearing the house apart to eat them all up. Now we make about 300 as a family event every Christmas and each family/adult gets to take a bag home. We, the direct descendants of Emma, have been known to hide the last few from our spouses so we can have them to ourselves because 'it's our heritage'. My niece, nephews and now my sons are the 5th generation to learn how to make them here in North America. Love this.
Karen Cross
Hi Karen,
my name is also Karen and I am half Danish on my father's side as well! Middle name is Michelle. What's yours?
Anyhoo, you make yours just like my Aunt and I do, except we use Ammonium carbonate, aka Baking Ammonia and then we sprinkle them after frying with powdered sugar! They are GREAT!
Thanks for sharing and letting me share!
Merry Christmas
Karen
Hello half Danish Karen! I've taken to sprinkling them with powdered sugar after baking them in the past few years! If I have time (Danish fingers crossed) I'll be making Kleyner/Klejner/Kleiner tomorrow! ~ karen
Bonnie Christensen
My mom (from Copenhagen) made the cuts so that the cookies are a parallelogram before turning inside out. They lay flatter. She used a deep fry pan to make them. I have never made them because I am a little scared of deep frying in my home, but I may be adventurous this year. ! As a child I really loved helping mom making these.
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Karen
I remember these from my childhood. My Danish grandmother used to make these every Christmas but with cardamom. My aunt actually was the one who taught me how to bake and fry these.
Karen
I've been adding cardamom for the past few years now Karen! It's great. Apparently my grandmother was making them wrong her whole life, lol. I've rectified that now. ;) ~ karen!
kim jensen
Just a few comments.
As you might now, klein, comes from German meaning small- However we Danes (100% born and raised myself) have a similar word, klejn, pronounced "kleyn", also meaning small or fragile.
So, the proper spelling would be klejne. (J is pronounced as your y, hence Jensen is Yensen and so on). So, one cookie is klejne, two or more cookies would be klejner. "Klejners" would be plural with added English plural..
And diamond shape is the proper way :-D
Anthony Nemelka
This is wonderful. Very similar to a recipe my grandmother passed down, which it seems she spelled completely wrong, but here's the recipe: http://www.nemelkafamily.com/kliner.html.
A key ingredient her recipe includes is Almond extract, at about 3/4 the amount of the vanilla. Adds a very memorable aroma at Christmas time.
Karen
I just made my klejner last night Anthony. And I ended up omitting the vanilla and using cardamom. I think it could handle both next time. I also did what another reader suggested and dipped about half of them in sugar after frying them. Wow. WOW! They're delicious. I'll go have a look at your recipe now. :) ~ karen!