Ingredients:
0.5 cup honey
0.75 cup sugar
0.25 cup water
2.5 cup flour
2 eggs
1 stick (50 g) warm butter or margarine
0.25 tsp baking soda
Spices set:
3 whole cloves
¼ tsp cinnamon
1 pinch ground nutmeg
1 spicy pepper
Coriander and cardamom (optionally, on taste)
Note:
If you use light-colored honey, add slightly melted sugar to it.
To make slightly melted sugar, put 1 tbsp sugar in a small skillet, and cook on medium heating for about 2-3 minutes, until the sugar turns brown. After that, add 1-2 tbsp water into the skillet, and dissolve the sugar in it. Then, add this liquid to the honey to make its color darker.
Method:
Grind all spices together into a very thin consistency (like thin flour).
Pour the honey, sugar, and ¼ cup water in a sauce-pan, and heat slightly until the sugar dissolves. Stir to avoid burning.
Add 1 cup of the flour and all ground spices. Stir thoroughly with a wide wooden spoon to an even consistency.
Cool to room temperature, and add the eggs, warm butter, baking soda, and 1 more cup of the flour, and make dough.
This dough is very sticky, and it is hard to make dough.
Add more flour if necessary to get dough that’s not sticky but stretchy and easily shaped.
The shapes and sizes of these pryanics are up to your imagination.
Pre-heat an oven to 190-200 degrees C (370-400 F).
Place the pryanics on a baking sheet, grease their tops with blended egg yolks, and bake for 20 – 30 minutes (depending on their sizes).
Note:
You can add ground nuts, lemon or orange peels, vanilla, or raisins to the dough.
You can cover the pryanics with jam, or sugar icing, or with melted chocolate, and let cool.
Or, you can roll the dough into a 0.5” thick sheet, and cut out details for a “pryanic house” for New Year celebrations, and create your own styles of “pryanic houses”.
Pryanics are very ancient Russian sweets.