Marzipan vs almond paste?

spoeklet, Sep 13, 12:18pm
I want to bake some stollen and need marzipan, butcan't find it in any of the supermarkets. Does anyone know where to buy it for baking? Is the almond icing in the shops basically the same as marzipan? Thanks!

crails, Sep 13, 2:27pm
Try a Dutch food or specialty sweet store

lilyfield, Sep 13, 8:34pm
Make you own, really easy. Almond icing is no where near the s

dreamers, Sep 13, 8:59pm
There is no comparison between the 2 products .

uli, Sep 13, 9:37pm
Almond icing is just sugar and almond flavour as far as I have seen in the shops.

Marzipan is finely ground (blanched and peeled) almonds with icing sugar and an egg white to bind it together. You can add a drop of almond essence in addition if you like.

This time of year marzipan is usually available at New World.

davidt4, Sep 13, 10:44pm
Marzipan is very easy to make.

1½ cups almond meal (either blanch and grind the almonds yourself or buy almond meal)
1½ cups icing sugar
1/2 tsp pure almond extract
1 egg white

Combine in a food processor (or knead by hand) until it forms a very stiff paste.

spoeklet, Sep 13, 11:29pm
Great - thanks! I assumed it would be hard to make, but I think it would also be cheaper to make. I will try some this week.

My husband is away for a week and I wanted to eat stollen all week! LOL

uli, Sep 13, 11:40pm
Stollen is better if you leave it to "mature" a bit. It gets basted with melted butter after baking to seal it and some icing sugar over the top. Then wrap in several layers of foil or a thick plastic bag and store in the fridge for a few weeks for maximum enjoyment. So maybe bake a few, so you can eat one straight away :)

spoeklet, Sep 13, 11:58pm
Thanks uli - I will make it this week and secretly eat it in a couple of weeks.

floralsun, Sep 14, 10:19am
I make a similar recipe to #6 - and use the leftovers to place a thin slice on top of the fruit mince in my Christmas mince tarts - it caramelises as the tarts cook - the flavour is amazing.
I've also rolled out my short pastry to a rectangle, spread it with fruit mince, then thin slices of marzipan, rolled up from the long edge, sealed the edges, cut into 1cm thick slices, placed on a baking paper lined oven tray and baked them. Delicious.

sampa, Sep 14, 9:49pm
I really like that idea floralsun - fruit mince tarts minus the tart. ;-) Much less fluffing around especially when the aesthetics go unnoticed by the 'menfolk' as they shove the entire thing in their gob with no second thought as to how pretty we may have made it look!

Will have to give it a go and may even make the effort with the marzipan since it sounds easy enough to make and like a worthwhile addition.

Thanks.

fogs, Oct 19, 10:04am
Best to make your own Marzipan with a Stollen firstly the favour is far superior to the commercial almond paste, the first stollen I made I used the almond paste and the sugar in it just melted out no marzipan filling it was most disappointing