Hazelnut moon crescents / Croissants de Lune Sablés

With this unstable weather, I suggest to step back into your kitchen to make these lovely, crumbly hazelnut sablés. These hazelnut moon crescent are the home-made version of a famous French biscuit brand (Les croissants de Lune de Bahlsen).

I have my very own way to eat them since I was a child: one moon segment at a time! I love them on their own or a cup of tea, but they would probably be fantastic served with a cup of coffee (If I'd like coffee!).

As per the original recipe, I shape them as little crescents. The dough is so easy to work that you can let your kids express their own creativity. My 4 years-old made caterpillar and mushrooms, unfortunately they've been eaten before I could make any pictures, so there you can see them before baking. Dinosaurs are back!

Ingredients (~ 25 crescents)

- 125 g flour, sifted
- 100 g butter, diced, cold
- 50 g hazelnuts, whole*
- 40 g caster sugar
- 1 tbsp praline paste - recipe here
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 pinch of salt
- 1 tbsp caster sugar
- 1 tbsp icing sugar

Preparation (10 mins + 60 mins resting + 15 mins baking)

1. Finely ground the hazelnuts in a mixer or a mill.*
2. In a mixing bowl, mix together all the ingredients except one table spoon of caster sugar and one of icing sugar. Mix until the butter is completely combined with the other ingredients. Then, aggregate the preparation in your hands and form a ball.
3. Refrigerate for 1 hour.
4. Form about 25 small balls, roll them and form the crescents. With the blade of a knife, print four segments on the crescent.
5. Bake for 13-14 mins at 180C. Keep an eye during the baking as you don't want to overcook them. Depending on their size, you may bake them for shorter.
6. When still hot, put them on a cooling rack and generously dust the crescent with the combined caster and icing sugars using a skimmer. Let cool down.

Thanks to Eryn Folle Cuisine who spent months and years experimenting this recipe - Eryn's recipe is even better than the original from Bahlsen, but a tiny bit too big to my taste so I prefer to make 25 of them instead of 20.
I also replaced the vanilla sugar by caster sugar and reduced the proportion of salt given that NZ butter is naturally salted.

Tips

* I do recommend you use whole hazelnuts and ground them freshly rather than using grounded hazelnuts. It makes a real difference!