Leipziger Lerche Recipe (Apricot Marzipan Pastry) (2024)

Leipziger Lerche is a unique almond and apricot marzipan pastry originating from Leipzig, Germany.

Oh my gosh! This is a recipe that I have been meaning to get up for ages now – it’s like the one that I’ve had ready, but just not quite ready. Because every time I went to go publish it, I realized that I didn’t actually have all of the measurements specified very well, or the directions……or basically anything! Geez. Does this happen to you to? I’m not always the best at writing down my recipes and adjustments as I make things so I have to go and decipher a bunch of jumbled notes later. Makes sense to me, but it probably wouldn’t to you, and I figured you deserved a cleaned up version so you wouldn’t secretly curse at me under your breath whenattempting this recipe.

Anyway, it’s apricot picking time! I just had a neighbor give me a load last week, and now my in-laws said they got some more for me! So I figured a great way to celebrate this was to make some Leipziger Lerchen (Apricot Marzipan Pastries). Although, it really won’t make a dent in your apricot stash. I’m talking like, it uses approximately 3 in the recipe. So make a quadruple batch or something! And then go and make this apricot tart (from Karen’s blog – I have yet to try but I think it’s on the list of “must-make now” items) and make some pineapple apricotjam (ahem, MOM, still waiting for you to email the recipe).

Or if you are really having a creative kick, and just can’t seem to get rid of the rest of those darn things, whip upa coffee cake and some almond flavored whipped cream, and stack yourself upan apricot trifle. I did this a few weeks ago with a snickerdoodle muffin recipe I found on the web. The muffin was definitely more cupcak-ish in its sweetness factor and it made a huge mess in the tins as it seemed there was a bit too much leavening going on in that mix. But, hey, when cakey baked goods go wrong, I say, “Make a trifle.” It will always redeem you. I’ll have tomake it again and see if I can write it down this next time when I’m not doing it on the fly!

So back to this little delectable pastry that does require a lot of love to make, but pays off in the end. It hails from Germany. By the way, I love enjoying foods from different countries…..most of the time. I have to admit, I’ve tried squid and we didn’t really get along. And for some reason, papaya just tastes off to me…..like armpit. I don’t know how else to describe it.

But most of the time, I’m all game! And when it comes to anything of the baked, buttery, and sweet variety, I never seem to have any qualms!

My husband was over in Europe a couple summers ago for a fellowship grant that he received. I had planned to come out for a little while, but then things were thrown off with a quick second surprise-ish pregnancy – I kind of realized it would be a little challenging and ridiculous caring for my six-month old, carrying another in the womb, and be flying and living away from my midwife for all of my check-ups yadayadayada…. So I missed out.

Luckily, my husband brought something back with him – the taste and motivation to re-create these Leipziger Lerchen. One of his friends from the program, Jules, was from Germany. After the program was over, he took a few days to go travel a little bit and have her show him the sites. She gave him a mini-tour of some areas of Germany, one being the city of Leipzig. He said the city was amazing but one of his favorite things was this little apricot marzipan pastry that they got one morning from a local bakery.

It sounded divine – a caramely almond marzipan with a hint of apricot, then layered with a fluffier almond sponge cakefilling, and all contained within a sweet pastry crust. I was drooling. We had to make these!

We scoured the web for recipes, but were having little luck. And did I mention, most of the recipes were in German? So there we were, plugging everything into Google Translator to figure out at least a basic ingredient list.

And then the bitter almond problem. One recipe we found said that we’d need one – I didn’t even realize that bitter almond is very different than the almonds we eat until I started doing a little research. In fact, bitter almond can be lethal if ingested in high enough doses. But it is what is used to make almond extract. Well….guess what? It’s illegal to buy/sell bitter almonds in the U.S. Looking out for us, I guess. Anyway, we stuck with the almond extract route (since we didn’t really have another choice).

The first attempt was good, but a little too dry, and Benjust said it generally just wasn’t the same. We were missing that caramely goodness that made these over the top. So the next attempt, we just started kind of doing our thing – a little of this, taste, a little of that, how’s the consistency? And voila! They turned out fabulous!

I’ve seen some versions around on the web that simply use jam for the bottom layer. I think that could be pretty good, too, but have yet to try it because I just kind of get addicted to the idea of the apricot marzipan every time I think of them.

Now, I’ve never been to Leipzig and tried the all-famous original Leipziger Lerchen, but I have to admit, thesecreations we’ve madeare pretty freakin’ good!

If you have ’em,make these in little tart/brioche molds (well-greased, btw – and don’t ask me how I know this), although you can use a muffin pan. I did the muffin pan for the longest time, and they turned out great, but with such a delicacy, I thought they deserved the extra “prettiness” factor so I finally found some molds on the cheap at a little local baking supply store. You can also get them on Amazon for a pretty good deal.

I do have some metric measurements included in this recipe, since we really did do most of our original experimenting by weight. We are hopingto go back and add these measurements to our other recipes over time – boy is it alot of work, but we’ll get there for you!

I love these fresh out of the oven, or they are absolutely fabulousthe next morning with a hot drink. Celebrate this little wonderful masterpiece of a pastry from Leipzig and give these a try today!