Lemon almond cookies: how to keep the almond cookies moist and the icing paper-thin

Crumble the almond paste into small pieces and put them into a bowl. Add the icing sugar, the almond flour, the lemon juice and the finely grated lemon zest. For the zest, be sure to use an organic lemon and grate only the yellow part, as the white pith underneath tastes bitter.

Process everything with the food processor or the hand mixer with dough hook until the mixture comes together in crumbs. Then press the crumbs together with your hands to form a dough. If the dough is still too crumbly and doesn't hold together after kneading, add a few drops of lemon juice, but only a little, otherwise it will stick when rolling it out.

Shape the dough into a flat block. This way it chills evenly and is easier to roll out later. Wrap it in cling film and place it in the refrigerator for about one hour.

Preheat the oven to 190 °C fan-assisted. Take the dough out of the fridge and knead it briefly by hand. Place rolling pin guides on the left and right: for 8 mm, stack a 5 mm and a 3 mm guide on top of each other. Dust the work surface with a little caster sugar and roll out the dough between the guides. The sugar keeps the dough from sticking and gives the crescents a fine, crisp underside. This way the dough is exactly the same thickness everywhere, and all the crescents bake evenly.

Use the half moon cookie cutter to cut out the crescents and place them on a baking sheet lined with baking paper. Dip the cutter briefly into caster sugar now and then, so the dough releases more easily. Knead the scraps back together, roll them out again and keep cutting until the dough is used up.

Bake the lemon crescents for 8 to 10 minutes. They should stay pale and only take on a very slight colour at the edges. If you bake them for too long, they become dry instead of moist. While they are in the oven, prepare the icing.

Put the icing sugar into a bowl and gradually whisk in the water with the whisk until you have a smooth, runny icing. Do the spoon test: if the icing coats the back of a spoon evenly and opaquely, it has the perfect consistency. If it is too thick, add water drop by drop. If it is too thin, add a little more icing sugar.

Place a cake rack next to the bowl. Let the Möndli cool only briefly after baking so they do not break, then dip each one upside down into the icing while still slightly warm. The warmth helps the icing spread into a wafer-thin layer, which dries to a delicate, glossy coating.

Lift out each little moon, let the excess icing drip off briefly and place it glazed side up on the cake rack. Put baking paper under the cake rack to catch the drips. Let the icing dry completely at room temperature before you store the moons.