Wheat-free, egg-free Pfefernuts (pfeffernusse, pepper nuts, pfefferneuse, whatever)

More holiday traditions- this time, my husband's side of the family. I've been making these little nutty cookies for a couple of years at his request, and since he washes all the dishes, who am I to refuse? They are a little addictive. Since we're (well, they are) wheat-free now, I had to adapt...

Just from looking at the original recipe, I ascertained that the only thing keeping these cookies from being rocks was the eggs. Hmm. So I scoured the Internet for an egg-free version, using "vegan" as my convenient search term, and I discovered that an egg-free pfeffernusse recipe was included in a book called, "My Sweet Vegan" but no one was kind enough or copyright-brazen enough to reprint it. In my search, though, I discovered that these mysterious pfeffernusse are as traditional at Christmas for Germans as dios is for Hungarians, and that like dios, the recipes definitely vary. No others I found were tiny like the recipe from my mother in law, though all were very similar. Interestingly, our recipe does not call for pepper. Maybe someday I'll try that.

I ended up just doing a straight substitution into her recipe with Bob's Red Mill GF flour for the flour and egg replacer and water for the eggs, and you know what? They're great. Light and crisp- possibly nicer than the wheat version! I mixed up a small batch of those, too, so we'll get to do a taste-test, unless they all get eaten first. I baked the wheat-free, egg-free version tonight.

Pfefernuts
(this makes A LOT. I made 1/3 of the recipe and filled two one-quart containers)

Cream together:
3 C sugar
1 1/2 C butter
1 C sour cream
3 T egg replacer and 3 T water, mixed first (originally 3 eggs)

Add and mix:
1/2 tsp soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp each: mace, anise oil, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, ginger, allspice

Add:
6 C Bob's Red Mill All Purpose GF flour to make stiff dough (originally 10 C flour)

Refrigerate overnight (or longer). Make into rolls as round as a penny. Cut into thin slices (or blobs) . Bake in 350 degree oven on a parchment-lined baking sheet until brown. Yum! Eat by the handful!