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Kransekake
Sørlandet · Southern Coast

Kransekake

The towering almond ring cake of celebration — chewy marzipan rings stacked and laced with royal icing.

1 hr 40 minAdvanced
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Cultural Context & History

No Norwegian wedding, christening or 17th of May is complete without the kransekake — a spiralling tower of eighteen concentric almond rings. Along the southern coast it is often filled with a small bottle of wine or wrapped sweets, a gift hidden inside the architecture of the cake.

Ingredients

  • 500 g ground almonds261 kcal · 25.6 g protein · 16.8 g fat · 0 g carbs per 100 g
  • 500 g icing sugar24 kcal · 0 g protein · 0 g fat · 5.9 g carbs per 100 g
  • 3 egg whites54 kcal · 10.9 g protein · 0 g fat · 0 g carbs per 100 g
  • For the icing: 1 egg white, 250 g icing sugar, lemon juice166 kcal · 9.4 g protein · 3.6 g fat · 24.1 g carbs per 100 g

Per-100 g values shown for ingredients verified against Nutrition data: USDA FoodData Central (snapshot 2026-09-11). Ingredients not yet verified show no nutrition line.

Recommended Tools

  • Kransekake ring setGraduated moulds for the signature stepped tower.
  • Piping bag with fine tipDelivers the delicate white icing zig-zags.

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Step-by-Step Instructions

  1. 1

    Knead almonds, icing sugar and egg whites into a firm, smooth marzipan. Rest overnight.

  2. 2

    Roll into ropes and press into graduated kransekake ring moulds.

  3. 3

    Bake at 200°C for 10–12 minutes until lightly golden but still chewy.

  4. 4

    Cool completely, then stack the rings from largest to smallest, piping zig-zags of royal icing to bind each layer.

Chef's Tip

The rings should be barely coloured — over-baking turns the chew to crunch. Pull them the moment the edges take on colour.

How this page was made

Written by
The Norcook editorial archive. No individual author is named yet — see the editorial and food-safety policy for what that means and what has to happen before a byline appears.
Content last checked
— “checked” records an editorial check, not a qualified review. Where one exists, the recipe-specific review record appears in the food-safety callout.
Regional context
Sørlandet — the hub carries the wider background, the ingredient glossary and its own sources.
Sources
No page-level sources are recorded for this recipe yet. The cultural background above is written as general context, not as a sourced historical claim.

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