Krumkake is a delicate Norwegian cookie that is loved across generations. It’s decadent, delicious and worth every minute spent making it!
A great advantage of being married to someone from another country and culture is that there is always something new to learn every day.
So, are you out of holiday coma? I’m still recovering from all the good food and gifts and everything. This was my first holiday season in the U.S and I enjoyed it the most. What is better than spending the holiday season with family and loved ones? Well, true. Half of my loved ones are back in Iran and my heart goes out to them. But I am also so grateful that I have a wonderful family here in the U.S that make me feel at home and comfortable and have introduced me to Christmas baking!
Our favorite Christmas recipes:
- Oatmeal Walnut Cookies
- Chewy Double Chocolate Cookies
- Chewy Ginger Molasses Cookies
- Peanut Butter Oatmeal Raisin Cookies
- Brown Sugar Pecan Cookies
- Cardamom Cookies Recipe
You know what brings people closer? Sharing food and recipes, and especially old family recipes. To me, family recipes are the best.And for today, I have another old family recipe from Kyle’s grandma – who is the loveliest grandma of them all – called Krumkake, a special Norwegian holiday cookie. You may ask why these Norwegian cookies? It’s because Kyle is one-eighth Norwegian!
“Krumkake is delicious, delicate and full of memories!”
Kyle’s grandma made this beautiful recipe book for Kyle’s mom so she has all the favorite recipes. Such a great thing to do for your daughter, and also to keep precious family recipes alive and safe. She has written the recipe of Krumkake in that notebook and I’m going to post the exact recipe here with some minor notes to make it easier and simpler. Kyle’s mom and I made these Krumkakes together and we had so much fun making them. It was a wonderful time spent together and the result was these gorgeous, delicious cookies that I just couldn’t limit myself to eat only one! They are lacy, sweet, crunchy and so, so incredibly delicious. You know I’m all about easy recipes but this one is worth every minute spent making it!
See those adorable drawing on the recipe? My husband’s piece of art on his mom’s recipe book. I am not grinding my teeth! 
As you can see, the ingredients are pretty basic and accessible. When I first saw the recipe on mom’s book, I was like:
“Mom this looks so simple! All the steps and ingredients are easy!”
“It’s not as simple as it looks, Shadi 🙂 ”
“But how can it be challenging? It’s basically mixing everything and then cooking it!”
“We will see :)”
And we did see, it was not simple to make them and mom had told me of course because she had made them so many times! The stubborn Persian I am, though, thought it was just mixing and cooking!
“Despite the challenge, krumkake is a must-make!”
What makes these cookies (or some may call them waffles) special is the Krumkake iron that you can find either in Scandinavian shops or online. It’s like a waffle iron but is used on the stove. I think these days the electric Krumkake irons are also available.
The trick to have the perfect Krumkake is for the batter to have the perfect consistency, I would say the consistency is like cake batter, maybe even a tad bit runnier. It’s totally normal to ruin the first 3 Krumkakes, do not lose hope and keep going! This recipe yields 25-30 cookies so there will be enough batter to practice with!
The recipe has not mentioned to coat the iron with non-stick spray but Kyle’s mom and I discovered that it’s much easier if you coat the iron with non-stick spray each time you want to pour the batter. And the cooking time for each side depends on the heat, ours varied from 35 to 45 seconds. After a couple of trials and errors you will figure out the right amount of time for yours.
So, here is the precious Krumkake recipe from the loveliest grandma to you, my friends. I love you all so much and all I am asking of you is to gather family recipes and save them somewhere. There is nothing more precious in the world!
Krumkake - Norwegian Holiday Cookies
Ingredients
- 4 eggs
- 1 cup sugar
- 3/4 cup 12 tbsp melted butter
- 3 tbsp cold water We ended up adding 2-3 more tbsp, so 5-6 tbsp cold water in total
- 1 1/2 cup unsifted flour
Instructions
- Beat eggs and sugar with mixer for 5 minutes until creamy and light.
- Add melted butter, water and mix again.
- Add flour and mix until fully combined.
- Put the Krumkake iron over medium heat and let it get hot.
- Open the iron and coat it with non-stick spray.
- Pour one tbsp of the batter on the iron and close the iron. Let it cook for 35 seconds and then turn so the other side cooks for another 35 seconds too. Do not open the iron.
- Take the iron off the heat, open it and take the krumkake out of the pan, roll immediately as it dries right away.
- Repeat the steps again until all the cookies are ready. Coat the iron every time before pouring the batter.
Notes
- The cooking time varies depending on the stove. It can be something between 35-45 second on each side.
- A good krumkake has the color seen in the photos, bright brown.
- Make sure to coat the krumkake iron with non stick spray.
Nutrition
Mardene Carr
Okay..I am going to step away from this table right now….oooooooooooh these look good
unicornsinthekitchen@gmail.com
Thanks Mardene! Glad you like these! <3
Chrisy @ Homemade Hooplah
These are so pretty! I love the pattern on the outside, such a delicate touch. I’m sure I’ll ruin more than 3 the first time I make them, but I’ll power through 🙂 I can’t wait to try them!
unicornsinthekitchen@gmail.com
you definitely should try them 😀 It’s not easy but I’m sure you will nail it! The Iron comes in different patterns and there is a lot to choose! <3 🙂
Stacey @ Stacey Homemaker
These look so fancy and special! I love that you make recipes from your husbands grandma, what a lovely tradition. I’m so glad you had a great 1st Christmas here in the states! I can’t wait to see what you make next =)
unicornsinthekitchen@gmail.com
Thank you Stacey! yea i do love family recipes I think they are the best because they’re full of memories! <3 Hope you had a great Christmas too! <3
Becky @ Disney in your Day
They look so good – but I can imagine how they could be challenging!
unicornsinthekitchen@gmail.com
Hey Becky! Yea they are not easy, but so so so delicious! 🙂
Matt @ Plating Pixels
How fun! These look like crepes but rolled up as a cookie. My girlfriend would love these!
unicornsinthekitchen@gmail.com
Exactly! Though the consistency is not like crepe batter but they are very similar! Hope your girlfriend loves them! 🙂
Elisabeth
I’m Norwegian and I absolutly love these christmascookies! Here in Norway we like to eat them with some cloudberrycream next to it, thats a perfect combination. Love your blog ?
unicornsinthekitchen@gmail.com
Thank you so much Elizabeth! I’ve never heard of cloudberrycream! Would love to try it!
Siri marken
My great grandmother from Norway made these each year. The only thing missing is cardamon. She would put cardamom seeds in a paper bag and pound them with a rolling pin to crack them, then put that in the batter. As a child, my favorite taste with krumkake was the course pieces of cardamon.
Shadi HasanzadeNemati
Hi Siri! Wow that sounds amazing, I never thought of cardamom and my husband’s grandmother’s recipe didn’t have cardamom but it sounds perfect! i’m definitely going to make this year’s batch with cardamom, thank you so much!
Wilhelmina Wessel
This is a brand new recipe for me and I can’t wait to make it! Such a special treat for the holidays!
Shadi HasanzadeNemati
Thank you! Hope you enjoy these!
Sarah
You were so right. Despite the challenge, they are SO worth it! Already thinking about making them again!!
Shadi HasanzadeNemati
glad you like krumkake Sarah!
Pedro
Hi Shadi,
I didn’t see a way to email you so I thought I would just reach out via the comments. We love this recipe and linked to it from our article here ->
https://easykitchenappliances.com/nordic-ware-norwegian-krumkake-iron-review/
Shadi HasanzadeNemati
Hi Pedro, glad to know you enjoy this recipe!
Andrew Glover
A good tasting recipe but sadly my Krumkake mold seemed to make them very very thin, at the edges they were about 1/2mm and even in the ‘thickest’ center it was 1mm maximum. As a result the cookies alternated between burnt at the edges and pale yellow in the middle. Looking at the images of others online its clear to see that the other molds are at least twice if not three times thicker, a shame as I really do like the buttery taste of the cooked cookie.
I tried adding some cornstarch to give me a little more thickness at the edges and varying the amount of batter but even a teaspoon caused an overflow at the edges. I may add some baking powder/soda to the remaining batter and use it to make pancakes…..
Shadi HasanzadeNemati
Hi Andrew, Thank you for your comment. I’m sorry to hear that the cookies didn’t come out perfect. If you’re planning to get a new mold, please check out Amazon or Nordicware as they have newer models. Hope you enjoy the rest of your week 🙂
Karen Sanders
Ohh, Yummy!
Never I will miss this delicious recipe. I am gonna buy these ingredients. I will let you know how I made similar to this recipe. I am not bad at cooking 🙂
Shadi HasanzadeNemati
Hope you enjoy this!
Cyndi
Question about the amount of butter. The printed recipe say 3/4 c 12 Tbs butter. That’s a lot of butter and the Norwegians do like butter!! Would I use all that butter?
Shadi HasanzadeNemati
Hi Cyndi, yes, I agree that’s a good amount of butter. This recipe makes a big batch of krumkake (about 30-40), therefore you will use all that butter. You can cut the recipe in half if you want, but I don’t recommend it. Hope this helps 🙂
Kimo
I have my grandmothers krumkaka iron that I watched her use many, many times when I was little. Even though I don’t eat sugar (for my RA) im going to break out the iron and make the cookies this weekend. First time in at least 20 years! We’ll see how it goes! I recall powdered sugar on them or just plain but I may need to make some cream for them. Yumm-o!
Shadi HasanzadeNemati
Hi Kimo, hope you enjoy these cookies, they really are delightful! You can have them with or without cream, we usually go without 🙂
Vicky
This is a new treat that I’ve never heard of and I can’t wait to try it!
Patty at Spoonabilities
These truly are the most special cookies! I love your handwritten recipe with the scribbles your hubby made as a child. What a treasure!!
Renee | The Good Hearted Woman
This is just a wonderful post! I remember my mother had a friend who made these: I don’t think I’ve had one since I was five.
As to that green crayon “decorating” Kyle’s mom’s cookbook; some of the pages in my mother’s cookbook look like that: with extra “instructions” crayoned into the margins. She use to get so mad at me for *illustrating* her cookbook, but later in life, my pictures made her laugh. The crayon marks have their own story.
Michelle
These are so pretty, and delicious too! No wonder the recipe has been passed down