The Leibniz-Keks or Choco Leibniz is a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 brand of biscuit

Biscuit

A biscuit is a baked, edible, and commonly flour-based product. The term is used to apply to two distinctly different products in North America and the Commonwealth Nations....

, produced by the Bahlsen

Bahlsen

Bahlsen is a German food company based in Hanover. It was founded in July 1889 by Hermann Bahlsen as the Hannoversche Keksfabrik H. Bahlsen. The family of founder Hermann Bahlsen, led by his grandson Werner Bahlsen, continues to control the company...

 food company since 1891.

Name

The brand name Leibniz comes from the philosopher and mathematician

Mathematician

A mathematician is a person whose primary area of study is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with quantity, structure, space, and change....

 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. The only connection between man and biscuit is that Leibniz was one of the more famous residents of Hanover

Hanover

Hanover or Hannover, on the river Leine, is the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony , Germany and was once by personal union the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, under their title as the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg...

, where the Bahlsen company is based. At the time when the biscuit was first made, there was a fashion for arbitrarily naming products after famous people (compare Mozartkugel

Mozartkugel

The Mozartkugel , originally known as the “Mozartbonbon”, was created by the Salzburg confectioner, Paul Fürst, in 1890 and named after Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart....

).

Leibniz-Keks

The Leibniz-Keks is a plain butter biscuit, or Butterkeks as it is known in German, inspired by the French Petit beurre created in 1886 by Lefèvre-Utile. The word Keks in Leibniz-Keks was originally a corruption of the English word "cake

Cake

Cake is a form of bread or bread-like food. In its modern forms, it is typically a sweet and enriched baked dessert. In its oldest forms, cakes were normally fried breads or cheesecakes, and normally had a disk shape...

s" by Bahlsen. Due to the popularity of the Leibniz-Keks, Keks has since become the generic German word for a crunchy, sweet biscuit.

Design

The original Leibniz biscuit has a simple and distinctive design. Fifty-two "teeth" frame the rectangular field, on which is imprinted "LEIBNIZ BUTTERKEKS" in capital letters. This was Hermann Bahlsen's original 1891 design. The biscuit has been featured in a series of "Monuments of German Design" by the Süddeutsche Zeitung

Süddeutsche Zeitung

The Süddeutsche Zeitung , published in Munich, is the largest German national subscription daily newspaper.-Profile:The title literally translates as "South German Newspaper". It is read throughout Germany by 1.1 million readers daily and boasts a relatively high circulation abroad...

 .

Varieties

In addition to the original Butterkeks, there are several varieties of Leibniz on the market today. These include Choco Leibniz (styled as "more chocolate than biscuit"), Leibniz Milch & Honig, Leibniz Vollkorn, and Leibniz Zoo.

Ingredients

Ingredients include sugar

Sugar

Sugar is a class of edible crystalline carbohydrates, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose, characterized by a sweet flavor.Sucrose in its refined form primarily comes from sugar cane and sugar beet...

, wheat

Wheat

Wheat is a cereal grain, originally from the Levant region of the Near East, but now cultivated worldwide. In 2007 world production of wheat was 607 million tons, making it the third most-produced cereal after maize and rice...

flour, cocoa

Cocoa solids

Cocoa solids are the low-fat component of chocolate. When sold as an end product, it may also be called cocoa powder, cocoa, and cacao....

 mass, cocoa butter

Cocoa butter

Cocoa butter, also called theobroma oil, is a pale-yellow, pure edible vegetable fat extracted from the cocoa bean. It is used to make chocolate, biscuits, and baked goods, as well as some pharmaceuticals, ointments, and toiletries...

, whey

Whey

Whey or Milk Serum is the liquid remaining after milk has been curdled and strained. It is a by-product of the manufacture of cheese or casein and has several commercial uses. Sweet whey is manufactured during the making of rennet types of hard cheese like cheddar or Swiss cheese...

 products, glucose

Glucose

Glucose is a simple sugar and an important carbohydrate in biology. Cells use it as the primary source of energy and a metabolic intermediate...

 syrup, emulsifier, soya

Soybean

The soybean or soya bean is a species of legume native to East Asia, widely grown for its edible bean which has numerous uses...

 lecithin

Lecithin

Lecithin is a generic term to designate any group of yellow-brownish fatty substances occurring in animal and plant tissues, and in egg yolk, composed of phosphoric acid, choline, fatty acids, glycerol, glycolipids, triglycerides, and phospholipids .The word lecithin was originally coined in 1847 by...

, whole milk

Milk

Milk is a white liquid produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals before they are able to digest other types of food. Early-lactation milk contains colostrum, which carries the mother's antibodies to the baby and can reduce the risk of many...

 powder, salt

Salt

In chemistry, salts are ionic compounds that result from the neutralization reaction of an acid and a base. They are composed of cations and anions so that the product is electrically neutral...

, raising agents, sodium bicarbonate

Sodium bicarbonate

Sodium bicarbonate or sodium hydrogen carbonate is the chemical compound with the formula Na HCO3. Sodium bicarbonate is a white solid that is crystalline but often appears as a fine powder. It has a slightly salty, alkaline taste resembling that of washing soda . The natural mineral form is...

, citric acid

Citric acid

Citric acid is a weak organic acid. It is a natural preservative/conservative and is also used to add an acidic, or sour, taste to foods and soft drinks...

, and flavouring.