Yeast Strudel with Cheese-Strawberry Filling and Streusel

We had our first proper snow of the year this weekend, and the water has finally frozen over on the pond, which is a sign that winter is finally settling in after a relatively warm November. Right now it still all seems lovely, the powder-sugar look of the snow and the promise of Christmas (and winter break!) around the corner, but soon enough I'm sure I'll be fed up with it. After all, I hate the cold. Hate it. 

Anyways, I stay indoors as much as physically possible in the months from October to March, preferably in the nice, warm kitchen. I wanted to bake something nice with a slightly summery taste, but all the butteriness and warmth that winter demands. So I made a simple strudel with a filling of Polish fresh cheese (tvarog), lemon zest, and a thickened mixture of frozen berries picked in the summertime, sugar and lemon juice. The whole thing was topped with a very crumbly streusel and though it kind of exploded in the oven (too much filling; I've corrected for that in the ingredients list) it still tasted fantastic, with the flavour of the warmer months from the berries and the lemon zest to brighten things up. The cheese filling is very good, but would have been even better if I'd used a cheese with greater fat content- try to look for something creamy. The streusel gives some extra textural appeal.

The fruit filling can be highly variable, with fresh fruit being a wonderful substitution if available, and I'll be trying it with other berries in the future, rhubarb as well. I really like the dough- it's very soft and tender, and has just enough structure to hold up all the filling. This is the kind of cake you can even eat for breakfast reasonably, since it's got all your food groups. 

Until Christmas baking proper begins (all I've got thus far is Stollen) I eat my strudel and think of the long winter ahead.

You can't see it, but there's  a thin layer of snow on the deck.

Yeast Strudel with Cheese-Strawberry Filling and Streusel
Adapted from Moje Wypieki

For the Dough:
1 1/2 C. Bread flour
1/4 C. Buttermilk or kefir, warmed slightly
1 Large egg
2 TBSP Sugar, or vanilla sugar
Pinch of salt
30 g. Oil, or melted butter
1 Tsp. Vanilla extract
1 1/2 Tsp. Active dry yeast, or 20 g. Fresh yeast

Mix yeast and buttermilk/ kefir. Add sugar, vanilla and egg. Mix in flour and salt and knead until a cohesive dough forms (you might need more liquid). Add oil and knead until elastic. Let rise in a greased, covered bowl about 1 1/2 hours, or until doubled. Punch down and roll into a 25 x 35 cm rectangle.

For the Cheese Filling:
200 g. Twarog/farmer's cheese
1 Yolk, white reserved
1/4 C. Sugar
1 Tsp. Vanilla extract
Zest of one lemon
25 g. Butter, softened
3 TBSP 18% Sour cream, or 14% plus 1 Tsp. butter (if your cheese is lower-fat; if it's at least 10%, skip this step!)

Mix all together well. Use food processor for a smoother texture, or simply a spoon to keep the curds intact. If the mixture seems too liquid, add a small spoonful of cornstarch.

For the Fruit Filling:
200-300 g. Strawberries, from frozen, thawed
1 TBSP Cornstarch
1 TBSP Sugar
Juice of half a lemon

Mix lemon juice, cornstarch, and sugar. In a small pot, cook the strawberries until the juices run on medium-low heat. Add the cornstarch mixture and stir constantly until thickened. Let cool.

(For fresh strawberries, simply tossing them in the other ingredients ought to be enough)

To assemble, brush the dough rectangle with the reserved egg white, whisked until foamy, in a thin layer all over. In the lower half of the rectangle, spread the cheese filling evenly, but leave about 2 cm around the perimeters empty. Top with the fruit filling and fold the other dough flap over it, pressing down on the clean edges to seal them and tucking them under the roll. Transfer to a sheet lined with baking parchment and let rise covered for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 190℃.

For the Streusel:
100 g. Flour
50 g. Sugar
1 Sachet vanilla sugar, or 1 TBSP homemade
60 g. Butter, melted

Crumble all together by hand or with a pastry cutter, or with two forks in a small bowl.

Before baking, brush the strudel with what's left of the egg white (if there isn't any, or you want a brighter coloured loaf, use a whole beaten egg with a tablespoon of milk). Use a very sharp knife to make a long cut lengthwise along the top of the strudel and sprinkle on the streusel.

Bake for 30 minutes and let cool before cutting. Powder with sugar if desired.

Buttermilchbrot (With Caraway Seeds)

Since my quark-making adventure, I had about half a litre of good-quality buttermilk left over, as well as a nugget of fresh yeast from making stollen. I decided to make a loaf of buttermilk-based rye-wheat bread, since it could be left to its own devices for the most part and I was quite busy with studying. I added some caraway to complement the hearty flavour of rye and to contrast  the tanginess of the buttermilk. I love caraway in rye! Then again, I love caraway in a lot of things. It really goes down very well in this particular recipe.

As well as having a complex flavour, this loaf also has a great, porous crumb that's still dense and moist. It would make an ideal partner with a stew (especially a cabbage-based dish) or in wedges with soup- or with a firm sharp cheese on top. I think I'll try a variation with coriander seed, or maybe cumin, and also try replacing the rye with spelt or another whole grain. The recipe might even work well with kefir instead of buttermilk. 

Buttermilchbrot
From chefkoch.de

450 g. Buttermilk
21 g. Fresh yeast, or 2 1/2 Tsp. active dry yeast
340 g. Bread flour
200 g. Rye flour, dark or medium
1 TBSP Vinegar, preferably apple cider vinegar
1 TBSP Salt
1-2 TBSP Caraway seeds, optional

Mix the yeast and buttermilk to dissolve it. Add the vinegar and both flours and mix until cohesive. Add the salt and knead for 5-10 minutes to form a dough, along with half of the caraway seeds if using.

Let rise covered for 30 minutes. Form a loaf and sprinkle with the other half of the caraway seeds if desired. Otherwise, dust with flour. Let rise covered until doubled.

Preheat oven to 200℃. Cut the loaf with slits around the sides so that it can expand in the oven. Bake for an hour, adding steam after 10 and 20 minutes with a spray bottle of water for an extra crispy crust. Let cool for at least an hour before cutting.

Homemade Quark- German Fresh Cheese

For the longest time I've mourned the fact that you just can't get the insane variety of dairy products available in Germany in Canada. Particularly quark cheese, which is the backbone of a classic Käsekuchen, not to mention a key ingredient in countless other doughs, dishes, and fillings- I've seen one ultra-low fat 0.25% version for sale, but I don't want to make a pastry with that! Vastly superior would be something of at least around 10% fat. 

Of course, there are other types of quark. Magerquark is, to my knowledge, any quark with less than 10% fat- but something to the higher end of that spectrum is better for baking, while that with less fat can be eaten like yogurt with fruit or jam. Topfenquark, which is used in a ton of strudels, Auflaufs, and pastry fillings, is about 20% fat. And Speisequark is about 40% fat, and can be used as a bread spread amongst other uses in giving richness to dishes. 

When I found this recipe for homemade quark that didn't need rennet and could be done within the temperature range that my oven offers, I was suspicious that it was too good to be true. And while this isn't "true" quark in that it isn't cultured the same way... it's definitely a good enough approximation for me! I made mine with half 18% cream and half 3.8% buttermilk to get something with a slight amount of richness, but not too much- perfect for enhancing bread doughs, or for the Quarkstollen that I plan to be making. I'll definitely be trying the recipe out with different fat proportions, like a 20% fat version made partly with whipping cream... then I can try my hand at Topfenstrudel and Topfenpalatschinken. And delicious German cheesecake, of course.

I got just over 400 g. of quark out of this batch, but because I drained it in the fridge overnight, it was really a lot firmer than one would be used to for quark- but that's good, because you typically want to wring out as much whey as you can. Then, you can remoisten it to the desired level by adding some buttermilk or cream. I froze the majority of mine (hey, Google told me I could, but only time will tell if that was really a smart idea) but reserved a small amount to try right away. I added a spoonful of extra buttermilk, some chopped green onion, and some salt and pepper to make a spread for some freshly-baked buns, and it was received with great enthusiasm.

I never would have expected something so good to come of a recipe so simple and easy- any sort of homemade cheese always feels intimidating, but it's really not. My grandmother used to make her own fresh cheeses this way, and in my humble opinion, it tastes much better fresh and homemade.

You can also control the quality of all your ingredients very easily! I'm going to try my hand at other fresh cheeses in the near future. And get back on that Quarkstollen.

Homemade Quark
Adapted from chefkoch.de
(makes 400-500 g.)

500 mL.Buttermilk, 3.8%
500 mL Light cream, 18%

Mix both and let sit for about 15-30 minutes. Pour into a large Dutch oven or other baking pan. Place in an oven preheated to 100℃ and bake for 2 hours. Let cool. 

After cooling completely, strain for 2 hours (or better yet, longer in the fridge- I drained it overnight) with cheesecloths over a pot or bowl. Squeeze the curds dry and add a little buttermilk or cream to get a suitable consistency- you usually want it to be about as thick as Greek yogurt.

Buttermilk Streusel Cake with Fruit

This is one of my recurring favourites, especially when I have a little buttermilk kicking about in the fridge. It's one of those infinitely variable cakes that you can adjust to suit whatever fruit you have on hand. Rhubarb, as the original recipe used, is great, but so are berries, stone fruit and mandarins. You can omit the streusel and use some sliced nuts or a sprinkling of sugar to further simplify the already extremely easy recipe, and change the flavours up a little- I used lemon zest to make it taste bright and fresh, but nutmeg goes very well with peaches, too. You can add a little almond extract for stone fruit, some orange zest with blueberries, cinnamon with apples, and so on. If you don't have any fruit, you can also just make a straight-up streusel cake, substituting a quarter of the flour used with cocoa powder to make a chocolate version. You can even marble the chocolate and vanilla parts- this is a very versatile recipe.

While it's delicious on its own, accompaniments are welcome. Vanilla sauce, whipped cream or sour cream all give a textural counterpart to the spongy cake and crunchy streusel. Which one you use depends of whether the fruit you chose is more sweet or sour- use the former two with more sour fruit, and the latter with sweeter ones.

I used a couple of peaches, some blueberries and raspberries, a nectarine and my leftover 18% sour cream. As always, this cake tastes extremely bright and summery, soft and tender with the right amount of crispy streusel, the fruits adding colour and flavour. Just make sure the fruits are in relatively light pieces so they don't sink into the cake. If you don't have cake flour, substituting 30 grams of the flour called for with cornstarch will let you use all purpose flour. This will make the cake lighter and more tender. Once good trick is to use vanilla pudding powder instead of cornstarch for this in order to add some extra vanilla and colour. 

Don't forget to make some coffee or tea to go with it!


Buttermilk Streusel Cake with Fruit
Adapted from Chefkoch

280 g. Sugar
3 Eggs, room temperature
2 Packets vanilla sugar
Zest of one lemon
Pinch of salt
375 ml. Buttermilk
375 g. Cake flour
2 1/4 Tsp. Baking powder

To Top:
400-500 g. Fruit, in thin slices if large
60 g. Butter, softened but cool
60 g. Sugar
1 Packet vanilla sugar, or 1 Tsp. Vanilla extract
90 g. Cake flour

Grease and line a 8"x8" or 9"x13" baking pan. Preheat the oven to 200℃.

Beat the eggs, zest, salt and sugar until fluffy and pale yellow. Whisk in the buttermilk and sift in the flour and baking powder.

Pour into the prepared baking pan and top with fruit. Mix the butter, flour and sugar with hands and sprinkle the pieces on top of the fruit.

Bake for 20 minutes at 190℃, and 15 minutes at 180℃. Serve with vanilla sauce, whipped cream or sour cream. 

Monkey Bread Loaf

Sometimes I come across a recipe that it seems everyone else has been familiar with since birth, but is completely alien to me. I've seen all kinds of renditions of monkey bread on the net, but never in bakeries or grocery stores- I guess it's one of those cultural phenomenons that only exists in the homemade state. And that makes perfect sense- it's very easy, and also tastes the best fresh out of the oven. 

It can be made in the cheatey way probably invented by '50s housewives in the dawn of a glorious age of premade baking mixes and doughs, with canned biscuit dough and plain old sugar. Just take bits of dough, roll them in sugar, adhere them together and bake. Add whatever spices or enrichments you like, but it all comes back to that simple formula. Of course, yeast doughs are also a possibility, such as this recipe here (you could use store-bought bread dough... but why you'd want to do that is completely lost on me) and the dough itself can be further varied to be a sort of brioche or egg bread, simple white bread, t cetera. 

The top sugar is crispy, yet conceals a gooey underbelly, like a lava flow! Only safer and better tasting.

I really like this buttermilk-based, very simple dough that I've jazzed up just a tad with orange extract and vanilla. It's tangy and mildly sweet, tender, and requires no eggs. The orange goes really well with the vanilla- lemon is also good, or even tangerine zest would be excellent.

The sugar itself is the basic brown sugar plus a bit of cinnamon and cardamom for what I'd hoped would be some Nordic flair. I lived in Finland as a toddler, and while I remember nothing of it, my mother always tells me of how all the pastries were flavoured with cardamom. I like to think this spice has imprinted itself on me that way- I now use it in biscuits, on oatmeal, in puddings, even on plain old bananas. You can imagine how much I like Indian sweets, which use a lot of cardamom. But you can always try another spice- maybe replace the cinnamon and cardamom duo with 1 1/2 Tsp. of apple pie, pumpkin pie, or even gingerbread spice. You don't really need any spices, but they definitely add something to the sugary buttery aura of the bread.

Speaking of butter- you don't need to use it, so long as you get the sugar to stick to the dough bits in some way or another, but it adds a lot of flavour and welcome richness. Not too much, not too little. Just right for breakfast, with tea, or to pick off with a fork while reading on a rainy day. 

Definitely a party favour favourite. The Carnage has already begun, as the missing chunks indicate.

Monkey Bread Loaf
Adapted from Baking Bites

2 1/2 Tsp. Active dry yeast
1 1/2 C. Buttermilk, at room temperature
1/2 Tsp. Orange extract, or the zest of one orange
1 Tsp. Vanilla extract
1/4 C. Sugar
3 to 3 1/2 C. Bread flour

Topping Mixture:
1/2 C. Butter, melted
1 C. Light brown sugar, or a mixture of white and dark brown sugar
1 Tsp. Cinnamon
1/2 Tsp. Cardamom

Grease a 9" loaf pan with butter and set aside.

Mix the yeast, buttermilk, extracts and sugar. Add just enough flour to form a sticky, cohesive dough and knead until elastic- it will remain sticky. Let rise covered for about an hour, or until doubled.

Divide into small pieces, about 16. Form balls. Mix the light brown sugar, cinnamon and cardamom. Dip the balls of dough firstly into the butter, then into the sugar mixture. Place the balls into the pan and once all the dough is used up, pour any remaining butter and sugar on top. Let rise 45 minutes covered.

Bake at 190℃ for about 35 minutes, or until the inside of the bread registers 190℉ with a thermometer. Let cool before unmolding- or eat straight from the pan while warm.

Blueberry Buttermilk Pancakes

I'm a big pancake person. I love waffles, and french toast, and every other dessert-like breakfast food ever doused in butter and syrup, but pancakes are still on top.

A big stack of (slightly overbrowned) pancakes!

I think it's their versatility. Pancakes are really nothing more, by definition, than any sort of doughy disk cooked in a pan- so there's room for an incredibly diverse range of variations. You've got savoury and sweet, thin and thick, quick-rising, yeasted and unleavened, not to mention the almost infinite flavour and ingredient combinations. Even if you don't change up the pancakes themselves, there's also the huge amount of options for things to top them with. Pancakes of some sort exist in about every culture on Earth, and are all differently delicious.

These, however, are probably the closest thing to the American "default" pancake. When I was a kid I never had fluffy, American-style pancakes unless they were from a box in the freezer section- ours were almost exclusively thin and crêpe-like nalesniki rolled around a filling, or maybe some kind of banana fritter if we had too many brown ones. But the light, syrup-sponging pancakes I'd see on TV as part of the all-American breakfast seemed very exotic.

Needless to say, these are much, much better than any frozen boxed pancake. It took me many attempts to experiment with the much-exalted Martha Stewart recipe for the quintessential buttermilk pancakes until I got just what I was looking for- fluffy, light, tender and ready to absorb insane amounts of maple syrup.

I would recommend looking for "real" buttermilk for these pancakes- not regular milk that's been cultured or curdled with an acid. It really does make a difference, in my books. I used whole fat buttermilk from Organic Meadows, which is my absolute favourite buttermilk available, but use whatever looks to be the highest quality and fat content. I would even try thinning out a good organic sour cream with milk if I couldn't find good buttermilk- the important thing is that the acidity helps leaven the dough (by reacting with the baking powder) and tenderize it by preventing gluten networks from forming. This is also why you need to sift the dry ingredients- to minimize lumpiness, since overmixing the batter to make it completely smooth isn't an option.

You naturally don't need to use blueberries, if they're out of season or you want something different. You can also omit them and make plain buttermilk pancakes, or use chocolate chips. Still, when blueberry season finally hits Southern Ontario, I'm going to be collecting large bagfuls to freeze so that I can make these babies all through the winter. Fresh is obviously better since you can reserve some as a garnish, but you can throw frozen ones into the pancakes just as easily.

I would really, really recommend a nonstick skillet for these if you have one- for ages I suffered with pancakes that stuck regardless of how much oil I used or what the temperature was, or didn't want to cook through properly- a combination of a nonstick pan, medium heat and small pancake size fixed all these issues. You could also use a griddle if you have one, obviously- I didn't. And remember, flip frequently! They cook quickly, and nobody likes a burned pancake. If the surface is cooking faster than the inside, cover the pan with a lid after the first flip.

Lastly, use maple syrup. Not pancake syrup, not "butter-flavoured" syrup. You made these fantastic pancakes, so you deserve the best. And maple is the best.

Blueberry Buttermilk Pancakes
Adapted from Martha Stewart Living

2 C. All purpose flour
3 TBSP Sugar
2 1/4 Tsp. Baking powder
1/4 Tsp. Baking soda
1/2 Tsp. Salt
2 C. Buttermilk
2 Large eggs, yolks and whites separated
2 TBSP Butter, melted
1 TBSP Oil
1 Tsp. Vanilla extract
1 C. Blueberries, fresh or just out of the freezer
Oil or butter, to fry

Mix the flour, salt, baking powder and soda and sift into a large bowl. Stir in the sugar, buttermilk, yolks, butter, oil and vanilla extract- it's alright if it's a bit lumpy.

Beat the whites until firm peaks form and fold into the batter.

Heat a frying pan or skillet (nonstick works best) on medium. Add Use a ladle or 1/4 Cup scoop to dispense batter onto the pan. Drop a few blueberries onto each mound of batter.

Fry about 30 seconds on each side (in the beginning it takes longer since the skillet isn't hot yet) or until golden brown. Keep warm in an 80℃ oven until all the batter is used up.

These are best served with extra fresh blueberries (in season), maple syrup and pats of butter.

Southern Corn Cakes

Certain foods speak to you, you know? There's a kind of message you get from it just by tasting it. If this dish could speak, it would probably scream "IT'S FINALLY, FINALLY SUMMER IN CANADA! GET YOUR ARSE OUTSIDE AND ENJOY IT WHILE YOU CAN!"

Because sweetcorn is one of the great harbingers of warm weather. And while fritters and fried foods might usually be more suited for cold weather, these are packed with fresh, bright flavours that really do taste like summer. I modified this recipe quite a bit to suit what I had in the fridge, and added some red bell pepper bits and paprika for additional colour.

I myself was shocked at how good these were. Really, really, really good. These are the dangerous kinds of cakes I could easily eat all by myself, condemning my family to find their own dinner. But I didn't, obviously (mostly because I enjoy the deluge of compliments I get when I make something really good). If you have an abundance of fresh corn, this is a good way to highlight their raw flavour with just a bit of roasted goodness- they still taste fresh at the end. 

I served these with a bit of soy chorizo, creme frâiche, the spicy cilantro pesto I made yesterday, and some cherry tomatoes and lime wedges. As far as I'm concerned, those are the ideal condiments, each of the ingredients complimenting one another with spice, creaminess and zest. They'd also taste good with regular sour cream, salsa, crumbled feta, or whatever you have on hand to brighten them up. 

Southern Corn Cakes
From The Backyard Lemon Tree

3 Ears of corn, husked and desilked
1/2 C. Masa harina, or cornmeal
1/4 C. All purpose flour
3/4 C. breadcrumbs
1/4 C. Cilantro, chives, or a mixture
1 Tsp. Baking powder
1/2 Tsp. Baking soda
3 Eggs 
4 TBSP Buttermilk, or thinned down sour cream (my last-minute substitution, as I had no buttermilk!)
2 TBSP Olive oil
1 Tsp. Smoked paprika
1/4 Red bell pepper, diced finely (optional but very recommended) 
1/4 C. Shallots or red onions, diced finely
2 Cloves of garlic, minced
Salt and black pepper, to taste
Oil, to fry

Cut the kernels off the corn cobs with a sharp knife. Mix with the shallots, garlic, pepper and herbs. Set aside. 

Separately, whisk together the breadcrumbs, flour, masa harina, salt and pepper, baking soda, baking powder and paprika.

Beat together the eggs, buttermilk, and oil. Add the dry ingredients and mix until well incorporated with a wooden spoon. Add the corn and vegetables. Mix well to form a firm, pasty batter.

Heat a large skillet over medium heat and add some oil. Fry the corn cakes about two minutes, then flip with a spatula and cook another two minutes covered with a lid. Keep warm in an oven at about 80℃.