Swedish Cinnamon Buns and Safrron Buns (Kanelbullar och Saffransbullar)

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of attending a baking class arranged by the SIS Out and About Club.  We had a lovely teacher, NikAnnika Märak, who taught us a few tricks.  Among other things, I learned that I have been making my dough way too dry. Our teacher kept hers very wet.  Basically you just have to have to learn to live with goopy hands.  But as you knead the dough, it becomes less sticky. 

I also learnt a new filling.  The classic filling for cinnamon buns is just butter, sugar and cinnamon.  Ms. Märak added almond meal which added a lovely subtle flavor and thickened the filling so it didn't just all drizzle out of the bun when you cooked it.

Cinnamon Buns (Kanelbullar)

About 16 buns

Dough

75 grams butter (smör)

2.5 deciliters milk (mjölk)

25 grams fresh yeast (jäst), sold in 50 grams cubes in the refrigerated section, normally near the butter

½ deciliters sugar (strösocker)

1 egg (ägg)

1 spice spoon salt (a pinch)

1 teaspoon cardamom (kardemumma)

420 grams all-purpose flour (vetemjöl)

Filling

100 grams butter at room temperature (smör)

1 deciliter almond four (mandelmjöl)

150 grams sugar (strösocker)

3 tablespoons cinnamon (kanel)

Handful of pearl sugar (pärlsocker) for garnish

Melt the butter in a small pan on the stove, or in the microwave.  Crumble the yeast into a large bowl.  Add the milk into the butter and stir.  Stick your finger into the butter/milk mixture.  It should be about body temperature.  If it feel hot to the touch, let it cool because a too high heat will kill the yeast.  Pour the butter/milk mixture in the bowl with the yeast and stir until the yeast is dissolved.  Add the rest of the ingredients for the dough (egg, cardamom, salt, sugar, and flour).  Stir the ingredients until it forms a dough.  The dough should be quite wet and sticky.  Knead the dough on the counter or on a board, using a bit of flour but not too much.  The dough will become easier to work and less sticky as you knead it.  Knead until it is smooth and elastic.  If you are kneading by hand, you cannot overknead.  Put the dough back in the bowl and dust with flour.  Put plastic wrap over the bowl and let it rise for at least 30 minutes until it roughly doubles.  If the room is cold, it will take longer to rise.

Meanwhile, mix together all the ingredients for the filling in a small bowl.

Some of the different shapes you can make.

Put the dough out onto a lightly floured board or counter.  Using a rolling pin, roll out the dough to a rectangle about ½ centimetre thick.  Spread the filling over the dough.  Roll up the dough and shape into buns.  Put the buns onto a baking sheet covered with parchment/baking paper (bakplåtspapper).  Turn on the oven to 225 degrees Celsius.

Let the buns rise for 30 minutes (a bit more if the room is cold).  Brush the buns with beaten egg mixed with a bit of water.  Sprinkle over pearl sugar (pärlsocker).  Bake in the oven 8 to 10 minutes until golden brown.

Saffron Buns (Saffransbullar)

About 16 buns

Dough

75 grams butter (smör)

2.5 deciliters milk (mjölk)

25 grams fresh yeast (jäst), sold in 50 grams cubes in the refrigerated section, normally near the butter

1 deciliter sugar (strösocker)

1 egg (ägg)

1 spice spoon salt (a pinch)

1 packet ground saffron (saffron), ie. 0.5 grams

420 grams all purpose flour (vetemjöl)

Filling, if desired

100 grams butter at room temperature (smör)

1 deciliter almond four (mandelmjöl)

150 grams sugar (strösocker)

3 tablespoons vanilla sugar

Handful of pearl sugar (pärlsocker), raisins, or flaked almonds for garnish

Melt the butter in a small pan on the stove, or in the microwave.  Crumble the yeast into a large bowl.  Add the milk into the butter and stir.  Stick your finger into the butter/milk mixture.  It should be about body temperature.  If it feel hot to the touch, let it cool because a too high heat will kill the yeast.  Pour the butter/milk mixture in the bowl with the yeast and stir until the yeast is dissolved.  Add the rest of the ingredients for the dough (egg, saffron, salt, sugar, and flour).  Stir the ingredients until it forms a dough.  

The dough should be quite wet and sticky.  Knead the dough on the counter or on a board, using a bit of flour but not too much.  The dough will become easier to work and less sticky as you knead it.  Knead until it is smooth and elastic.  If you are kneading by hand, you cannot overknead.  Put the dough back in the bowl and dust with flour.  Put plastic wrap over the bowl and let it rise for at least 30 minutes until it roughly doubles.  If the room is cold, it will take longer to rise.

Meanwhile, mix together all the ingredients for the filling, if you are using it.

Put the dough out onto a lightly floured board or counter.  If you don’t want the filling, divide the dough into 16 pieces and shape as desired, using the raisins for garnish.

For filled buns, using a rolling pin, roll out the dough to a rectangle about ½ centimetre thick.  Spread the filling over the dough.  Roll up the dough and shape into buns.  Put the buns onto a baking sheet covered with parchment/baking paper (bakplåtspapper).  Turn on the oven to 225 degrees celcius.

Let the buns rise for 30 minutes (a bit more if the room is cold).  Brush the buns with beaten egg mixed with a bit of water.*  Sprinkle over pearl sugar (pärlsocker), or flaked almonds.  Bake in the oven 8 to 10 minutes until golden brown.

You can also brush them with sugar syrup instead of egg if desired.  To make the sugar syrup, boil 1 dl sugar with 1 dl water until the sugar is fully melted.  Cool.

Rye No-Knead Bread with Orange, Fennel, Anis, and Cardamom

I love the spiced Swedish "limpa" that is so popular here in Sweden.  Limpa means "loaf" in Swedish but refers to a particular type of bread which is spiced and has a lot of sugar syrup in it to sweeten it. It is particularly popular at Christmas. Swedes routinely put various spices into their bread. For example, most sweet breads, like cinnamon rolls, have cardamom in the dough. The old fashioned limpa generally has "bread spice" which you can buy pre-mixed in a packet in Sweden.  The other day, I decided to try to mimic this flavor using my quick and easy no-knead bread recipe. I added a bit of rye flour to get a more earthy flavored bread and dumped in a bunch of spices.  A tad more honey and a generous amount of raisins give it sweetnes.  I stuck it in the oven, crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.  The loaves were delicious! Both loaves were polished off by me and my two sons in one afternoon...we were so full of bread that we skipped dinner.  There was just a small bit left in the morning, which my sons ate for breakfast.  I call that a success.

2 loaves

25 grams fresh yeast

3 dl water
1 dl filmjölk, buttermilk or yogurt

1 tablespoon salt

2 tablespoons honey

9 to 11 deciliters flour
1 dl fine rye flour

1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom
1 teaspoon ground fennel seeds
1/2 teaspoon ground anis seeds
zest of one orange
about 1 dl orange juice
2 dl raisins

In a large bowl, pour in the water, which you have run from the tap

to feel warm but not hot with your fingers.  If the water is too hot, it will kill your yeast.  Crumble in the yeast and stir until the yeast is dissolved.  If your spices are whole, grind them now in a mortar and pestle or other spice grinder.  Add the ground spices to the yeast.

 Zest the orange and add to the yeast mixture.  Cut the orange in half and then juice the orange. It should be about 1 dl.  Add the orange juice to the bowl. Add in the filmjölk, salt, and honey. Stir to combine.

Dough after all the flour is mixed in.

Add the rye flour and then the regular flour, a bit at a time until the dough starts to form a ball. At first it will look like you have too much flour and it will look shaggy.  Stir it a bit more and the flour will absorb more

Dough with raisins forming a ball.

water. Give it a good stir to make sure that all the flour is well mixed in. If you have the perfect ratio of flour and liquid, it will come together as a ball and your bowl will be clean, although the dough will still be very

Dough doubled after 2 hours.

sticky.  But if this doesn't happen, don't worry. This recipe is forgiving.Add the raisins to the dough and mix again until the raisins are nicely distributed through the dough.  Cover the bowl with a clean cloth and let stand in a warm and draft-free place for 1 ½ to 2 hours.  The dough should more than double.

Pre-heat an oven to 225 degrees C.  Pour the dough out onto a well floured board or smooth counter-top.  Divide the dough into two pieces, making sure your hands are well floured.  Lay each piece onto a baking sheet covered with parchment.  Dust each loaf with flour.  Let it rest with a cloth over it while the oven warms. When the oven is hot, you can slash the loaves with a very sharp or serated knife, if you like.  The dough is quite soft so if your knife is not very sharp, it will just mush the dough.  If so, you can just skip this step.  You do not need to let the bread rise a second time, it will rise further in the often. 

Bake in the middle of the oven for 20 to 25 minutes until nicely golden brown on top.  Take out and let cool, preferably on a rack of some kind, in order to let the moisture from the bread dissipate.  If you just rest it on your cutting board, the moisture coming out of the bread as it cools will make your crust soggy.

Christmas Stollen

The holiday season brings upon a flurry of baking in my house.  This year, I was inspired by a recipe in the Wall Street Journal to make a Christmas Stollen, which a German sweet bread studded with rum soaked fruit.  Perusing different recipes for stollen, I came across one on the BBC which incorporated a swirl of marzipan.  In order to get the correct proportions of yeast and flour, I had to find a Swedish recipe which was adapted to the live yeast that you can buy here.  Collating and cross referencing these different recipes took a bit of time, with the result that it took me almost all day, even with the dilligent help of Gustaf, to bake these loaves.  Then, distracted by making dinner, I messed up on the final baking of the loaves, baking them at too high a heat, an error I did not notice until I checked on the loaves about half way through the cooking time and saw that they were already quite brown on top.  I had to take my loaves out in order for them not to burn, with the sad result that the center of the loaf is a tiny bit gooey and underdone.  Peter assures me that it tastes better that way but he is a guy that steals raw dough as I am making it.  While the final result is a bit dissapointing to me, the flavor is excellent and I can see that it would have been perfect if not for that too high temperature.  But now you are forewarned, so yours will perfect.  I promise.

Enough for 2 stollen

100 grams candied orange peel

200 grams raisins

200 grams other dried fruit (for example, currents, cranberries, apricots, pineapple, figs, citron peel etc), chopped into appropriate sized pieces

1 dl rum

2 dl almonds, slivered

35 grams yeast

2 dl Milk

2 eggs

200 grams butter, at room temperature

5 dl (270 grams) strong bread flour

5 to 8  dl (about 300 to 450 grams) all-purpose flour

50 grams sugar 

1 pinch salt

1 whole Lemon or orange zest

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/8 teaspoon ground cloves

400 grams Marzipan, optional

The night before you want to make the bread, mix the raisins, orange peel, and dried fruit together and add the rum, mixing it all together.  Let the mixture stand overnight to absorb the rum, stirring occasionally if you can be bothered.  When you are ready to begin the bread, strain the fruit, reserving the residual rum to brush onto the bread after baking.

Make the starter by crumbling the yeast into a large bowl.  Warm your milk in a small pan on the stove to about 100 degrees F, slightly warm to your finger.  Be careful not to warm to much because you will kill your yeast.  Stir the warm milk into the bowl with yeast until the yeast is fully dissolved.  Add 2 dl flour, mix well and allow the starter to stand for half an hour, after which the yeast will have puffed up the mixture.

Into the bowl with the starter, add 5 dl of bread flour, sugar, salt, nutmeg, cloves and zest of either one lemon or orange.  Stir the ingredients together, to form a stiff dough.  Add about one quarter of the softened butter, alternating with a decilitre of all purpose flour.  Knead with your hands, in the bowl, until the butter and flour are incorporated, and then add more butter.  Continue until all the butter is incorporated and you have a nice dough that is still soft but not too sticky.  You should have used about three to four deciliters of the all purpose flour.  Turn the dough out onto a generously floured board and knead for at least 15 minutes until the dough is elastic and smooth.  During this kneading process, incorporate a further decilitre or two of flour.  Once the dough is fully kneaded, spread it out a bit on your board, sprinkle with some all-purpose flour, and pour over about half of your dried fruit.  Draw the dough over the fruit and knead together, addingmore flour when the dough gets sticky.  When the fruit is incorporated, repeat the procedure with the remaining fruit.  Finally, add in the slivered almonds. 

Shape the dough into a neat ball and put into a bowl and cover with a towel to rise for about an hour until the dough doubles in size.  At this point, you can also put the dough in the refrigerator and let it rise more slowly overnight, if you prefer, in order for you to bake it the morning. A slower yeasting brings out more complex flavors in the bread, and is commonly used among artisan breadmakers to get a finer more flavorful bread.  However, in this case, the bread is so highly flavoured with spices and other ingredients, that it seems to me the subtle flavour differences brought upon by a slow yeasting are irrelevant.  However, you still may want to use the slower yeasting to adjust the timing of baking your bread to fit your schedule.

Once the bread has finished its first rise, knead it for a minute or two and divide the dough in half. (You can also bake one large loaf, if you prefer.) 

For the marzipan swirl, take each half of the dough and roll out, using a rolling pin, to a rectangle.  Take half of the marzipan (200 grams) and roll out to a rectangle, slightly smaller than the dough.  Use powdered sugar to keep the marzipan from sticking to your board.  Put the marzipan on the dough and roll up the dough on the long side of the rectangle.  Pinch the ends shut and pinch the dough to seal it on the edge, making sure there is no marzipan sticking out.  Place the roll on a baking sheet covered in parchment paper.  Repeat for the second piece of dough.  If you prefer not to have the marzipan in the dough, then simply shape each ball of dough into a long loaf shape.

Cover with a towel and let the bread rise for the second time, for about an hour or until the loaves double in size.  Bake in a 180 degree Celsius (350 degree F) oven for 35 to 45 minutes until the loaves are brown.  Do not be tempted to raise the temperature to get a faster bake because the sugar in the dough will make the loaves brown too quickly, while the inside will remain uncooked.

When the loaves have cooled but are still warm, brush the loaves with the leftover rum from soaking the fruit.  Then brush with melted butter and sprinkle liberally with powdered sugar.  When the cake is cooled, you can sprinkle some more powdered sugar over, if you like, to make a more even “white” surface.  Cut into slices to serve.

Lucia Rolls

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  Santa Lucia is a holiday in Sweden celebrated on December 13th.  Leading up to the day, the prettiest girl in town is chosen to represent the saint in a candlelit procession.  Lucia is an Italian saint who lived in Sicily about 1,800 years ago and who died for her Christian faith.  She became very celebrated throughout Italy and her day has been marked on the calendar and celebrated in Sweden since medieval times.  However, today's Swedish tradition dates very much from the lat 19th century and has more to with a celebration of light than Christianity.  What is important about the holiday, is of course, the food.  Traditionally, saffron flavored sweet rolls are served along with copious quantities of mulled wine.

Lussekatter, as these rolls are called in Sweden, are a slightly sweetened saffron bread.  They are actually a bit bland to eat, but the flavor grows on you;  the first mouthful is a bit dull but by the end of the roll, you are ready for another.  I wanted to liven the traditional recipe with some candied orange peel and perhaps a topping of rock sugar, but my family protested terribly against any alteration from the traditional!

•  200 grams butter
• 1 gram powdered saffron
• 5 dl milk
  ½ dl whipping cream
  50 grams live yeast
  2 eggs
  1 pinch salt
  2 ½ dl sugar
  16 to 17 dl bread flour
  For garnish, a handful of raisins and an egg for the wash

• Melt the butter in a large pot on the stove with the saffron.   Take off the stove.  Measure out the milk.  Pour the milk into the butter until the mixture feels  just warm to your finger.  Set any remaining milk aside.  Crumble the yeast cake into the butter/milk mixture and stir until the yeast is fully dissolved.  Add the rest of the milk and the cream to this mixture. 

In large bowl, measure out 14 dl of the bread flour, the salt and the sugar.  Make a hole in the middle of the flour and break in the two eggs.  Beat lightly with a fork and then pour in the milk/butter mixture.  Stir the flour and liquids together with a large wooden spoon until it is combined.  If you feel that the mixture is firm enough to knead, you can turn it out onto a floured board.  If it is still too sticky, add more flour until you feel it is firm enough. 

Generously flour your hands and the board and knead the dough, adding more flour when the dough gets sticky.  Knead for about 10 minutes until the dough becomes smooth and elastic.  Put in a bowl and cover with a towel and leave to rise for an hour.

Punch the dough down and knead for about a minute to get the air bubbles out.  Cut the dough into four pieces and then cut each quarter into 6 to 8 pieces.  Roll each piece into a long snake.  Curl the snake in opposite directions on each side until you meet at the middle.  Stick a raisin into the center of each curl.  Place onto a baking sheet covered with parchment paper, leaving plenty of room for the buns to rise.  Cover with a towel and leave to rise for about an hour.

• Beat an egg and brush the tops of each bun. Heat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius and bake for 8 to 10 minutes until golden on the top.
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New York Style Bagels

Bagels differ from bread in three ways.  First, they are flavored with malt.  Many recipes use malt extract or syrup.  I had trouble finding this in the store, and my husband Peter suggested that I use a porter beer which is heavily malt flavored instead. The worked very well and was much easier to find than the extract.   A true bagel is boiled for a couple of minutes in water before it is baked.  This step gives the bagel its chewy texture.  The water interacts with the outside of the dough to form a crust.  This crust prevents the dough from rising too much in the oven, giving a denser bread.  The longer that the dough is boiled, the chewier the bagel is. Finally, bagel dough is a much stiffer dough than normal bread, meaning it has much less water.  This is partly what gives the bagel its dense crumb and texture, and also allows it to stand up to the water bath.

While making bagels is quite straightforward, I do not recommend it if you have never baked bread before.  The reason for this is because the dough is so stiff that it is much harder to knead than a normal bread dough and thus there is a larger probability of going wrong.  The first time I made bagels, I made three batches before I had any success!  The first batch I used an old sack of bread flour that had been sitting in my cupboard for three years.  As I was kneading it, the dough was extremely crumbly and did not show any signs of elasticity.  I looked up whether flour could be too old, and it turns out the protein and gluten content does deteriorate with age.  So, I dumped that batch and started again.  This time the dough felt better immediately, but I was so concerned with having a dry enough dough that I didn’t put enough water in it.  After kneading for over half an hour and even enlisting my husband’s hands for a further 10 minutes, the dough still did not want to be smooth.  I went ahead and finished the bread but while the bagels were baking, I read all the recipes I could find and realized that my dough had simply been too dry.  While the bagels came out edible, they were misshapen and ugly. Of course, I had invited some friends over to try my bagels, and they gamely complimented my efforts but it didn’t really feel like a success!  Later that afternoon, I decided to try one last time, making sure the dough was not too dry, and it finally worked. For this reason, I can suggest that if you do not make bread very often, buy more yeast than you need.  If the first batch doesn’t work, you can always throw it away and begin again.  While I dislike waste, the ingredients here are quite inexpensive, so you can afford to experiment.  Do not be put off by the length of the recipe.  It is not that difficult or time consuming, but I have tried to give a lot of detail so that you won’t have to do it three times before getting a good bagel!

12 bagels

For bagel dough:

50 grams (1.5 ounces) fresh yeast cake

3 dl (1 1/4 cups)water

3 dl (1 1/4 cups) porter style beer

3 tablespoons honey, syrup, or brown sugar

2 teaspoons salt

10 to 13 dl (4 to 6 cups) strong bread flour

For boiling the bagels:

The rest of the bottle of porter

½ cup brown sugar

Optional, topping for bagels

Sesame seeds, caraway seeds, flake sea salt, or poppy seeds

In a bowl or large measuring cup, pour in the warm water.  The water should feel slightly warm to the touch (around 100F, if you measure with a thermometer).  The yeast is already active and does not need to be woken up. Better to have the water slightly too cold than too hot because water over 130F will kill the yeast.  Crumble the yeast cake into the water and stir until it is fully dissolved.  Then add in your choice of sweetening agent and the beer and stir.

In a large bowl, pour 10 dl (4 cups) of flour and add the salt and stir.  Make a hole in the center and pour in the yeast mixture.  Stir with a spoon until the flour is more or less incorporated and then start kneading the mixture in the bowl with your hand.  You should have a stiff dough, much stiffer than a normal bread dough, but all the flour should be incorporated and the dough should be in one mass.  If the dough is crumbly and does not seem to want to form a ball, then add a bit more water.  If the dough is sticky, then gradually sprinkle in more flour.   You should end up with a ball of dough that is a bit rough and lumpy but that sticks together.  Although you want a dry stiff dough, it is better to err on the wet side if you are unsure.  The worst that will happen is that you have a softer, more bread like bagel, while if it is too dry, the dough will not come together smoothly and you will have lumpy bagels.  It is also easier to add more flour to make the dough drier during the kneading process than to wet a dry dough later.  Put a towel over the bowl and let the dough stand for 10 minutes.  This will allow the gluten in the flour to relax slightly, making it easier to knead.

Lightly dust a working surface with flour and start kneading the dough.  After about 2 to 3 minutes, it should start becoming smooth.  The dough should not be at all sticky.  If it is sticky, dust a bit more flour on it and continue to knead.  Repeat until the dough no longer feels sticky. Because the dough is dryer than normal and because you are using bread flour with a higher gluten content, it will take longer to knead.  If you should feel that your dough is too dry, wet your hands and knead again until all the water is incorporated.  You can repeat this several times until you reach a consistency that feels better. Continue kneading for a further 15 to 20 minutes until the dough is smooth and elastic and forms a neat ball.

If you have a mixer with dough attachments or a bread-maker, you can let the machine do this work.  In fact, many recipes I have read recommend using a machine, presumably because the machine can do a better job with the stiff dough and you may find that a machine can incorporate a bit more flour than you can do by hand.  Do keep an eye on it, though, to make sure the machine does not overheat due to the stiffness of the dough!

Put the dough in a clean bowl, cover with a dishcloth, and set in a warm spot.  Let rise for 1 hour or more, until the dough has doubled.

Punch the dough to get the air bubbles out and turn it out and knead for a minute.  The dough should be smooth and elastic.  At this point you can put the dough back in the bowl, cover with plastic wrap and put in the refrigerator overnight or up to two days.  The dough will slowly rise in the refrigerator, and this slow rise will improve the flavor and texture of the bread.  If you have room in your refrigerator, you can also form the bagels now and let them rise on the trays overnight.  Then, in the morning, you can simply dash out, remove the trays and let them warm up while you go back to bed for another hour. However, if you are in a hurry, you can skip the slow rise in the refrigerator and go straight to forming the bagels and baking them after they have risen.

Take the dough out of the refrigerator and cut into 12 even pieces.  You can form each bagel in one of two methods.  (1)Roll each piece into a smooth ball and then stick your thumb into the center and make a hole in each piece.  Roll the dough around, stretching it evenly to make a hole about 1.5 to 2 inches in diameter.  (2) Roll out the dough into a snake.  Wind it into a circle and press the two ends together very hard.  Then roll the area which you have pressed to even it out.  It is said that professional bagel makers use this method, but you can choose whichever suits you best.

Put each bagel on a parchment covered baking sheet and cover with a towel.  If the dough is cold from the refrigerator, let them sit out on the counter to come to room temperature for 60 to 90 minutes.  They should rise a bit during this time.  If you skipped the second rising in the refrigerator, let the bagels rise a second time, about 20 to 30 minutes.  If you put them in the refrigerator already shaped, then they only need to come to room temperature, they will already be risen.

When you are ready to bake the bagels, preheat the oven to 400F (200C). Bring a pot of water, about 4 inches deep to a boil.  The pot should be big enough to fit 3 to 4 bagels.  Pour in the rest of the beer and ½ cup of sugar.  This will increase the malty flavor and the sugar will make a nice crust on the bagels.  The water should not be at a rolling boil, but at a simmer.  With a slotted spoon, lay each bagel into the water, in batches of 3 to 4, whatever fits comfortably in your pot.  If you have refrigerated the dough, you need to make sure it has come to room temperature.  If the bagel does not rise to the surface of the boiling water and float, then the bagel is still too cold.  Wait for another 15 to 20 minutes and then try again. 

Let the bagel simmer for about a minute and then flip them over and simmer for a further minute on the other side.  The bagels will puff out a bit in the water. Have ready a plate where you have sprinkled the topping of your choice.  Take each bagel from the boiling water and lay on the plate.  The water from boiling will help the topping stick to the bagel.  Remove the bagel and put on the baking sheet, topping side up.  You can smooth the topping with a finger if it is not even.  Repeat until your baking sheet is full.  You should probably be able to fit 6 to 8 bagels on one baking sheet. 

Bake the bagels for 15 to 25 minutes until they are golden brown.  Serve warm, split with butter or cream cheese or other topping of your choice.  Bagels freeze very well.  Simply let them thaw out and toast.