Hefekranz - German Sweet Bread
I have received an unholy number of requests for my recipe. So here it is, at long last.
Disseminate at your own discretion!
Preparation and baking time: 3-5 hours
Feeds: One really hungry person; two moderately hungry people; three or four normal-hungry people; or maybe five peckish people.
Warning: Dangerously delicious.
100g+20g (3.5oz+1oz) sugar (or more, to taste. I occasionally pig out and add ALL of the sugar)
250ml/½ pint milk (I use semi-skimmed, but recipe calls for full. This is up to you)
½ tsp salt (this is not necessary)
80g/3oz butter (salted, preferably)
Cinnamon sugar (cinnamon + sugar + shaking; quantities are flexible and mostly up to you. Warning: this makes your hefekranz taste a lot like magic. Add in step 14)
Vanilla (vanilla sugar or pod seeds; add early for maximum effect)
Raisins (add when the moment feels right)
milk and powder sugar (amounts depend on dough size… it’s complicated. See step 21).
Thinly sliced almonds to sprinkle over the top.
2. Preparation: (it’s really not as complicated as it looks, I promise!)
1. Prepare ingredient quantities as outlined above. It’s good to have the butter quite warm, but will work with cold butter too.
2. In a large mixing bowl, mix together 100g/3.5oz sugar and the flour.
3. Warm your milk to lukewarm. DO NOT OVERHEAT; the yeast will die a horrible death and instead of bread you will wind up making a rock. A delicious rock, but a rock nonetheless.
4. Add 20g/1oz sugar to the milk. Stir well to dissolve. Then add yeast. Leave this mixture to activate for at least five minutes.
5. While you wait, heat your butter in a microwave until it is basically delicious yellow liquid.
6. After activation of yeast, the container with the milk should be frothing like a rabid dog. Add butter, yeast mixture, and an egg to your flour.
7. Knead into a dough. Add flour as necessary (I usually have to add about 150g/5oz of flour at this stage, but it depends on your flour). Continue to knead for 8-10 minutes. Work those muscles.
8. When your dough is smooth and relatively dry to the touch, but still malleable, flour the base of your bowl, put in the dough, and put it aside to let it rise (N.B. if you do this in the open, cover with a clean dishcloth to avoid nasty things landing in your delicious dough). I recommend putting it in an oven at 40-60°C/100-140°F, if you can, to rise. Rising can take anywhere from 1-3 hours, depending on temperature.
9. When dough has become enormous, remove from the bowl, and knead for another minute or two.
10. Set your oven to 160°C/320°F (or thereabouts).
11. Test your dough. You know you want to. MMMMmmmmm. Yeah, that’s right.
12. Divide dough into three or four equally sized balls (four is easier because… halves).
13. Take each of these balls and rub it between your hands (hoho, saucy) to elongate it into a noodle shape (let’s be honest, this is the phallic part). Best results come from fairly thick and short strands (this is not getting any better, sorry).
14. OPTIONAL: Roll these strands out flat (lengthways), sprinkle with magic powder (cinnamon sugar) and then roll them up again to make a cinnamon core to each strand.
15. Braid your strands together. The easiest way to do this is to treat it like a weaving project and start in the middle and work towards each end. But you can also start at the ends and braid from there. Cover your strands in flour if they are getting hard to braid – but don’t overdo it, or your bread will be quite floury.
16. Cover this beautiful creation with a dishcloth, and let it rise for 30 minutes. This seals the gaps in your crappy braids.
17. While you wait, prepare your glaze: Get a cup, and beat an egg in it.
18. After your 30 minutes has passed, with either a paper towel (if you are a poor student) or a basting brush (if you are a swanky monkey), gently glaze your ENTIRE loaf (except the underside, obviously). Make sure to get the egg in the cracks. The whole thing should be shiny by this stage.
19. Throw your bread in the oven!
20. Cook for 25 minutes at 160°C/320°F, or until the outside of the bread is about the colour of Chewbacca. Lower the temperature to 140°C/280°F, and continue to cook for a further 15 minutes or so. Make sure it doesn’t get too dark; some ovens cool down slower than others.
21. While you wait to cook, prepare your frosting: Take about half a cup of powder sugar, and add a dribble of milk to it. Stir with a fork or spoon. Bear in mind that this will become VERY thin VERY quickly. Add sugar or milk as required to make a frosting that is just thin enough that your silverware no longer stands up in it. You want it to flow out of the cup when you frost.
22. Once your bread is done, remove, frost, and let cool for five to twenty minutes, or as long as you can keep your hungry claws off of it.
For maximum pleasure, cut thick slices (nearly 2cm thick or so), and make some hot chocolate. Dip the bread IN the hot chocolate. Let it soak for a bit. Transfer to mouth. Smile and look wistfully out the window.
And remember: pics or it didn’t happen.
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