Raisin-Marzipan Snail Buns

I made some pudding snail buns in 2013, but I wasn't too impressed with them. I prefer the raisin-marzipan snail buns I remember from my childhood. So here's one version of it.

The dough used here is a very traditional German dough, a Quark-Oel (Greek yoghurt-vegetable oil) dough. It's consistency is similar to a yeast dough, but it doesn't contain yeast, so no rising time is necessary. Instead, the dough contains baking powder and can be used immediately after mixing. This Quark-Oel dough is considered the yeast dough for impatient people. However, you can certainly make the yeast dough I described in the pudding snail recipe.

Ingredients:

Baking sheet

Parchment paper

Dough:

150 g all-purpose flour

4 leveled teaspoons baking powder

75 g Greek yoghurt (Fage or Chobani brand)

50 ml milk

50 ml vegetable oil

40 g sugar

1 package vanilla sugar or some vanilla extract

1 pinch of salt

Filling:

100 g Marzipan

50 g butter or margarine

1 egg yolk

125 g raisins

50 g hazelnut flour (I used almond flour instead)

25 g candied lemon peel or the zest of one fresh lemon

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1 tablespoon rum

Topping:

80 g powdered sugar

1-2 tablespoons rum

Preparation:

1. Mix flour and baking powder, then sift the mixture into a bowl. Add Greek yoghurt, milk, vegetable oil, sugar, vanilla sugar or vanilla extract and salt. Using the knead hooks of an electric hand mixer mix all ingredients until a soft dough has formed (about 1 minute). If dough is sticky add more flour (the more moist the yoghurt is the more extra flour you'll have to add). On a flour-covered surface form a long rod from the dough.

2. Add marzipan, butter or margarine, egg yolk and mix until smooth (I used a blender, but you can also use an electric hand mixer). Add raisins, hazelnut or almond flour, candied lemon or lemon zest, cinnamon and rum and mix until raisins are all coated.

3. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius (350 F).

4. Roll dough on a flour-covered surface out into a rectangle of 30x40 cm (12x16 inches). Spread mixture for filling evenly on dough. Starting from the longer side roll dough up into a snail. Cut 1 inch wide slices and put sideways on parchment paper.

5. Bake snail buns for 25-35 minutes until the surface is golden.

6. Mix powdered sugar with rum and stir until smooth and creamy. Remove snail buns from oven and coat one side with topping. Let topping dry before serving.

Comments:

1. The Greek yoghurt I used was too moist, so I had to add two more hands of flour.

2. I used a full egg for the filling, and almond flour (Trader Joe's) instead of hazelnut flour.

3. To make the snail buns alcohol-free you can add a little of rum extract to the filling, and use lemon juice or water to prepare the topping.

Braided Yeast Bread (Hefezopf)

Ingredients:

Baking sheet

Parchment paper or some grease

500 g All-purpose flour

100 g sugar

200 ml lukewarm milk

1 package active dry yeast

100 g butter

1 pinch of salt

3 egg yolks

1 egg

2 teaspoons vanilla sugar or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Zest of one lemon

Optional: 100g or 1/2 cup raisins 

For the glaze:

1 egg

Preparation:

1. Heat half of the milk until barely lukewarm. Add yeast to milk, then stir in some flour until a thick batter has formed. Sift a thick layer of flour on top and let mixture stand for 15 minutes.

2. Heat remaining half of milk until lukewarm, and stir in sugar, butter, salt, egg, egg yolks, vanilla extract or vanilla sugar and lemon zest.

3. Sift remaining flour into a large bowl, and make a little dent in the middle. Pour yeast batter and milk-butter mixture into this dent, and knead everything together until a soft dough has formed (I used knead hooks and an electric hand mixer). Cover bowl with a cotton cloth and let yeast rise for at least 45 minutes until dough has doubled in size.

4. Knead dough again (I used my hands at this time). If you'd like to add raisins knead them in at this time. Then divide dough into four even portions. Form a long rod with your hands of each portion. Put all four strands next to each other, then press the ends on one side together to fuse them.

5. Take the strand on the far right and put it over the strand to its left, under the strand second to the left and over the strand on the far left. Now use the strand that is to the far right and repeat the braiding (over, under, over). Always starting for the right braid the strands in this pattern until done. At the end press the ends together to fuse the strands at the other end. Put yeast bread on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or a greased baking sheet.

6. Cover the braided yeast bread with a cotton towel and let the yeast rise until braided bread has increased about 1/3 in size.

7. Preheat oven to degrees Celsius  (325 F). Add water to a metal bowl and put in oven (the steam helps the yest bread to stay moist during baking, but it isn't necessary). Beat egg yolks and brush over top of braided bread. Bake at 160 degrees Celsius  (325 F) for about 45 Minutes until golden on the surface.

Pear tarte

Ingredients:

A springform (22 cm or 10 inches in diameter)

Some grease

A piping bag or a small sandwich bag

Cake batter:

75 g butter or margarine

75 g sugar

Some vanilla essence or a package of vanilla sugar

Optional: 2 drops bitter almond extract

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 eggs

75 g flour

1 leveled teaspoon baking powder

100 g almond flour (I buy mine at Trader Joe's) or grind almonds in a food processor

Filling:

2 cans Bartlett pears or 3-4 fresh pears

1 tablespoon sugar

1 tablespoon water

Optional: 2 tablespoons pear liquor

Topping:

1 egg white

30 g powdered sugar

50 g marzipan

50 g almond flour

Preparation:

1. For fresh pears: Peel pears and dice into small pieces. Add pear pieces to a pot, add sugar and water, then boil until the pears have softened. Remove pears from stove and let cool down. Stir in two tablespoons of pear liquor.

For canned pears: Drain liquid, then dice or cut pears into thin slices.

2. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius (350 F).

3. Add butter or margarine to a bowl. Using an electric hand mixer mix until butter or margarine has softened. Add sugar, vanilla sugar or vanilla essence, bitter almond essence (optional) and ground cinnamon, and stir until mixed. Add one egg at a time, and mix for about 1/2 minute per egg. Mix flour and baking powder, add to batter and mix. Lastly, stir in the almond flour.

4. Pour batter into greased springform, and spread evenly. Spread pears evenly on top.

5. Cut the marzipan into small pieces. Mix marzipan, egg white and powdered sugar until smooth, then stir in almond flour. Add mixture to a piping bag or a plastic sandwich bag. If using a sandwich bag cut off a small piece from one corner. Decorate cake top with a crisscross pattern.

6. Bake cake for 45 minutes at 180 degrees Celsius (350 F) or until a toothpick comes out clean. Remove cake from oven, remove springform edge, let cake fully cool down. Sprinkle powdered sugar over cake just befor serving.

Comments:

1. The original recipe calls for fresh pears, but I used canned pears, which works just as well. Just drain them very well!

2. In the original recipe ground hazelnuts are used. I decided to use almond flour instead because one can conveniently find it at Trader Joe's. Moreover, marzipan is an almond paste, and I thought that the hazelnuts might overpower this flavor, and almonds will just as well go with pears.

3. For the first version of this cake I diced the pears, and used a sandwich bag to make the crisscross pattern on top of the cake. For the second version I sliced the pears and stacked the slices like an apple tarte. And I used a piping bag to make the pattern. The first version had not such a pronounced pattern on top, but still looked really nice. While the second version looks neat, I prefer the more unpredictable appearance of the first version.