Nutty triangles - 'Nussecken'

Inspired by my crumbly pastries last week, I continued with the Süsse Stückle theme this weekend. The first recipe I baked was these nutty triangles, or Nussecken. Nussecken have a bit of a reputation for being old fashioned and a lot of people associate them with the 1970s. I am not sure why and they are certainly still very popular today. Actually, the first time I had these very delicious cakes was when my aunt Klara baked them for us sometime at the beginning of the 1990s. I liked them a lot and I have baked them many times since. So here it is: my aunt’s Nussecken recipe – thank you, Klara! These triangles are great, because they not only taste really good, but they also keep fresh for quite a while in a tin. They consist of a buttery hazelnut topping baked on top of buttery pastry and finished off with some dark chocolate. 

I baked this in a rectangular tin of 20 x 30 cm (which cut into 18 triangles) and there was enough left over to bake an additional 20 cm round tin of the stuff.

For the pastry base:

300 g flour

1 tsp baking powder

130 g butter

130 g sugar

2 eggs

For the hazelnut topping:

200 g butter

150 g sugar

Some vanilla seeds or vanilla extract

400 g ground hazelnuts (roasted hazelnuts are even better)

4 tbsp water

A few tbsp apricot jam

200 g dark chocolate

Make the pastry, roll out until about ½ cm thick and press this into a well-greased tin. Spread the apricot jam on top of the pastry and refrigerate.

Melt the butter, mix in the sugar and vanilla and stir until the sugar has resolved. Add the hazelnuts and water. Combine well and leave to cool. Spread the hazelnut topping on the pastry and smooth the surface. Bake at 175 degrees for about 25 minutes (or until the edges start turning brown). Leave to cool in the tin, then carefully cut into triangles with a sharp knife. 

Melt the chocolate and use this to decorate two corners of the triangles. Leave the chocolate to set, then store in a tin.

Crumbly pastries – ‘Streuselküchle’

Streuselküchle are only one type of that great institution in the Swabian region of south-west Germany: Süsse Stückle, translated as ‘sweet pieces’. Süsse Stückle come in a large variety of shapes and flavours and they are sold in every bakery. Other typical examples of Süsse Stückle are the Swabian twirls and custard twirls I wrote about previously. The custom in most households in south-west Germany, I think, is to purchase Süsse Stückle in a bakery for afternoon coffee if there isn’t any time to bake a cake at home. At least this is what happened when I was a child. For some reason, I really felt like eating a Streuselküchle, or crumbly pastry, last night, but as I do not have access to a German bakery I had no choice but to make them myself. The Streuselküchle is an extremely popular example of the Süsse Stückle, consisting of a yeast-dough base and topped with buttery pastry crumble (it is also a rather unkind name for calling a spotty teenager). The recipe might sound a bit dry, but these pastries are delicious (especially fresh) with a cup of coffee. The trick is to cram as much crumble on each piece as you possibly can. Commercial bakeries these days all tend to cover the Streuselküchle (and indeed most other Süsse Stückle) with a thick layer of icing. For my liking this is too sweet and really not necessary. My father’s theory is that this is done only so the Streuselküchle can be sold for longer with ascorbic acid added to the icing as a preservative. He is probably right, so I tend to stick with the traditional version without the icing.

Variation and improvisation on the Streuselküchle, however, is very possible. The picture above shows the most basic version, consisting only of yeast dough and crumble. The picture below includes a thin layer of vanilla custard under the crumble (the same used in the custard twirl recipe) and I also added a few frozen raspberries. In summer, other soft fruit (especially apricots, red currants or blueberries) tastes excellent in these pastries, or a spoonful of jam can also be added.

This recipe makes about 16 Streuselküchle, about 10 cm each in diameter.

For the yeast-dough base:

200 ml warm milk

100g melted butter

20 g fresh yeast (or one sachet dry)

500 g plain flour

80 g sugar

1 egg

For the crumble topping:

170 g butter

150 g sugar

250 g plain flour

Seeds from one vanilla pod, or some vanilla extract:

Optional: vanilla custard (half the recipe of the ones used for the custard twirls is enough); berries or other soft fruit (frozen or tinned is fine).

Mix the warm milk with the melted butter and dissolve the yeast in this mixture. In a bowl, combine the flour with the sugar. Pour the milk mixture on top of the flour and leave the yeast to activate for about 30 minutes. Then add the egg and knead patiently until you have a soft ball of dough. If it is sticky after kneading for several minutes, add a bit more flour. Cover and leave to rise for about 1 hour. After one hour, stretch and fold the dough and leave to rest for another 30 minutes.

In the meantime, make the crumble. Combine all dry ingredients, add the soft butter (or melted butter) and mix until you have coarse crumbs.

Divide the yeast dough into about 16 pieces. Leave the pieces to rest for a couple of minutes, then roll out into round shapes. If you are making the plain Streuselküchle press a generous amount of crumble on top of the dough. Leave to rise for about 10 minutes then bake in the preheated oven at 200 degrees centigrade for about 20 minutes (the yeast dough should be nice and golden, the crumble topping still light). If you are using fruit or a custard filling add this before you put on the crumble. A spoonful of custard spread thinly on the dough is enough. Bake as above.

If you like it really sweet you can cover the Streuselküchle with icing (icing sugar mixed with a few spoons of water or lemon juice) when they have cooled down. The Streuselküchle should be eaten within a day or two, but they can also be frozen.

Cherry cake with semolina – 'Kirsch-Grieß Kuchen'

This is a very simple and traditional southern German recipe. Semolina, cherries and cinnamon are a classic combination and most German children will have grown up eating semolina pudding with cherries and a sprinkling of sugar and cinnamon on a regular basis. The flavours of this typical ‘comfort food’ are replicated in this cake. As discussed in my Donauwellen recipe a few months ago, morello cherries (called sour-cherries in Germany) can be bought in large jars in Lidl or Aldi in the UK. Of course, in summer the cake should be made with fresh cherries instead! This recipe is enough for a smallish (24 cm max) round baking tin. I baked it in a 20 cm x 30 cm rectangular tin.

100g semolina

100 g sugar

375 ml milk

80 g butter

3 egg yolks and 3 egg whites

80 g ground almonds

1 tsp cinnamon (or more, if you like)

1 jar morello cherries or a few hands full of fresh, pitted cherries

Put the semolina, sugar and milk in a pan, bring to the boil and cook for a few minutes until the semolina has absorbed all the liquid (the mixture should have the consistency of thick porridge). Add the butter, which will melt in the hot mixture. Once the butter has melted, stir in the three egg yolks and combine well. Leave the mixture to cool down.

Add the ground almonds and cinnamon and combine well, then mix in the cherries. If you are using a jar of cherries make sure you drain them well to stop the cake from going soggy (I dry them off on a few pieces of kitchen towel before adding them to the mixture). Finally, whisk the egg whites and carefully fold them in. Pour the batter into a well greased baking tin, smooth the surface and bake at 200 degrees for about 60 minutes. 

Rustic rye bread - 'Rustikales Roggenmischbrot'

 

Unfortunately, I don’t manage to bake sourdough loaves nearly as often as I would like to. Admittedly, these breads are a labour of love and require some planning. The making and baking process itself is not too bad, but just getting the dough ready requires a few fairly lengthy periods of rest and proofing in between the individual steps. Over the past few months the day job just didn’t allow me to engage in this more time-intensive kind of baking very often. Having said this, though, the effort is absolutely worth it. This weekend I managed to reinvigorate my sourdough starter that was waiting patiently in the fridge and then baked another variation of rye bread with sourdough. This bread is made of three components, as described below: the sourdough, a pre-dough involving a very small amount of fresh yeast, and also a ‘soaker’, making the bread particularly moist. As most of the flour used for the bread is left to absorb liquid (water) overnight, the bread is not in danger of becoming dry, as all the moisture is ‘locked’ in the flour and seeds. The addition of a few spoons of walnut oil, as well as a small amount of coriander and caraway seed spicing, underlines the bread’s rustic flavour and appearance.

For the sourdough (my PREVIOUS POST describes how to make your own sourdough starter)

140 g wholemeal rye flour

140 ml lukewarm water

30 g sourdough starter

Mix these three ingredients in a bowl, cover with cling film, and leave to rest in a warm place (28 – 30 degrees are ideal) overnight or for about 12-15 hours.

For the pre-dough:

100 g wholemeal wheat flour

100 ml lukewarm water

2-3 g of fresh yeast

Dissolve the yeast in the lukewarm water, mix in the flour, cover with cling film and leave to rest at room temperature (the room does not need to be heated) overnight or for about 12-15 hours.

For the ‘soaker’:

150 g wholemeal rye flour or coarsely milled rye grain

100 g sunflower seeds, or pumpkin seeds, or walnuts (or a mixture), dry-roasted in a pan

230 ml lukewarm water

15 g salt

Mix all the ingredients in a bowl, cover with cling film and leave to rest at room temperature or for 12-15 hours as the pre-dough above.

When all three components are ready to go (the sourdough and the pre-dough should have increased in size and should look bubbly and light) put them all in a bowl. Don't forget to keep a couple of spoons of the sourdough as your starter for the next bread! Then add the following:

250 g plain flour

2 tbsp walnut oil (can be replaced with any other oil)

½ - 1 level teaspoon each of finely ground coriander seeds and caraway seeds (I use a pestle and mortar)

If you have one, leave your food processor to knead the dough for at least 7 minutes. You can also knead the dough by hand (it’s a bit sticky) and a friend told me that he gets his bread maker to knead his sourdough, which also works. Leave to rest for about 20 minutes in a warm place.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and, with wet hands, quickly knead and fold into the desired shape. This dough is fairly sticky, so I usually bake it in a tin, which is easiest. If you are brave, you can leave it to rise in a floured bread proofing basket instead and turn it out onto a baking sheet before baking. 

This is the dough after 60 minutes of rising. It roughly doubled in size.

Leave to rise in a warm place for about 60-90 minutes. Preheat the oven to the highest temperature possible. 250 degrees are ideal. When the bread has visibly increased in size, score the top with a sharp knife or razor blade. Spray some water into the oven (this improves the bread’s crust) and enter the loaf. Bake at the highest temperature for 20 minutes then gradually decrease the temperature to about 190 degrees to finish off. The overall baking time is about 60 minutes. 

When the bread is finished, wrap it in a clean tea towel and leave to cool before eating (if you can, wait until the next day before cutting it). It keeps fresh for at least 5 days and also freezes well.

Making a sourdough starter

 

Making a sourdough starter is easy and cheap, but it takes a bit of time and patience. However, once your sourdough starter is ready it will keep going for years and the lengthy process does not need to be repeated. The starter will survive in the fridge for several weeks in between baking loaves of bread. Only when it goes black or mouldy it should be disposed of. Sourdough gets better with age – the more often you bake with it, the quicker and better your bread will rise. For the first few loaves a bit of yeast can be added (7 – 10 g) in order to support the sourdough’s strength. Bread made just with sourdough can take longer to rise (sometimes up to several hours). I therefore still add a bit of yeast most of the time (or use a pre-dough, as in my rustic rye bread), to safe time.

Below is a description of how I made my own rye flour sourdough starter, which has been alive now for almost a year and its ‘relatives’ are used by several friends to make their own bread. Sourdough can also be made with wheat or other flours, but rye is the most stable and easiest to make:

Day 1: Mix 100g wholemeal rye flour with 100 ml of lukewarm water in a fairly large bowl (more flour and water will be added in subsequent days). Cover the bowl (do not use cling film, but a plate or a loose-fitting lid) and leave in a warm place (25 degrees or higher are ideal) for 24 hours. It can be difficult to find a place in the house that is warm at all times. I rested the sourdough near the boiler when the heating was on. When the heating was off, I wrapped the bowl in a blanket with a hot water bottle filled with warm water, which did the trick! It is important not to let the sourdough get too hot. More than 40 degrees will kill it!

Day 2: add another handful of wholemeal rye flour and enough warm water to get the consistency of a sponge-cake batter. Stir well, cover and leave in a warm place as above for 24 hours.

Day 3: add a further 100 g of rye flour and 100 ml of water. Mix well and put back into a warm place to rest for 24 hours. By this point the sourdough should start smelling ‘sour’ and will be bubbly and light. If it hasn’t done so at this point, just keep going. The smell of sourdough is not always pleasant and can be quite strong, but this is normal. Only if the sourdough is turning black or has gone mouldy something has gone wrong.

Day 4: finally, feed the sourdough with a further 100g rye flour and 100 ml warm water. Mix well, cover and put back into a warm place for another 24 hours.

Now the sourdough is ready to be used for baking bread. Make sure you keep a few spoons full of the sourdough in a small jar in the fridge (before adding any more ingredients) each time you bake. This is your starter for the next bread. 

'Sunken' apple cake - 'Versunkener Apfelkuchen'

There is a ridiculous number of recipes for apple cakes in Germany. It’s a very popular type of cake and it is kind of odd, admittedly, that I have not yet posted a single one on my blog. As apples are one of the few local fruits available in the UK at the moment, I intend to make up for this. I am starting off with one of the quickest recipes for an apple cake – the famous sunken apple cake. This consists of a simple sponge base with apples, scored in a nice pattern and cut in half, making it moist and flavoursome. The cake does not take long to make and it usually doesn’t hang around the kitchen for long, because it goes down very well. Variations of the recipe below are possible. In particular, the flavour can be changed by replacing some of the flour with ground nuts. Hazelnuts, I find, are particularly tasty in this cake. 

This makes one large, round cake (I used a tin with a 28 cm diameter), but it can also be baked in a square tin.

250 g butter, soft at room temperature

130 g sugar

3 eggs

Some vanilla seeds or extract (optional)

200g plain flour

1 heaped tsp baking powder

50 ml milk (or some milk and some rum)

4-5 eating apples, depending on their size

Cream the butter and the sugar and whisk until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one by one and continue whisking. Add the vanilla, if using. Mix the flour and the baking powder and blend into the butter mixture. Add the milk as required – the batter should not be liquid, but it should not be too dry either (it needs to be firm enough for the apples not to sink before you put the cake in the oven).

Grease a baking tin, add the batter and smooth the surface. Peel the apples, cut them in half and remove the core. Slice the surface of the apples with a sharp knife without cutting through the apple (the photo of the baked cake above shows best how this should be done). Place the apple halves on top of the batter and bake in the preheated oven at 180 degrees for 40-50 minutes. 

Buttercake - 'Butterkuchen'

Buttercake, consisting of a fluffy yeast-dough base and topped with sweet and crunchy sliced almonds, is very traditional and often served with afternoon coffee or tea. If at all possible, the cake should be baked and eaten on the same day and it tastes best when it is still a little bit warm. The cake is very simple and easy to make, but its flavour is very delicate and it is not too sweet. Some single cream or whipping cream is poured on the cake when it comes out of the oven, making it moist and enhancing the buttery flavour. I really recommend using fresh yeast for this, as the yeasty flavour is central to this cake and dry yeast just does not taste quite as good. I buy my fresh yeast in larger batches on ebay, where it is sold by a number of professional bakers in England. The yeast I received was always very fresh and of excellent quality and arrived within a day of buying it. I immediately cut it into 20g portions when it arrives, wrap it in tin foil and keep it in the freezer. 

This makes one square or rectangular cake of about 25 by 25 cm or 20 by 30 cm. It cuts into about 12 slices. The recipe can easily be doubled  for a larger cake tin.

For the dough:

250 g plain flour

60 g sugar (or more, if you like it sweeter)

20 g fresh yeast (or one sachet dry)

125 ml milk

1 egg yolk

30 g butter

For the topping:

50 g sliced almonds

50 g sugar

50 g butter, cut into small pieces

100 ml single or whipping cream

Combine the flour and the sugar. Dissolve the fresh yeast in the milk and pour on top of the flour. Leave to stand for about 20 minutes. Add the egg yolk and melted butter and knead for a few minutes until you have a soft and fluffy ball of dough (if using dry yeast, just combine all dough ingredients straight away). Cover and leave to rise for at least 1 hour or until doubled in size.

Roll out the dough to fit your baking tin or tray (this should be greased). Leave to rise again for about 30 minutes. Punch some holes in the dough with the handle of a wooden cooking spoon (or use your fingers). Top the cake first with the sliced almonds, sprinkle on the sugar and finish with the butter, cut into very small pieces. Bake at 180 degrees for about 25 minutes. If you use a cake tin with a loose bottom I recommend placing this in a baking tray to avoid melting butter dripping into the oven.

Remove the cake from the oven and carefully pour on the cream – I punch a few more holes in the cake before I do so, to ensure that the cream is absorbed into the cake. Leave to cool slightly and eat while still warm. 

German Cheesecake – 'Käsekuchen'

German cheesecake is quite different from American-style cheesecake, which is most common in the UK. The German version is always baked and its main ingredient is quark – a soft cheese with a considerably lower fat content than Philadelphia cheese. The flavour of German cheesecake is not dissimilar to the American version, but its consistency is a lot lighter and fluffier. Until a few years ago quark was not really available in regular supermarkets in the UK. Now it is sold almost everywhere. I baked this with the non-fat version (making up for this with the addition of melted butter), but the more fatty curd cheese, which is similar in texture, can also be used. The amount of butter in the mix can be reduced in this case. I have read (but I have not tried this yet) that quark can be replaced with strained yoghurt if it is nowhere to be found. Thick yoghurt is placed in a sieve lined with a thin cotton tea towel and left to strain in the fridge overnight. The resulting consistency resembles that of quark. I am sure this will work, but I also think that the flavour will not quite be the same.

German cheesecake is one of my favourite cakes. It keeps for a few days and it can be varied according to taste. The very basic version, without any flavouring or additions, tastes great. The flavour can be altered with the addition of grated lemon peel or vanilla seeds or extract. Fruit can also be added. In winter, raisins or slices of poached pears are good. In summer, a handful of raspberries, blueberries, cherries or apricots make for a fruity alternative.

This makes one large cheesecake – I used a spring form with a 28 cm diameter.

For the pastry:

250 g plain flour

130 g cold butter

75 g sugar

1 egg yolk (plus two tbsp cold water, if required)

For the filling:

750 g quark cheese

65 g plain flour

175 g sugar

4 eggs

100 g melted butter

Quickly knead all pastry ingredients into a ball of dough. Leave to rest in the fridge for about 45 minutes. Grease a springform tin and line it with the thinly rolled out pastry.

For the filling divide the egg yolks from the egg whites. Whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks. Mix the egg yolks with the quark cheese, flour and sugar. Add the melted butter and mix well. Finally, thoroughly fold in the whisked egg whites. You can add some vanilla seeds/extract or some grated lemon peel to flavour the cheesecake mixture. The cake in the picture contains some rum-soaked raisins and vanilla.

If using, add some raisins or fruit to the pastry shell. Add the cheesecake mixture and smooth the surface. Bake in the preheated oven for about 60 minutes at 180 degrees. Make sure the cake does not get too dark on top. If it does, it can be covered with some aluminium foil.

The cheesecake can rise quite a lot and tends to sink a bit in the middle when it cools down. I have found that it sinks less if it is left in the switched off oven for a while to cool down slowly (maybe open the door a little bit). Leave to cool completely before cutting.

Flaming Hearts - 'Flammende Herzen'

I baked these flaming hearts with Valentine’s Day in mind. They keep fresh for quite a few days, so it doesn’t matter that this is a bit early (although I doubt they will survive until the 14^th). Flammende Herzen very much remind me of my childhood. They are a real 1980s thing and my mother sometimes bought these for us in the bakery to eat in the afternoons. Needless to say that they are quite tasty. I think you can still find them in quite a few bakeries, but they have lost some of their popularity to muffins and to other more fashionable cakes. 

Flaming hearts are traditionally filled with either jam or a chocolate filling. For the latter, the use of German nougat is most common. As discussed already in my Spitzbuben (Rascals) recipe I posted before Christmas, this praline paste is not commonly sold in the UK, but it can be substituted with a range of alternatives. In this case just a regular chocolate spread, like Nutella, would also work OK (although a filling that firms up seems preferable and will probably look better). As I used my last pack of German nougat for this batch of Flammende Herzen, I will soon experiment with homemade praline paste, made like a ganache with cream and melted chocolate and some pure hazelnut butter. Taste-wise, I think, this would come pretty close.

This recipe makes about 20 large double biscuits.

For the biscuits:

250 g very soft butter

120 g icing sugar

4 egg yolks

300 g plain flour

Seeds from one vanilla pod or some vanilla extract

For the filling:

Either jam, mixed with a bit of water and slightly warmed up

Or chocolate spread

Or nougat or a praline paste replacement (see above)

To decorate: melted chocolate or chocolate cake covering

Whisk the butter with the sugar and egg yolks until light and fluffy. Add the flour in a few additions and combine well, but don’t overmix the batter or whisk too hard. Fill the batter in a piping bag and pipe evenly sized biscuits onto a baking sheet covered in baking paper. Put in the fridge for about 10 minutes to let them firm up a bit. Bake in the preheated oven at about 170 degrees until the edges turn slightly golden (about 10-15 minutes).

Remove from the oven and leave to cool. Don't try to remove the biscuits too quickly, as they are quite brittle when warm. When the biscuits are cold, sandwich them together with your choice of filling. Melt the chocolate or cake covering and dip one side of the biscuits in the chocolate. Leave to dry and then store in a tin.

Custard twirls - 'Puddingschnecken'

These little pastries are sold in pretty much every bakery in Germany. They are a favourite for breakfast or with coffee or tea in the afternoon. Of course, variations of these twirls also seem to be a staple of the continental breakfast around the world. Very similar pastries can be found in a lot of other European countries and Germany certainly cannot claim copyright for this recipe. However, they are fairly traditional and certainly tasty enough to be included in this blog. In German these twirls have another strange name. Puddingschnecken literally translates as custard snails. But don’t let this put you off. The custard-type filling makes the twirls particularly moist and sumptuous. They are relatively easy to make and they freeze well and can be defrosted and reheated in the oven very quickly. The recipe below makes about 15 custard twirls.

For the dough:

500 g plain flour

20 g fresh yeast (or 1 sachet dry)

80 g sugar

Seeds from one vanilla pod

2 eggs

120 ml lukewarm milk

100 g melted butter

For the filling:

65 g corn flour

500 ml milk

80 g sugar

Seeds from one vanilla pod

100 g raisins soaked in rum (or apple juice)

 2 tbsp orange marmalade

Dissolve the yeast in the warm milk and mix with all the other dough ingredients. Knead thoroughly for about 10 minutes until you have a smooth and fluffy ball of dough. Put in a bowl, cover with a tea towel and leave to rise until it has roughly doubled in size.

In the meantime make the filling. Mix the corn flour with the sugar and vanilla seeds. Add about 80 ml of the milk and whisk well. Make sure there aren’t any lumps. Bring the rest of the milk to the boil. Add the corn flour mix and boil for about 1 minute, whisking continuously, until the custard has thickened. Leave to cool. I usually place some cling film on top of the custard to prevent a skin from forming. When the custard has cooled down (it can still be lukewarm) mix in the raisins.

Roll out the dough thinly into a rectangle of about 40 by 60 cm. Spread the custard mixture on top evenly and thinly. The filling should not be too thick or it will ooze out when rolling and cutting. Roll up from the shorter side of the rectangle. Cut carefully (I use a sharp serrated knife) into twirls about 2 cm thick. Place on a baking sheet lined with baking paper. Take care not to apply too much pressure when cutting, so the filling stays in place and the twirls keep their shape.

Bake in the preheated oven at 180 degrees for about 25 minutes (or until golden brown on top). In the meantime smooth the marmalade through a sieve and mix with a bit of warm water. Take the twirls out of the oven and brush with the marmalade whilst still hot. This gives them a nice shine. Eat within two days or freeze.