Stollen Recipe

Crust: Bread to Get Your Teeth Into | Kyle Books, 2007

This delicious stollen bread is traditional at Christmas time. As it keeps well, you can make it up to a week in advance. Beware, though—stollen is pretty irresistible, so you might find it gets eaten before the festivities. Stollen freezes well, fully baked. Defrost at room temperature.–Richard Bertinet

Hands-On Time: 1 hour | Total Time: 5 hours, 30 minutes, not including cooling | Makes 3 stollen

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Ingredients

For the crème d'amande
1 cup plus 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
2/3 cup sugar
1 1/3 cups ground almonds
3 tablespoons flour
2 eggs
2 large tablespoons rum
For the stollen
7 1/2 cups white bread flour
2/3 ounce (about 4 level teaspoons) fresh yeast
2 1/2 cups milk, at body temperature
1 cup minus 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, use the wrapper for greasing
1/4 cup sugar
2 level teaspoons salt
8 ounces (shelled weight) eggs, roughly equivalent to 4 large
1 batch Crème d’Amande
1 1/4 cups natural (uncolored) marzipan, cut into small pieces
For the filling
1 1/3 cups golden raisins
3/4 cup glacé cherries
1 1/2 cups candied peel
1/2 cup toasted slivered almonds
4 tablespoons rum
1 teaspoon cinnamon
For the glaze
7 tablespoons butter
2 capfuls rum
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting

Directions

To make the crème d’amande
1. Beat the unsalted butter and sugar by hand or mix in a food processor with a paddle, until pale and fluffy. Add the ground almonds and mix again. Add the flour and continue to mix. Finally, add the eggs, one at a time, along with the rum, mixing well between each addition, until the cream is light in consistency. (Can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for up to a week.)
To make the stollen
2. Preheat the oven to 350°F (170°C). You will need a large baking tray, greased with butter.
3. Place the flour in a mixing bowl and crumble in the yeast with your fingers. Mix in the milk, butter, sugar, salt, and eggs, using your scraper to combine everything together. When the mixture starts to come together into a dough, use your scraper to turn it out onto your work surface (don’t flour it first). Work the dough. Slide your fingers under the dough, then with your thumbs parallel to your index fingertips, lift it lightly, swing it upwards, slap it back down, away from you, onto your work surface. Stretch the dough forwards and sideways and tuck it in around the edges. Keep repeating this sequence, using your plastic scraper to help you lift the dough from the work surface.
4. Lightly flour your work surface, and then form the stollen dough into a ball. Put it back into your (lightly floured) mixing bowl, cover with a baking cloth, and let it rest for 1 to 1 1/2 hours.
5. Again, lightly flour your work surface. Turn out the dough with the help of your scraper and use your fingertips to flatten it into a rough square shape.
To assemble the stollen
6. Mix together all the ingredients for the filling.
7. Spread your filling over the dough and fold a few times to incorporate fully. Form the dough into a ball and put back into your (lightly floured) mixing bowl to rest for another 30 minutes.
8. Again, lightly flour the work surface and turn out the dough. Cut into 3 equal pieces. Put each piece of stollen dough, smooth side down, onto your lightly floured surface and flatten out with your fingertips into a rectangle roughly 8 by 6 inches. Spread the top of each piece of dough generously with the Crème d’Amande, and then scatter with pieces of the marzipan.
9. Working with one stollen at a time, fold one of the long sides into the center (over the cream and marzipan filling), then fold the other side over the top and press down all around the edges to seal. Place the filled stollens, seam side down, on your greased baking tray. Cover with a baking cloth and let rise for 2 to 2 1/2 hours, until just under double in volume.
10. Put the tray of stollen into the oven and bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until light golden. Just before the stollen come out of the oven, make up the glaze. Melt the butter in a small pan and stir in the rum. Take the stollen out of the oven and brush quite heavily with the glaze while still hot. Immediately dust thickly with icing sugar. Cool on a wire rack.