Saturday, March 13, 2010

Jooseps birthday kringel

Since my last kringel was a raging success, another friend of mine has asked me to make one for their birthday. This time, it will be a savoury one, which means another challenge for me, since I haven't done that before either. What makes it even trickier is that I'm vegetarian, and selfishly, I want my kringel to be something I can enjoy as well. Which means  excluding the best part (according to some) of a pizza kringel - ham. So I needed to think of something that is a) absolutely delicious b) isn't a body part. And Joosep isn't a fan of mushrooms or peppers, so they're out. Which left me little choice, since those were the two things I would have used. I mean, cheese and onions are nice on their own, but they're not enough. I want it to be awesome. At first, I had a blasphemous thought - soy slices, fried with spices and soy sauce would probably fool my carnivore friends. That would be cheating. Also, even to me, soy slices have this Soylent Green aura to them. So, over the course of a week, I've been thinking about components, with the brightest ideas hitting me the night before the party (sundried tomatoes!) and THE best idea reaching me when I was shopping for food. Pine nuts. This is going to be amazing.
Mind, I'm writing this before I've even started baking it, so we'll see what actually happens.

Dough:
40g yeast
375ml warm milk
2 eggs
120g butter, softened
~700g flour
2 tbsp sugar
3/4 tsp salt

Dissolve yeast in warm milk and in another bowl, whisk the eggs and butter (that makes them easier to incorporate) and mix everything together. Add flour, sugar and salt. Knead well. Kneading is important, I can't stress this enough. Give it a proper beating, about 10 minutes, until the dough stops sticking to your hands. Cover with a towel and let it rise in a warm place for about an 45 minutes, punch down and leave it for another 45ish minutes.

Filling:
50g butter, melted
1 large onion, chopped and fried in a tablespoon of butter. Seasoned with salt and pepper.
100g sundried tomatoes, cut into small pieces
50g pine nuts
100g roasted almonds, chopped
300g grated cheese
40g grated parmesan
oregano
1 egg

Fry the chopped onion while the dough is rising and let cool. When the dough is ready, evenly roll it out into a rectangle, making sure it's pretty thin. Cover the rectangle with melted butter, leaving 2 cm on one of the long sides so it will stick when you roll it up. Add all other components, spreading them evenly across the dough. Now for the tricky part. Roll up the dough, stretch if it looks too short. With scissors, cut it up lengthways, making sure the fillings don't fall out. Braid it as shown in my previous kringel recipe and carefully transfer to a baking tray. Pick up all the bits that fell out and stick them back on the kringel. Let it stand for 10 minutes, meanwhile preheat the oven to 165C. When all is done, brush the kringel with egg, stick the tray in the oven and bake for about an hour, until the kringel is nice and golden. While baking: I wish I could take pictures of the smell. Oh. My. God.
Enjoy. Makes one large kringel slightly too big for my silicone mat.


Hopefully it tastes as awesome as it smells!
Happy birthday, Joosep!

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